🏮 Tanabata Yoshinoyama Renge E

七夕吉野山蓮華会

Yoshino, Nara (Kinpusenji Temple) · Every year on 7 July

Summer festival

296 days to go
Rooms around Yoshino, Nara fill up while the festival is on.

Renge-e, one of the three major events at Kinpusenji Temple in Yoshino, Nara Prefecture, is held each year on July 7, the Tanabata festival, centered on the Zao Hall. It has long been performed as a Buddhist rite offering pure lotus flowers to Zao Gongen; the flowers are gathered from Benchi Pond in Okuda, Yamatotakada, where it is said the ascetic En no Gyoja used the water for his first bath. On the day, the lotus-gathering ritual begins at 10:00 a.m. at the Okuda Lotus Pond in Yamatotakada, and the Saitodai Goma offering is held from noon. At 12:30, a frog drum float carrying a large frog departs from in front of Chikurin-in and parades to the Zao Hall. At the Renge-e and Frog-Leaping rite from 4:00 p.m., after the ceremony the frog-leaping ritual is performed, and a rare event can be seen in which the presiding priest's precepts cause the frog to return to human form.

Getting there

From Kintetsu Yoshino Line Yoshino Station, take the Yoshinoyama Ropeway to Sanjo Station, then walk about 10 minutes. Alternatively, from Yoshino Station, take a Nara Kotsu bus bound for Nakasenbon and get off at Kinpusenji, which is right there.