Praying Place for The Dead in Keumsan-sa Temple, Korea

in travel •  6 years ago  (edited)

It looks like same when you look at the temple in first time.
But when you pay attention carefully each temples, you can find out the differences among those temple.
The role and meaning is same in the buildings in temple, but sometimes the name, ornaments and decorations are different in many points.

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In this temple of Keumsan-sa. I saw the unique building for the dead.
Jijang-Jeon is the building for the dead in common temples. But Keumsan-sa temple was different. The name of the building was slightly different. It was Daejang-Jeon. It means the Big Jijang-Jeon.

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Why did they put Big to the name of Jijang-Jeon ?
In my guess, they must’ve tried to give more importance to the building for the dead.
If not, they seemed to try to highlight the meaning of the death and the salvation.

The arrangement of the buildings of Daejang-Jeon and Mireuk-Jeon was very meaningful.
Those buildings were deployed to look at each other.
Below is the scene through the hole of the stone lantern standing in front of the Deajang-Jeon.

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As I posted before, Mireuk-Jeon is the place for the Future Buddha of salvation.
In Buddhism, Mireuk, Maitreya, seems as same as the Messiah.

And the Jijang Jeon was the prying place for the dead.

In my thought, this deployment has a specific meaning. My interpretation is that “ Even though we die, we need to wait for the salvation.”

Along with the arrangement, the sculpture in Daejang-Jeon was quite different to other temples.
There were no other statues of the Heaven Kings presiding over the world of the afterlife.
The architect of this building seemed to highlight solely the Jijang Bodhisattva.

Unlike other Jijang-Jeon, Jijang Bodhisattva statue in Keumsan-sa was made with splendid.
It looked like Buddha not a Bodhisattva.
Why did they remove the Heaven Kings ? There must be several explanations and interpretations.
In my guess, the architect wanted to focus on the dead not the inferno or the hell.
Or, the architect'd ve connected the death directly to the salvation in the future not to the judge in the hell.

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  ·  6 years ago 

Aha, I can read these characters.

How interesting is this temple of Keumsan-sa @slowwalker, and its sculpture is very striking, I'm curious about these places of prayer, good photos, thanks for sharing.

@slowwalker,
I like your interpretation of the architecture and the statues inside of the Daejang-Jeon building! Ancient artists tried to give a meaning and lesson through their artworks!
In Sri Lanka we have slightly different believes about the after life! Coz in Theravada Buddhism it interpret in little different way! But after all we both are waiting to see Maitryee Buddha in our next life!
Great journey and great findings! Thank you very much for the effort you put on these series of articles!

Cheers~

Quite an unusual story. I not did understand everything, but I agree with your interpretation, that "Even though we die, we need to wait for the salvation."
Support for you and resteem 🙂

This visit is perfect for explorers who need to find out about the historical backdrop of North and South Korea and the Demilitarized Zone. Travel with a guide while visiting locales, benefitting as much as possible from your adventure by finding out about the vital segment of land that isolates North and South Korea. In addition, you can decide on an evening spent visiting the shops and exhibitions of Insadong Street.

Beautiful temple and very nice photography ,
Blog so @slowwalker thanks for sharing...!

I love your blog. Great job.

Very Good post 👌

Wow. That is a beautiful temple filled with all the details.
Thank you for sharing @slowwalker.
Have a lovely weekend.

The style of the chair where the Buddha is sitting is unusual.

The style of the chair
Where the Buddha is sitting
Is unusual.

                 - sonki999


I'm a bot. I detect haiku.

살아서 죽음 그후의 세상을
염두하고 수행을 했으리라
생각을 합니다.

It is just these temples have a lot of meaning to them through visual presentation and representations @slowwalker and a non-Buddhist like me has a lot to know and understand in order for me to grasp what and how it all means. But once more the building temple is beautifully crafted.

@slowwalker, I'm wonder, first time I heard praying place for dead. Every temples has opportunity to pray our dead life. But is this only purpose pray dead temple? Inside the temple main door has gorgeous Buddha statue. I never know Korean letters. So I don't know what's wrote there. But painting designs so impressive. But seems massive meaning. Probably your prediction can be.

As I posted before, Mireuk-Jeon is the place for the Future Buddha of salvation.

Yep...I can agree with you after read you mentioned blog post.

My interpretation is that “ Even though we die, we need to wait for the salvation.”

It's better interpretation of you coz you have best knowledge of Buddhism background coz you're real Buddhism. Very creative designs indeed Jijang Bodhisattva statue. Is it golden one? However some of different ideas you have with this location's meanings. However your post has 100% trending level. Triple gem bless you.

@slowwalker the structure of the temple is really unique from others.The purpose remains same for every temple,devotes pray and ask to God.keep sharing such wonderful posts.

I bet you have so much fun looking all the details in that places :)

지금껏 본 불상 중 좌석이 가장 화려하네요.

Very beautiful photos. I really liked the altar, especially the fiery flame that surrounded it. Good luck to you and Love.

Очень красивые фото. Мне очень понравился алтарь, особенно огненное пламя, что его окружало. Удачи Вам и Любви.

Very good posts, good luck always in steemit business

Good post

Posted using Partiko Android

Cool temples ... but I not see lot there walks :)

These are some very beautiful and unique architectures :) Bravo for the effort, photography is on point making the place look some steps ahead in the ranks. A 10 out of 10 for the photography :)

You're a very interesting talk about the temples @slowwalker
It is always interesting to learn new information and historical facts.
Thank you very much for the photos!
With respect and appreciation, @Singa

your images are very good. Curious about these places of prayer, good photos, thanks for sharing.

The building was also very nice even though it was used to pray for the dead ...

all the temple is same..every single temple is equal.But some people think that it is not ours.

The temple is very different from other temples in general, the design is so attractive that it focuses more on the dead, maybe the architect intended this as the savior of those who are dead, and not judgment.

Amazing temple @slowwalker
These photos are very interesting thanks for sharing...

Incredible trip, I would love to go to that place one day, if you can visit my post, I have some trips inside my country! greetings!

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I love this publication is wonderful