Ep. 067: Asuka-dera, Japan's Oldest Temple

With Japan's oldest Buddha statue

You know, for a belief system that espouses, as in the Third Chan Patriarch's Faith in Mind, that one oughtn't discriminate between one thing and another, Buddhism spends a lot of time labeling things "the biggest this" and "the oldest that."

Case in point: Asuka-dera, a small and very modern-looking temple outside of Kyoto, is considered by many to be "the oldest temple in Japan."

Let's pay a visit in this episode of--

TEMPLE TALES!