Daming Temple () is a temple located at the middle peak of Shugang Mountain,

Yangzhou Yangzhou, postal romanization Yangchow, is a prefecture-level city in central Jiangsu Province (Suzhong), East China. Sitting on the north bank of the Yangtze, it borders the provincial capital Nanjing to the southwest, Huai'an to the north, Ya ...

Jiangsu Jiangsu (; ; pinyin: Jiāngsū, alternatively romanized as Kiangsu or Chiangsu) is an eastern coastal province of the People's Republic of China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its c ...

, China. This temple is known for a famous monk,

Jianzhen Jianzhen (; 688–763), or Ganjin in Japanese, was a Chinese monk who helped to propagate Buddhism in Japan. In the eleven years from 743 to 754, Jianzhen attempted to visit Japan some six times. Ganjin finally came to Japan in the year 753 an ...

, who studied the

sutra ''Sutra'' ( sa, सूत्र, translit=sūtra, translit-std=IAST, translation=string, thread)Monier Williams, ''Sanskrit English Dictionary'', Oxford University Press, Entry fo''sutra'' page 1241 in Indian literary traditions refers to an a ...

s and initiated people into monkhood here in 742 AD before he left for Japan.

History

Daming Temple is so named because it was constructed during the periods in the reign of Xiaowu Emperor of the

Liu Song Song, known as Liu Song (), Former Song (前宋) or Song of (the) Southern Dynasty (南朝宋) in historiography, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China and the first of the four Northern and Southern dynasties#Southern ...

dynasty during the period of Daming (453–464 AD). In the first year of Renshou in the Sui Dynasty (601), Emperor Yang Jian issued an edict to build 30 pagodas across the country for the worship of Buddhist relics (佛骨) to celebrate his birthday. So the Qi Ling Tower was build in this temple. The magnificent tower had nine floors and was known as "China's most magnificent and special architecture", so the temple was also called "Qi Ling Temple". During the periods of the Wuzong reign of the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdo ...

(618–907), it was called Qiling Temple. In the

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dy