Mission Photograph Album - Japan - O.P. #01 Page 0126

Mission Photograph Album - Japan - O.P. #01 Page 0126

1900-1930

Board of Missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church

Missions

Japan

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The General Commission on Archives and History of the United Methodist Church

45470 Binzuru Sama. It is said that Buddha confessed on him the power to
cure all human ills. For this reason believers rub the image of Binzuru on
that part which may be causing them pain in their own bodies, and then rub
themselves in the hope of obtaining relief and thus it comes about that
such images are often found with the limbs partly worn away, and the
features nearly obliterated. Binzuru is a highly popular object of worship
with the lower classes and his image is often to be seen adorned by his
devotees with a red or yellow hood, a bib, and mittens.

JanOP1-126:2 Great Buddha at Kamakura, Japan. "A statue cold set and
moulded in colossal clam." Dates from 1252 A.D. Eyes are of pure gold.
The image is formed of sheets of bronze cast separately brazed together and
finished off on the outside with the chisel. The hollow interior of the
image contains a small shrine, and a ladder leads up into the head. Height
49 ft. 7 in., circum 97 ft. 2 in., Length of Eye 3 ft. 11 in., Length from
knee to knee 35 ft. 8 in.

45840 Jiso, the compassionate Buddhist helper of those who are in trouble.
His image is often heaped with pebbles, which serve in the other world to
relieve the labours of the young who have been robbed of their garments by
the hag named Sho-zuka-no-baba and then set by her to perform the endleess
task of piling up stones on the banks of the river Sai-no-Kawara the
Buddhist Styx. The similarity of the two names Jiso and Jesus is
suggestive but the only connection that both are lovers of children.

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