Hōgon-ji (Matsuyama)
History. According to temple records, the temple was founded in 668 by an ancestor of the Kōno clan at the behest of the abdicated Empress Saimei. Ippen was born at the temple in what was then Iyo province in 1239. As a child he was known as Shōjomaru. In the year 1248, his mother died, and he became a monk with the name Zuien. In 1251 he left Iyo to study under Shōdatsu in Dazaifu. He returned to Iyo in 1263 at the time of his father's death, and married. In 1271, he vowed to give  up his domestic life. On a visit to Kumano Shrine in 1274, Ippen experienced a revelation and "spent the remaining sixteen years of his life in constant travel throughout Japan." "The term "ippen" 一遍 is a common word meaning 'once,' but its second element ("-pen, hen") also has the meaning of 'everywhere' or 'all pervading.'" In 1292, three years after Ippen's death, Hōgon-ji was rededicated as a temple of the Ji sect. On August 10, 2013, the main temple building and priest's quarters were destroyed by fire. Buildings and grounds. Besides the main hall, the temple grounds  included a rock garden and several kuhi (haiku stones) and other stone monuments. The kuhi include a haiku by Matsuyama poet Masaoka Shiki: Other kuhi feature haiku by Mokichi Saitō and Kawada Jun. Treasures. The temple's most noted treasure, a 114 centimeter high (mid Muromachi Period) (Important Cultural Property), dating from mid-Muromachi period (14th-16th centuries) was reportedly lost in the fire on August 10, 2013.