Kengō-in, Buddhist temple in Takagamine, Japan

Kengō-in is a temple of the Jōdo Shinshū Kengō-in school in Takagamine, Kita-ku, Kyoto, with no mountain name; its main images are a Shaka Nyorai and an Amida Nyorai. Its long nagaya-mon gate and shoin hall came from a villa that once stood on the site and incorporate remains of Bitchū Takamatsu Castle. The precinct also holds a main hall, a kuri and a garden.

The temple began in 1194, when regent Kujō Kanezane enshrined Shaka and Amida statues carved by Kaikei at his Tsukinowa residence. In 1201 his grandson Kujō Michiie founded the temple with Shōkū, a disciple of Hōnen, as founding abbot; Shōkū died there in 1247. It later served as one of the four Kurodo temples handling court Buddhist rites, and in 1583 Toyotomi Hideyoshi's plans for the Hōkō-ji hall forced a move to Teramachi, after which it became a Tendai temple. In 1955 it sold its grounds to Ritsumeikan and relocated to Takagamine, becoming head temple of the Shinshū Kengō-in sect.

The name Kengō-in combines the characters for sending forth (Shaka) and welcoming (Amida), the two main deities. The temple belongs to the Jōdo Shinshō Kengō-in school and is its head temple, known as Takagamine Kengō-in. Its former subtemple Yōgen-in in Higashiyama, linked to Yodo-dono, belongs to the same school.

Take city bus 6 or Kita-1 to the Takagamine Genkōan-mae stop, then walk about two minutes; the temple is in Takagamine, Kita-ku, at 9 Takagamine Kōetsu-chō. The precinct is entered through a long nagaya-mon gate moved from a villa, and the same gate and shoin are remains of Bitchū Takamatsu Castle.

The temple's long gate and study were brought from a villa that once stood on the site, and both are remains of Bitchū Takamatsu Castle. The main images, a standing Amida by Kaikei and a standing Shaka, are Kamakura-period works; one of the 68 printed Amida images inside them bears the date 1194.