Kinkaku-ji Audio Guide

Kinkaku-ji: what does the audio guide cover?

1. 01

   Welcome to Kinkaku-ji

   Welcome to Kinkaku-ji, known in Japanese as 金閣寺, the Golden Temple. You are in Kita Ward, in the northern part of Kyoto, close to the hill called Daimonjiyama. A gilded pavilion stands at the edge of a broad pond, and its reflection doubles it in the water. It is one of the most recognizable sights in all of Japan. Here is a first surprise. Kinkaku-ji is a nickname. The temple's formal name is Rokuon-ji, and the two names mean exactly the same place. It belongs to the Shokoku-ji branch of Rinzai Zen Buddhism, and its mountain name is Hokuzan. The golden building itself is the Shari-den, a relic hall. Its golden color gave the whole temple the name Kinkaku-ji, which means Golden Pavilion Temple. In 1994 the temple was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list as part of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto. It is very popular, so the grounds follow a one-way route. Take it slowly, because there is a great deal of story packed into this small stretch of garden.

2. 02

   Kinkaku-ji: From Aristocrat's Villa to Shogun's Court

   Two men matter most for understanding how this place began. The first is Saionji Kintsune, a noble of the Kamakura period. The land was once the country retreat of his Saionji family. The second is Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, the third shogun of the Muromachi shogunate. He took over the Saionji villa and had it greatly renovated. He turned it into a residence known as Kitayamaden, and he made it a center of politics and diplomacy. The golden Shari-den was built around 1397, the year the grand renovation began. So picture this pavilion not as a quiet monastery building at first, but as part of a powerful ruler's palace. The temple that you see today grew out of that world of state, status and display. Rokuon-ji, the temple's formal name, belongs to the later chapter of the story, when the site became a Zen temple.

3. 03

   Kinkaku-ji: Three Floors, Three Styles

   Look carefully at the three floors, because each one speaks a different architectural language. The first floor is built in the shinden-zukuri style of the Heian aristocracy. It is open and airy, with white walls and a roof of cypress bark. This floor is called Hosui-in. The second floor is in buke-zukuri, the style of the warrior aristocracy. The third floor is in the style of a Zen temple. In a single pavilion you can read three social worlds stacked one above the other: court nobles, samurai lords and Zen monks. The building sits beside a pond as part of a strolling garden designed with the Pure Land in mind. The pond holds small islands and carefully placed rocks, and the way the pavilion mirrors in the water is central to the design. Gold leaf covers the building both inside and out. Try to visit in early morning or late afternoon, when the light on the water is especially lovely. Snow, when it falls, makes the scene one of Kyoto's classic winter pictures.

4. 04

   Kinkaku-ji: The Night of the Fire and the Rebuilding

   The pavilion you see today is not the original. In the early hours of the second of July, 1950, a fire destroyed the Shari-den. The fire was set by a young student monk, 21 years old at the time. The pavilion had been designated a National Treasure, but it burned to the ground. A seated statue of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu and several other wooden statues inside were lost with it. After the fire, the National Treasure designation was lifted, and support for a reconstruction was agreed. About 30 million yen, which was the sum at that time, was raised from government subsidies and donations from all over the country. Work began in 1952 and was completed in 1955. A dedication ceremony was held on the tenth of October that year, and the building was restored to the appearance it had when it was first built. The event left a deep mark on Japanese culture. It inspired the painter Kawabata Ryushi's work called Kinkaku Enjo, and it inspired the novelist Mishima Yukio's famous novel about the pavilion.

5. 05

   Before You Head Off

   As you follow the path around the grounds, keep looking for small things beyond the golden pavilion. The temple's principal image is Sho Kannon, a form of the compassionate bodhisattva. There is also a remarkable giant tree within the grounds, an ichii-gashi oak, about nineteen and a half meters tall. Its base rises into broad buttress-like roots. It was designated a natural monument of Kyoto City in 1983. Experts think it could be a survivor of the old oak forest that once covered the area, which makes it a living witness older than the present temple buildings. Notice, too, how the pavilion looks from different points along the pond. Each angle shows a slightly different balance between water, trees and gold. Once you have walked the whole route, consider how a place can be a palace, a Zen temple, a victim of fire and a rebuilt icon all at once. What other layers do you think are waiting to be noticed?