Unshin-ji, Jōdo-shū temple in Otō-chō, Nagoya, Japan
Unshin-ji is a Jōdo-shū (Chinzei-ha) temple in Otō-chō, Atsuta-ku, Nagoya. Its main hall enshrines a seated Amida Buddha statue carved by the Kyoto sculptor Yamamoto Moyu in the Edo period; though seated, it exceeds 2 meters in height. The grounds include a stone statue of Kōbō Daishi wearing a hat, a Jizō statue, and a pond shaped like the character for "heart" (心).
Unshin-ji was founded in 1739 (Genbun 4) by Kondō Buhei, who invited a monk he had met after becoming a mountain ascetic. The following year it moved from present-day Tōkai to its current site in Atsuta, leaving a branch temple in Tōkai that is now a Chita Shikoku pilgrimage stop. Originally named Jihi-zan Fumon-ji, it took its present name after becoming a branch of Chion-in. Until the Meiji Restoration it had no parishioners and was funded by Nagoya notables; after the war it became the seventh sacred site of the Nagoya Twelve Zodiac temples, enshrining Seishi Bosatsu for the Year of the Horse.
Unshin-ji belongs to the Jōdo-shū Chinzei branch, not Jōdo Shinshū. Since the postwar period it has served as the seventh sacred site of the Nagoya Twelve Zodiac Guardian Temples, enshrining the Horse-year guardian Seishi Bosatsu with support from the Nagoya City Tourist Association. The temple also runs Takakura Nursery School, and its pond is shaped like the character for "heart" (kokoro).
Unshin-ji is about a three-minute walk from Nishi-Takakura Station on the Nagoya Municipal Subway Meijō Line. The temple stands in the Otō-chō district of Atsuta Ward, and its grounds were reduced by postwar land readjustment. The pond in the precinct is shaped to form the character for "heart" (kokoro).
The temple lost its bronze bell when metal was requisitioned during the Pacific War, and postwar land readjustment shrank its grounds. In 1892 a memorial stele was erected in the precinct for the 39 female workers killed when the brick factory of Owari Bōseki nearby collapsed in the 1891 Nōbi earthquake.
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