Gapsa Temple, Gongju, South Korea

Gapsa Temple, Gongju, South Korea

451-33, Gapsa-ro, Gyeryong-myeon, Gongju-si, Chungcheongnam-do, Republic of Korea

Mention Gapsa Temple on Gyeryongsan Mountain, and the mind naturally turns to Donghaksa — and equally, mention Donghaksa, and Gapsa comes to mind in return. These two celebrated temples on Gyeryongsan occupy valleys on directly opposite sides of the mountain, with Cheonhwangbong Peak rising between them. Donghaksa lies closer to the city of Daejeon, while Gapsa falls on the Gongju side. Donghaksa, for all its history and reputation, is a surprisingly small and intimate temple; Gapsa, by contrast, is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful temples in Korea, holding its own against any in the country. It is especially famous for its autumn foliage, celebrated in the traditional saying "Magoкsa in spring, Gapsa in autumn."

Gyeryongsan straddles the central heartland of Korea, spanning the South Chungcheong Province cities of Daejeon and Gongju, and is not by nature a particularly rugged or remote mountain. Yet Gapsa is positioned, somewhat surprisingly, in such a way that the full drama of the mountain's ridgelines and peaks can be taken in at a single glance. Standing in the courtyard of the Daeungjeon and looking straight ahead, the summits of Gyeryongsan fill the entire frame — a defining characteristic of how the temple complex has been laid out. The effect is almost as if the mountain itself had been arranged as a folding screen backdrop for the temple forecourt.

Gapsa is said to have been founded in 420 CE, the first year of Baekje King Guishin's reign, by the Goguryeo monk Ado Hwasang, and was subsequently rebuilt in 556 CE, the third year of King Wideok's reign, by the monk Hyemyeon. During the Unified Silla period, the great monk Uisang undertook a sweeping reconstruction, adding over a thousand bays of halls and establishing the temple as a center of Hwaeom Buddhist study — one of the ten great Hwaeom temples of the era. Further rounds of reconstruction followed over the centuries, sustaining the temple's lineage through to the present. During the Joseon dynasty, a great number of halls were lost to fire in the second phase of the Japanese invasions in 1597, and large-scale restorations were carried out in 1604 and again in 1654. The Daeungjeon and the Jinhaedang were most recently restored in 1875, the twelfth year of King Gojong's reign, and the temple has continued in that form to this day.

Situated at the starting point of the hiking route that crosses Gyeryongsan from Donghaksa over Cheonhwangbong Peak and down to Gapsa, the temple is well served by buses from both Gongju and Daejeon, making it unusually easy to reach. Perhaps as a result, even on a weekday the atmosphere is not the hushed stillness one expects of most historic temples, but rather something more lively — a steady flow of hikers passing through, coming and going with energy and purpose. Gapsa is a temple I feel compelled to return to in autumn. Neither too large nor too small, it is a beautifully proportioned place that continues to draw a steady stream of visitors throughout the year.

Gapsa holds, as one would expect, several cultural artifacts of significant importance. The first among them is the Gapsa Stupa — a Goryeo-period work and one of the finest surviving examples of its kind, in a country where relatively few Goryeo stupas remain. The identity of the monk it commemorates is not precisely known, but the stupa is currently designated National Treasure No. 257. The second is the woodblock-printed edition of the Worinseokbo, designated Treasure No. 582. A compilation of the Worin Cheongang Ji Gok and the Seokbo Sangjeol, the Worinseokbo was assembled in 1459, the fifth year of King Sejo's reign, as a Buddhist canonical text recording the life and chronology of Shakyamuni Buddha. The copy preserved at Gapsa is the only surviving edition remaining in Korea today.

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