Doseon Sa Tour Part 3 - On the way to Doseon Sa – A visit to a Buddhist temple of a different denomination

After the birth of Buddhism in India (around 2500 years ago), it spread in Asia and reached Korea after 800 years after it’s birth(1). It was later “purified” and modified refined to suit the Korean ways and the influence by the Korean Buddhist monks.

Therefore, in modern Korean, you would not find a lot of influence from India at , when it comes to design of a Buddhist temple or the different statues or architecture.

However, the widespread of a different denominations, allows you to sometimes find the Indian influence kept preserved.

By a sheer coincidence, we stumbled upon this lost temple in the edge of a mountain in Korea on our way to Doseon Sa. (actually the bus driver punched the wrong GPS location on his on-board computer and took us to the wrong Doseon Sa temple!)

I am not sure if it a case of a copyrights infringements but, anyways, I got some nice (and rare photos, according to Dr. David, our tour guide)

You will see in the photos what looks as Ganesha or Kali in Hinduism.

We are told that the many arms symbolizes helping the many people this god has to help and the many faces symbolizes that this god is looking after people’s lives to help them.

I leave you with the photos. Since they are uploaded in high resolution I highly recommend that you examine the photos in and see the items the god is handling in his hand. Very detailed art! 

After you click on the photos below, it will take you to Picasa, then click this button in the top right of the statue photo to see the photo in full size. Then you can either use the mouse to drag it around or save-as on your PC.

Enjoy!

 The statue

 A closeup of the statue

 The traditional Buddhist drum overlooking the above statue

 a nice art work, click to examine in closeup

 both side by side

 

(1) Wikipedia

Doseon Sa Tour Part 2 - Entrance to the Temple

So, today we continue with the Doseon Sa tour.

Today I will explain the entrance to Doseon Sa Temple

One interesting thing is that the temple entrance is also an entrance to the Bukhansan National Park.

Bukhansan National Park holds the Guinness World Record for the most visit park in the world!

This place is visited by 6 million people per year!

Most of these are Koreans who want to hike at the Bukhansan Mountain or the Dobongsan Mountain.

In Korea, Hiking is the number 1 sport or, hobby, here… they love it!

In Dubai, on the other hand, my number 1 hobby was to eat fast food and watch 4 Simpsons episodes re-runs every weekend… :-D

However, for some reason I gain a little bit over 10 kgs in the last year alone (D’oh!)

I look forward to shed some weight here… maybe I’ll give this hiking thing a try sometime…

So, anyways, this is a map to the park in general (we are at the lower right):

Overhere, you can see the gate, guarded by four gods, representing the four directions.

The north and the south gods: To the right is the north god (the symbol of death) and to the left is the south god, holding the peril of wisdom:

They were portrayed after the scariest thing an 8th century  man could imagine……… A MOGUL COMMANDER!!

Yes… the Mogul were true to their reputation  at that time too.

And below are the gods of east and west…  Now, imagine you’re a simple farmer living in the 8th century and you see the scene those part-of-four coming to the temple...????

This was supposed to make you “good” once you reach the inside…

 

Of course, try THAT with a kid today who has seen Saw I, II and III before he is even 10… ! 

I doubt even such a 3D effect might work on him!

Kids today…

Royal Asiatic Society in Korea - Doseon Sa Tour Part 1

So, I am here in Seoul, Korea... finally...  In 3 short weeks, I have managed to revert to my earlier habits in Dubai... work, home, work, home, work, home, work, work, work.... home... weekend, sleep on weekend, sleep more on weekend... work, home... etc

So, what should I do?  I have promised myself, even before I come to Korea, to mingle with other people, Korean and Non-Korea, outside the workplace....

It was about time I keep a promise to myself... just for a change!

But how can I do that?  So, I searched the net a little bit and using Google and other Korea guides... and somehow I stumbled upon this website: http://www.raskb.com/

It turns out that is an expedite group which makes trips on Saturdays and lectures on the weekday about Korean culture. So, being interested in getting to know more about this country said "Why not?"  We gathered at 10:00am on Saturday, in front of a subway station.

We took the bus.  Doseon Sa (pronounced "Do-Seon-Sa") is a very well known figure in Korean history. He was the reformer of Buddhism in Korea.. probably the greatest Buddhist monk who ever lived!    

Why? Do you really wanna know why? then prepare yourself for a history lesson!  I know, I know, most of us used to hate history maybe even more than geography classes...!

But I am going to talk about his life only...  courtesy of Prof. David A. Mason, the university professor who guided us during the tour... one thing about this guy, he really loves history and the Korean culture  Usually, when you see someone passionate about something, chances are a lot of this passion would rub on you...
which what happened to me in this case!   I will be brief, for a detailed biography about Doseon's life, visit Prof. David's webpage:

Doseon-guksa: A brief Biography

Chinese Characters at the age of 2? WAW!

So, at 835 AD, soon after her was born, Doseon was a prodigy child said  to have learned reading Chinese characters when he was two, and decided to shave his head and  become a monk when he was 15. He entered a branch of Buddhism which was dedicated to learning scriptures.

The average monk typically 20~30 years to become enlightened in this discipline of Buddhism….. in order to become fully enlightened.

… It took Doseon only 3 years to memorize all the scriptures and become fully enlightened!

After this,  he decided to pursue another branch or Buddhism, which was more focused on meditation, after a few more years he was enlightened in that discipline as well!

(think of it as obtaining two PhDs, back to back, in less than 6 years!)

So, our story hero, Doseon, was a fully enlightened monk at the age of 20
Was that enough for him? No! He decided to travel to China, the birth land of Buddhism, to purse more branches of Buddhism and learn more.

He learned about the energy of the Earth’s the different powers of energy

Doseon-guksa: Tao-Abundance National-Master (826-898)

which is concentrated in specific locations and then transmitted through the mountains to different lands. (“Final Fantasy-The movie'”.. anyone?)

It was a serious study which combined geography and astronomy and religion.

Upon returning to Korea, using his vast knowledge, he started having disciples who carried his teachings.

Studying Chinese history and mathematics, he knew that the current (then) Korean dynasty are coming to an end. Having predicted who will be next King or so, he devised a map (using his knowledge of the power of earth) to decide where the next Korea capital should be. With blueprints on were each Buddhist temple should be and in which exact location (in order to channel the power of earth to protect the capital)

He did all of this and put it in a sealed envelope and delivered it himself to the father of the next king’s father. To and unmarried man who was building a house. He told him that his house will witness the birth of a great person. And he gave the papers to him and ask him that they should not be opened until his child is mature enough.

Doseon died shortly after that.

Well, the story goes that. thirty years later,  his child grow up to become the king of Korea and opened and followed Doseon’s plans for a new capital.

This temple was built to honor Doseon himself.

(To be continued...)