Hoshakuji Temple

Hoshakuji holds five nationally designated statues of King Enma, the judge of the Buddhist afterlife, and his four administrators who record, announce, and document the fates of the dead. The set, dated to the Kamakura period, is the oldest known grouping of this five-deity assembly. A special post box in the Enmado Hall accepts letters of repentance addressed directly to Enma. The temple also keeps a kozuchi hammer and uchide wand that have been used in luck-granting rituals for centuries, now distributed in small colored pouches. A three-story pagoda said to have been built in a single night by Toyotomi Hideyoshi's forces remains on the grounds, along with the stone where Hideyoshi reportedly sat while planning to unify Japan.