Sensō-ji

Tradition holds that in 628 two fishermen brothers, Hinokuma Hamanari and Takenari, pulled a small statue of Kannon, the bodhisattva of compassion, from the Sumida River in their nets. Their village head, Haji no Nakatomo, recognised it, became a devotee and turned his house into a shrine for it. In 645 a monk named Shōkai is said to have built a proper hall and decided that the statue should be hidden from view, a rule kept ever since. The temple’s mountain name, Kinryūzan, Golden Dragon Mountain, comes from a legend that a golden dragon descended from the sky at the time.

Its rise came with the warriors. The Kamakura shōguns patronised it, and in 1590 Tokugawa Ieyasu named it a prayer temple for his house. As Edo grew, Asakusa became a pilgrimage and pleasure district: stalls, performers and teahouses clustered around the temple, and the licensed Yoshiwara quarter lay just to the north. After 1873 the temple grounds were turned into a public park, and the western blocks became Tokyo’s theatre and cinema district.

The main hall of 1649 survived the 1923 earthquake but burned in the air raid of 10 March 1945, along with the pagoda and the main gates. The present hall was completed in 1958 in reinforced concrete, the pagoda in 1973, the Kaminarimon in 1960 and the Hōzōmon in 1964. Sensō-ji was long part of the Tendai school; in 1950 it became the head temple of its own Shō-Kannon school.

The Kaminarimon, Thunder Gate, is the outer entrance. Its red paper lantern is close to four metres tall and weighs roughly 700 kilograms; look underneath for a carved wooden dragon. The gate was rebuilt with money from Matsushita Kōnosuke, founder of Panasonic, whose company still pays for new lanterns. The statues are Fūjin, god of wind, holding his bag of air on the right, and Raijin, god of thunder, with his ring of drums on the left.

Nakamise-dōri, about 250 metres long, runs from the Kaminarimon to the second gate. Its shops descend from stalls that local people were allowed to open in the early 18th century in return for cleaning the temple grounds. The Hōzōmon, Treasure House Gate, holds sutras and treasures on its upper floor. Two fierce Niō guardians stand in front, and on the back hang giant straw sandals, about 4.5 metres long, made in Murayama in Yamagata Prefecture and replaced at intervals of roughly ten years.

In the courtyard, the large bronze burner, the jōkōro, sends up incense smoke that people wave over themselves. The hall itself has a steep roof, now clad in titanium tiles to reduce weight. Inside, the ceiling paintings of a dragon and heavenly beings are by 20th-century painters Kawabata Ryūshi and Dōmoto Inshō. The five-storey pagoda stands to the left; its top storey reportedly holds relics of the Buddha donated from Sri Lanka.

Walk to the right of the hall and the architecture changes. Asakusa Shrine, in the ornate gongen style, was built in 1649 on the order of Tokugawa Iemitsu and survived 1945, which makes it one of the few original Edo-period buildings in the area. The Nitenmon, the eastern gate built in 1618, is also a survivor. Both show what the whole precinct once looked like.

The statue found in 628 is a hibutsu, a hidden Buddha. It is kept in a closed shrine in the inner sanctuary and, according to the temple, is not shown to anyone, not even its own chief priests; its exact size and form are not publicly confirmed. Hidden images are common in Japan, and their power is thought to come partly from being unseen. Kannon is believed to take many forms to help anyone who calls on her, and a proxy image stands in for devotion.

The golden dragon of the temple’s founding legend returns in a dance, the Kinryū no Mai, performed in the precinct on a few set days each year, including 18 March, the traditional anniversary of the statue’s discovery. The dragon is carried on poles by eight people and weaves through the courtyard. The Sanja Matsuri each May honours the three founders at Asakusa Shrine, whose name means shrine of the three.

Sensō-ji’s omikuji, drawn by shaking a numbered stick from a metal canister, are known for being strict. About three in ten are reportedly kyō, bad fortune, a higher share than at many temples. Those who draw a bad slip tie it to the rack so that the misfortune stays at the temple. The smoke from the jōkōro is believed to help whatever part of the body it touches, which is why people steer it to their heads, backs or knees.

For people who live in Asakusa, Sensō-ji is a neighbourhood temple first. In the early morning, before the gates of Nakamise open their shutters, neighbours cut through the precinct on the way to work, stop to bow at the hall and toss a coin, and older residents walk dogs around the pagoda. The 18th of each month is Kannon’s day, and devotees make a point of visiting then.

The temple calendar ties into the city’s year. At New Year, crowds queue from the Kaminarimon for the first prayer. On 9 and 10 July the Hōzuki market sells potted ground cherries, and a visit on those days is said to earn 46,000 days of merit. On 17 to 19 December the Hagoita-ichi sells decorated battledores to bring luck to the household. Families also come for Shichi-Go-San in November and for Setsubun bean-throwing in February. Many local businesses keep a Sensō-ji charm for good trade.