Hozenji Temple: The Fudō Beneath the Moss

Hozenji has stood in this part of Osaka since 1637. The district around it, Sennichimae—“in front of the thousand days”—takes its name from a thousand days of prayers for the dead held by its priest, Sennen, in what was then an area of cremation grounds, cemeteries and execution sites. The water-splashing ritual is much younger.

In March 1945, an air raid destroyed the temple buildings. The Fudō survived.

Fire could not destroy him. Water would slowly transform him instead.

According to the temple, the water-splashing custom began soon after the war. A woman scooped up, with her hands, the water placed before the figure as an offering, and splashed it over him while making a wish. Other visitors followed.

The ladles came later.

What now looks like an established instruction began with someone doing something a little differently.

The moss gives the scene an air of great antiquity. Yet the custom responsible for this appearance began within living memory. The temple’s long history and the figure’s green covering tell different parts of the story.

Up close, the moss was not a thin coating. It formed thick cushions over the figures, blurring the carved features and rounding their outlines. There was plenty to photograph, though a conventional portrait was becoming ambitious.

An overgrown statue can suggest that everyone has gone away. This one looked as it did because they kept returning.

The act of worship has physically changed the object of worship.

No single visitor had set out to create the figure in these photographs. Each had come with a wish of their own. Together, they had helped give him a surface no sculptor had carved.

The ladle resting across the vessel brought everything back to the scale of one person’s visit. The next contribution would be as simple as the last.