Isshin-ji Temple

Overview

Isshin-ji (一心寺, いっしんじ, Isshin-ji) is a Buddhist temple of the Pure Land tradition in Ōsaka, in Ōsaka Prefecture. It was founded in 1185, the first year of the Bunji era (文治, ぶんじ), at the very start of the Kamakura period (1185 – 1333). The temple belongs to two groupings of regional sacred sites: the Twenty-Fifth Reikyo of Dharan Shonin and the 大阪新四十八願所 (Ōsaka shin shijūhachiganjo), a set of forty-eight vow-sites of new Ōsaka.

Isshin-ji is best known for a practice that began in the Meiji period (1868 – 1912): the creation of images formed from the cremated ashes of devotees. Thirteen such images have been made. Each incorporates the ashes of tens of thousands of worshippers, and the annual burial ceremony held on 21 April draws tens of thousands of people.

History

The temple's founding date is 1185, the opening year of the Bunji era and conventionally the first year of the Kamakura period. The Kamakura period ran from 1185 to 1333, a span in which political power shifted from the imperial court in Kyoto to the warrior government at Kamakura, and in which new forms of Buddhism — among them the Pure Land teachings — spread widely among ordinary people.

Isshin-ji's distinctive modern practice dates from the Meiji period. From that time, the temple has formed images that incorporate the ashes of its devotees, and thirteen such images have been made to date. The scale is unusual: each image contains the ashes of tens of thousands of worshippers. The annual burial ceremony, held on 21 April, draws tens of thousands of worshippers each year.

What Stands There Today

The temple's defining feature is the series of thirteen ash images, produced since the Meiji period. Each is a composite of the cremated remains of tens of thousands of devotees, and the series as a whole represents the accumulated ashes of a very large number of worshippers over more than a century. The annual burial ceremony on 21 April is the occasion on which the temple's community gathers in the tens of thousands.

The Name in Japanese

The temple's name is written 一心寺. Its kana reading is いっしんじ, and its romaji is Isshin-ji.

The name breaks down into three kanji:

• 一 — read here as いっ (it-, from ichi), meaning "one."
• 心 — read here as しん (shin), meaning "heart" or "mind."
• 寺 — read here as じ (ji), meaning "temple."

Together, 一心 (いっしん, isshin) means "one heart" or "one mind" — a single, undivided focus. The final 寺 (じ, ji) is the standard suffix for a Buddhist temple, familiar from names such as 東寺 (Tō-ji) and 清水寺 (Kiyomizu-dera, where the same character is voiced as dera).

Two pronunciation points are worth noting. First, the combination 一心 is read いっしん, with a small っ (sokuon) that doubles the consonant: isshin, not ichishin. Second, when 寺 follows another element in a temple name it is normally voiced to じ (ji) rather than left as てら (tera). The name is therefore Isshin-ji, with the stress falling on the first syllable.

Visiting and Context

Isshin-ji stands in Ōsaka, at coordinates 34.6530556, 135.5108333. Its location within the city places it among the sacred sites of the 大阪新四十八願所, the forty-eight vow-sites of new Ōsaka, and it is also counted as the Twenty-Fifth Reikyo of Dharan Shonin.

For a visitor, the calendar matters. The annual burial ceremony takes place on 21 April and draws tens of thousands of worshippers, so the temple is at its busiest around that date. At other times the thirteen ash images — the temple's central and most distinctive feature, built up since the Meiji period from the ashes of tens of thousands of devotees — are the principal thing to see.

The temple's Pure Land affiliation and its Kamakura-period foundation in 1185 connect it to the broader spread of Pure Land Buddhism in Japan, while the ash-image practice and the 21 April ceremony belong to the modern history of the temple, beginning in the Meiji period.