María Alba
The Temple of Divorce
Shokozan-Tokeiji, should be a blast in Spring. When you go inside the temple, you feel something unique, maybe it's the smell that comes from a tiny tree, and I tried to find its name on the internet but didn´t have success ... (I'm a fan of flora). Or maybe it transmits you to the Buddha statue only a meter tall (compared to everything in Daibutsu it seems small ...) at the end of a path lined by sakura, japanese cherry trees, I saw that even without flowers or leaves, you can imagine how amazing it must be in spring ... The temple was founded in the year 1285, but in the beginning it was a convent.
Its founder was the nun Kakusan-ni, Tokinume Hojo's widow, known for leading the Japanese forces against the invasion of the Mongols, to spread Zen Buddhism and by extension Bushido among the warrior class in the 13th century. The convent was founded in a time when women had no right to divorce. However, there was a way to get it and it was nothing more and nothing less than spending 3 full years in the temple. Only after that time, they would get separated from her husband. In 1902, Tokeiji was no longer a convent and became a branch Engakuji Temple of the Rinzai Zen sect. It´s fantastic!
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