Tōdai Temple

Tōdai Temple, monumental Japanese temple and centre of the Kegon sect of Japanese Buddhism, located in Nara. The main buildings were constructed between 745 and 752 ce under the emperor Shōmu and marked the adoption of Buddhism as a state religion.

The temple, built just west of the earlier Kinshō Temple, was the largest and most powerful monastery in Japan during the Nara period (710–784). The Great Buddha Hall (Daibutsu-den) was built in the centre of a vast enclosure of some 2 square miles (5 square km) with gates, pagodas, subsidiary buildings, and colonnades. It was an enormous wooden building measuring some 288 by 169 feet (88 by 52 metres) in ground plan. It housed the Great Buddha (Daibutsu), a colossal seated bronze statue of Vairochana (Japanese: Birushana Butsu), originally some 53 feet (16 metres) high. The original building was destroyed in 1180, and the present Great Buddha Hall dates from the early 18th century. The building was renovated between 1974 and 1980; with a length of 187 feet (57 metres), a width of 165 feet (50 metres), and a height of 155 feet (47 metres), it is still the largest wooden building in the world. The bronze statue has also undergone extensive restorations, the last of which was completed in 1692.

Among the surviving structures of the Tōdai Temple is the Shōsō Repository (Shōsō-in), the main storehouse for the temple’s most precious objects. The largest of the temple’s repositories and the sole extant example, it is a huge structure built on 40 pillars that are 8 feet (2.4 metres) high. The main structure supported by them, 107 by 30 feet (33 by 9 metres), is 46 feet (14 metres) high and is covered with a hipped ridge roof of tiles; the front and two sides consist of timbers, triangular in cross section, laid horizontally one over another, giving a corrugated appearance. The Shōsō Repository treasure—the nucleus of which is a collection of more than 600 personal objects belonging to the emperor Shōmu—consists of about 9,020 works of fine and decorative art, which provide an eloquent picture of court life of the Nara period. The Shōsō Repository is not open to the public, but each autumn a selection of its treasures (all of which are now stored in fireproof concrete storehouses) is put on display.

Another important surviving structure of the temple complex is the Hokke Hall (Hokke-dō)—often called the Sangatsu Hall (Sangatsu-dō)—where in ancient times the Lotus Sutra (Japanese: Hoke-kyō) was recited annually during the third month (sangatsu) of the lunar calendar. Originally part of Kinshō Temple, it is the oldest structure in the Tōdai complex. The hall contains several notable 8th-century statues.