Two weeks in japan | Tofuku-ji
The Tofuku-ji temple
The Tofuku-ji temple, not in the traditional tourist tours in Kyoto, is the seat of the Tofukuji school of the Rizai sect of the zen Buddhism. The temple was built in 1236, it suffered from destruction several times. The visible buildings today date for some from the 14th centuries but much are much more recent.
The temple Tofuku-ji is constituted by numerous buildings within a luxuriant garden.
Since its construction, the temple Tofuku-ji burned numerous times (in 1319, 1334 and 1336). The door Sammon having been completely destroyed was reconstructed in 1425. It is one of more ancient and biggest gate of Buddhist Zen temple of Japan today.
This staircase allows to come down in the bottom of the valley which crosses the garden of the temple.
Around Hojo, one of the most importing building of the temple, there are four dry gardens. One by cardinal point, here it is the garden of the North. This garden is made by a stony checkerboard and moss. The moss is very important in Japanese garden.
The west garden is much less strict than the others, a more important part is given to the vegetation.
The garden of the South is the most sophisticated, stones symbolize iles Elysian and covered of moss mounds the sacred mountains.
Another dry garden, there are some around the other buildings of the temple. Let us not forget that we are in a temple of the Buddhism Zen.
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