China Guide
Jiangsu and Zhejiang
Lingyin Si
Opening time: Daily 7.30am–4.30pm
Price: ¥20
Address: On Feilai Feng, 3km west of the lake (bus #7 from Yuefei Mu)
Deep inside the Feilai Feng tourist area, Lingyin Si (Temple of the Soul's Retreat) is one of the biggest temple complexes in China. Founded in 326 AD by Hui Li, who is buried nearby, it was the largest and most important monastery in Hangzhou and once had three thousand monks, nine towers, eighteen pavilions and 75 halls and rooms. Today it is an attractive working temple with daily services, usually in the early morning or after 3pm.
In the 1940s the temple was so badly riddled with woodworm that the main crossbeams collapsed onto the statues; the eighteen-metre-high Tang statue of Sakyamuni is a replica, carved in 1956 from 24 pieces of camphorwood. Elsewhere in the temple, the old frequently brushes against the new – the Hall of the Heavenly King contains four large and highly painted Guardians of the Four Directions made in the 1930s, while the Guardian of the Buddhist Law and Order, who shields the Maitreya, was carved from a single piece of wood eight hundred years ago.