The Eighty-Eight Temples

Shikoku means ‘four’ (shi) ‘lands’ (koku), as the island is divided into four prefectures. For most of its history, Shikoku has been remote, poor and slightly forbidding. Thus it was sought out by wandering hermits and ascetics. Shi is also a Chinese homonym for ‘death’, and being ‘dead to the world’ remains one of the central ideas of this pilgrimage.

Buddhism reached Japan from Korea in the sixth century. While the earliest sects were scholarly, and monks lived in large temple-monasteries, unlicensed and unordained Buddhist ascetics also wandered the country, subjecting themselves to severe religious practices in the mountains and proselytizing among the common people.

At the end of the eighth century, Kukai (774-835) and Saicho (767-822) started to propagate ‘esoteric Buddhism’. Though based on the idea of hidden knowledge and wisdom, this proved appealing to the common people. Kukai talked of ‘Enlightenment in this very nature’ and the seed of Buddhahood found in all of us. To aid assimilation, the native Shinto deities of Japan (kami)  were found a place in the extensive pantheon of esoteric Buddhism.