CONSIDERATIONS ON THE COMPILATION PROCESS OF SAIKOKU SANJŪSANSHO KANNON REIJŌKI AND SAIKOKU JUNREI UTAGENCHŪ – ON TSUJIMOTO MOTOSADA’S SAIKOKU SANJŪSANSHO KANNON REIJŌKI ZUE
CONSIDERATIONS ON THE COMPILATION PROCESS OF SAIKOKU SANJŪSANSHO KANNON REIJŌKI AND SAIKOKU JUNREI UTAGENCHŪ – ON TSUJIMOTO MOTOSADA’S SAIKOKU SANJŪSANSHO KANNON REIJŌKI ZUE

Summary/Abstract: In the Edo period an extensive road system is created, and thus average people get engaged in walking the paths of Saikoku pilgrimage. While Saikoku pilgrimage becomes widespread within the whole country, it also gets tainted with strong entertainment features. This infiltration into society and people’s lives leads to a great number of pilgrimage texts. Among them, the texts written by Buddhist priests, to serve them when preaching the way in which Kannon’s salvific powers work on people who entrust their faith in the bodhisattva, are of important interest. Especially, a set of pilgrimage texts written by the Jōdo (Pure Land) priest Kōyo Shunō in 1726, Saikoku Sanjūsansho Kannon Reijōki (hereafter cited as Kannon Reijōki) (Record of the Thirty-three Holy Locales of Saikoku), and Saikoku Junrei Utagenchū (the interpretation of goeika, poem-prayers for each of the 33 temples), that take a double layer structure, guide the pilgrim from the surface layer of this worldly benefits into the deep layer of the after world salvation. Kōyo’s texts were targeted at priests who taught the Buddhist law to laymen, but in 1803 Tsujimoto Motosada edits the original work and rearranges it so as to be available for commoners’ level of understanding. Saikoku Sanjūsansho Kannon Reijōki Zue (hereafter cited as Kannon Reijōki Zue) (The Collected Pictorial Guide of the Thirty-Three Kannon Holy Locales of Saikoku) becomes very popular and is republished in 1833 and 1845. In this article, I will focus on the way Tsujimoto rearranged Kōyo’s texts and I will consider the religious nature of Saikoku pilgrimage in the late Edo period.

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