Once Agin To Bongwon-sa Temple For The Yeongsanjae Ritual.

Few days later, I had a chance to drop by Bongwon-sa temple once again.

I heard from my friend the Yeonsanjae Ritual will be held in Bongwon-sa at 6, June for the memorial day.
I was so pleased to look at the whole ritual on the ground.

It is said an annual ritual for the memorial day of Korea.
This ritual is held for the peace of the soul of the sacrificed during Korean War (1950 - 1953 )

Korean Buddhism have served a specific characteristics of the ceremony for the dead.
In my opinion, this characteristics were originated from the conjunction between Buddhism and Ancient Korean traditional Religion.

Buddhism needed to take the role of Ancient Korean’s religion to mitigate the opposition of traditional religion against Buddhism.
Ancient Koreans believed that their ancestor became a god after the death.
So Buddhism tried to utilize Korean people's sentiment for propagation.

The ritual was planned to open from 10 am.
There were the lanterns along the road to the temple for the memorial day.

It was an election period for local government by chance.
So many election campaign workers were standing along side the road to the temple.

In the middle of the road to the temple, there was a stupa area for the late monks.
Some foreigners were listening about the meaning of the stupa.

The atmosphere of the stupa in the fine day was quite different from that of the rainy day.
I posted the rainy day's atmosphere in the previous posting.
It was bright. I felt peace and hope near the stupa.
The change of the weather changed the image and the emotions on the stupa completely.

It means that Human's feeling and thought is so fragile and unsustainable.
But I think this instability of human being is a source of the Human culture.

Finally I arrived at the temple, unlike before when the ritual was performed in the building, at this time the stage for the ritual was prepared in the ground at the front of Daewoongjeon.

While going to the temple, I could look at some interesting sculptures in the temple.
There was a spring near the main building. You can find the spring in every temple.
The spring seemed a symbol of the Buddha’s teaching.
We, the ordinary people feel thirst for the truth, drink a cup of water in the spring of the teaching.

Near the spring, there was the dragon sculpture near the Spring.
I saw this kind of dragon sculpture first time in this temple.

I thought that this temple had been fired several time before, so they made such a special dragon sculpture to prevent from the fire.

The dragon means the water. In Korean Traditional religion, the dragon is a god of the sea.
So they believed if they made the dragon sculptures, the dragons would prevent the temple from the fire.

When I arrived at the temple, every thing was ready.