Kofukuji Temple

Kofukuji Temple, founded in 1620 by a Chinese monk from Fujian province, is the oldest of Nagasaki's Chinese Obaku Zen temples and served the city's early Chinese merchant community as both a place of worship and a cultural anchor. The temple's main hall, rebuilt after wartime damage, displays a distinctly Chinese architectural style rarely seen elsewhere in Japan, with a curved, upturned tile roofline, red-lacquered woodwork, and a moon-shaped gate at the entrance that gives the temple its local nickname, the Nankin-dera or Nanjing Temple. Inside the compound, visitors can see a large iron pot once used to cook rice porridge for famine relief, and a bell tower whose bronze bell is rung on ceremonial occasions. The temple compound is compact, and a visit walking through the courtyard, main hall exterior, and surrounding halls takes about thirty to forty-five minutes. Kofukuji is also credited as the origin point of the sencha style of Japanese tea ceremony, introduced by a resident monk in the seventeenth century, a history noted on plaques around the grounds. Weekday mornings are quiet, with few visitors beyond the occasional local worshipper, while the temple sees more visitors during Chinese New Year, when it is included in stops connected to the nearby Lantern Festival displays.