Shomyo-ji temple

1. Shomyo-ji temple is located at Kanazawa-cho, Kanazawa-ku in Yokohama city and its official name is Kanezawa-san Shyomyo-ji. It had been a family temple of Kanezawa Hojo clan and might originate from an altar (Jibutsu-do) installed by Hojo Sanetoki in his home of Rokuura-sho Kanezawa.
2. Library created by Hojo Sanetoki aound year 1275, at Shomyo-ji temple located in his fief of Kanezawa-sho, is called Kanazawa-bunko. We don't know the exact number of Japanese and Chinese books collected but those still remained are more than 30,000.
3. The garden of Shomyo-ji temple with its pond has been installed in order to make majestic the main building (Kondo). You enter by Nio gate from the south, then cross over a pond through two bridges, arch and flat, which hang on a middle island, in order to reach the main building. Such a construction became very popular after the middle Hean period and belongs to Jodo garden styles.
4. The pond models after the form of the first letter of Sanskrit "a". It symbolizes in Buddhism the mortality-immortality theory of everything.