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Chōshō-ji

Ishiizan Chōshō-ji
Choshoji Taishakudo.jpg
The Taishakudō, the statue of Nichiren and the four Deva Kings
Basic information
Location 12-17, Zaimokuza 2-chome, Kamakura, Kanagawa 248-0013
Affiliation Nichiren Buddhism
Country Japan
Website None
Architectural description
Founder Ishii Nagakatsu and Nichiren (founding priest)
Completed 1263

Ishiizan Chōshō-ji (石井山長勝寺?) is a Buddhist temple of the Nichiren Shū in Kamakura, Kanagawa, Japan. It's one of a group of three built near the site in Matsubagayatsu (Valley of Pine Needles (松葉ヶ谷?) where Nichiren, founder of the Buddhist sect that bears his name, is supposed to have had his hut. The first part of its name is derived from the founder's last name (Ishii), the second is an alternative reading of the characters for Nagakatsu, the founder's first name.

Kamakura is known among Buddhists for having been during the 13th century the cradle of Nichiren Buddhism. Founder Nichiren wasn't a native: he was born in Awa Province, in today's Chiba Prefecture, but it was only natural for a preacher to come to Kamakura because at the time the city was the cultural and political center of the country. He settled down in a hut in the Matsubagayatsu district where three temples (Ankokuron-ji, Myōhō–ji, and Chōshō-ji), have been fighting for centuries for the honor of being the sole heir of the master. All three say they lie on the very spot where he used to have his hut, however none of them can prove its claims. The Shinpen Kamakurashi, a guide book to Kamakura commissioned by Tokugawa Mitsukuni in 1685, already mentions a strained relationship between Myōhō–ji and Chōshō-ji. However, when the two temples finally went to court, with a sentence emitted in 1787 by the shogunate's tribunals Myōhō–ji won the right to claim to be the place where Nichiren had his hermitage. It appears that Ankokuron-ji didn't participate in the trial because the government's official position was that Nichiren had first his hut there, when he first arrived in Kamakura, but that he made another near Myōhō–ji after he came back from his exile in Izu in 1263. What Chōshō-ji claims are the remains of the hut lie near the entrance of the Zaimokuza Reien cemetery, outside the temple's premises.


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Wikipedia

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