Scene from The Illustrated Legends of Jin’ōji Temple

The history of the Jin'ōji engi emaki (Illustrated History of Jin’ōji) is a prime example of the unfortunate fate of many narrative handscroll paintings. The set of scrolls, known also as the Kōnin Shōnin eden (Illustrated Biography of the Monk Kōnin), was a unique work, made for a specific temple. Although not well known, it apparently survived intact until as late as 1940, after which it was divided into fragments, many subsequently bought by collectors outside Japan; about twenty are known to be in the United States.
When the circumstances surrounding the fragmentation of the scrolls were investigated in 1964 by Akiyama Terukazu, a modern copy was discovered at Jin’ōji, the original owner. The copy was made after several scenes had already been excised, so Akiyama could reconstruct only part of the original. Nevertheless, he was able to determine the outline of the narrative and the general sequence of the scenes.[1]
The Jin'ōji engi emaki consisted of two illustrated handscrolls that recounted the early history of a small temple at the foot of Mount Nunobiki, Osaka. The first scroll included seven sections of text describing the founding of Jin’ōji (also known as Kōnoji), accompanied by seven illustrations. The temple now belongs to Enryakuji, the headquarters of the Tendai sect, on Mount Hiei. Its origins, however, have been traced to the seventh century, when the hermit monk En no Gyōja (b. 634) established it as a local center for Shugendō, a harsh form of asceticism practiced by mountain hermits. According to legend, En no Gyōja traveled to the Silla kingdom on the Korean peninsula to invoke a little-known deity, Hōshō Gongen, and to ask him to serve in Japan as guardian divinity of the new temple. Jin’ōji was founded in 684, and it enjoyed a brief period of prosperity until its decline in the early eighth century.
The second scroll comprised six sections of text with six corresponding pictures.

These described the activities of Kōnin (d. 778), a Korean monk from the Paekche kingdom who revived the temple and restored it to its former splendor. Kōnin's name appears repeatedly on small blue cartouches pasted on the scroll, which explains why the set acquired its alternate title, the Kōnin Shōnin eden.[2]

Fragment a, which is a part of the first scroll, illustrates the episode in which Hōshō Gongen responds to the appeal of En no Gyoja and agrees to go to Japan. Before En no Gyoja, the aged monk seated at the right, is a minor god and Shinto medium, Shikigami, who—according to the cartouche—served as a guide to Hōshō Gongen. The demonic-looking creature at the foot of the pine tree at the left is an intermediary between En no Gyoja and Hōshō Gongen. The god himself, a fierce guardian figure with four arms brandishing a bow, a spear, a sword, and an arrow, materializes at the top of the tree.
Fragment b, originally at the very end of the second scroll, depicts an act of ritual purification in the Haraigawa River that pilgrims to the temple were required to perform in deference to Hōshō Gongen. At the left, a Shinto priest dressed in white and holding a ritual scepter converses with a monk on the riverbank. Two other pilgrims are in the water, having left their garments on the bank.
All the fragments of the Jin’ōji scrolls are in an unusually good state of preservation. The green and blue pigments of the hills and foliage are vivid, and the pinkish white of the flowers is fresh. Akiyama believes that the legend of Jin’ōji and the monk Kōnin cannot have originated before the twelfth century, and he dates the emaki to the last years of the Kamakura period, in the mid-fourteenth century.[3] The painting retains many characteristics of late Kamakura emaki, including washes of pale blue applied to broad bands of cloud in the sky that partly conceal trees and mountaintops (as in fragment a). While the colors are brighter in fragment a than in fragment b, other details in the latter, such as the mica particles sprayed over the ground areas, are better preserved. In both scrolls, the painter's skill in handling the brush is evident in the freedom and speed with which the ink outlines—defining landscape elements as well as figures—are drawn. It would appear that he received solid training in the production of Buddhist icons, as the confident handling of Hōshō Gongen and his various attributes in fragment a suggests.
[Miyeko Murase 2000, Bridge of Dreams]
[1] Akiyama Terukazu 1980b, pp.98–113. For a modern copy of the text, see Kinoshita Mitsuun 1975, pp. 154–62.
[2] The cartouches, with texts written in gold ink, are thought to have been affixed either at the time the scrolls were made or shortly thereafter. See Akiyama Terukazu 1980b, p. 110.
[3] Ibid.

[ Mayuyama & Co., Ltd. , Tokyo, 1966]; Mary Griggs Burke , New York (from 1966; transferred to Foundation); Mary and Jackson Burke Foundation , New York (until 2015; donated to MMA)

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Japanese Art: Selections from the Mary and Jackson Burke Collection," November 7, 1975–January 4, 1976.

Seattle Art Museum. "Japanese Art: Selections from the Mary and Jackson Burke Collection," March 10–May 1, 1977.

Minneapolis Institute of Arts. "Japanese Art: Selections from the Mary and Jackson Burke Collection," June 1–July 17, 1977.

Tokyo National Museum. "Nihon bijutsu meihin ten: nyūyōku bāku korekushon," May 21, 1985–June 30, 1985.

Ishikawa Prefectural Museum. "Nihon bijutsu meihin ten: nyūyōku bāku korekushon," July 13, 1985–August 11, 1985.

Nagoya City Art Museum. "Nihon bijutsu meihin ten: nyūyōku bāku korekushon," August 17, 1985–September 23, 1985.

Atami. MOA Museum of Art. "Nihon bijutsu meihin ten: nyūyōku bāku korekushon," September 29, 1985–October 27, 1985.

Hamamatsu City Museum of Art. "Nihon bijutsu meihin ten: nyūyōku bāku korekushon," November 12, 1985–December 1, 1985.

Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt. "Die Kunst des Alten Japan: Meisterwerke aus der Mary and Jackson Burke Collection," September 16, 1990–November 18, 1990.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Masterpieces of Japanese Art from The Mary Griggs Burke Collection," March 30–June 25, 2000.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Storytelling in Japanese Art," November 19, 2011–May 6, 2012.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Celebrating the Arts of Japan: The Mary Griggs Burke Collection," October 20, 2015–May 14, 2017.

Watanabe, Masako. Storytelling in Japanese Art. Exh. cat. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2011, p. 14, fig. 7.

Murase, Miyeko, Il Kim, Shi-yee Liu, Gratia Williams Nakahashi, Stephanie Wada, Soyoung Lee, and David Sensabaugh. Art Through a Lifetime: The Mary Griggs Burke Collection. Vol. 1, Japanese Paintings, Printed Works, Calligraphy. [New York]: Mary and Jackson Burke Foundation, [2013], p. 19, cat. no. 30a.