迦葉山弥勒寺 · Shrine or temple · Numata, Gunma
Kashōzan Mirokuji
The third of Japan's great tengu mountains, with a tengu mask taller than a house and a custom of borrowing a mask and bringing two back.
Quick Facts
- Type
- Shrine or temple
- Prefecture
- Gunma · Numata
- Nearest station
- Numata Station (JR Jōetsu Line)
- From the station
- Bus about 46 minutes on weekends and holidays only, then about 45 minutes on foot uphill; by car about 30 minutes
- English signage
- some
- Opening hours and admission
- See the official site (external link) · information checked on 2026-11-03
Hours, admission and closing days change, and this site does not list them. The link goes to the place's own page, with the date we last checked it.
What is there
Mirokuji sits high on the slopes of Mount Kashō north of Numata, founded in 848 and a Zen temple since the fifteenth century. In the guardian hall hangs a tengu mask six and a half metres high with a nose nearly three metres long, said to be the largest in the country, and smaller masks by the hundred cover the walls, for the custom here is to borrow a mask, take it home, and when the wish is granted bring it back with a second one. With Takao and Kurama, this is counted as one of the three great tengu mountains. Buses from Numata run only on weekends and holidays, and the last stretch is a walk uphill.Why here
The temple’s tengu is Chūhō-sonja, the disciple who helped restore the temple in 1456 and at the end of his life became a tengu and vanished into the mountain, promising to guard it. He is the same figure as Dōryō at Saijōji: the monk whose power outgrew his body. The masks are his face, and the borrowing is the way the mountain’s guardian is taken into a house and returned.Yokai you will meet
- Tengu 天狗 — The great mask of the guardian hall and the borrowed masks; the disciple who became a tengu in 1456.
Getting there
Numata Station (JR Jōetsu Line). Bus about 46 minutes on weekends and holidays only, then about 45 minutes on foot uphill; by car about 30 minutes.
Sources and further reading
- Reliable secondary Kashōzan Mirokuji (external link) Kashōzan Mirokuji Official site: the founding in 848, the great tengu mask and the custom of borrowing masks.
- Reliable secondary Kashōzan Mirokuji (external link) Numata City Tourism Association Visiting information and the weekend bus from Numata station.
- Reliable secondary Kashozan Mirokuji Temple (external link) Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, multilingual explanation database English explanatory text on the temple and its tengu.
- Database Kashōzan (迦葉山) (external link) Wikipedia (Japanese) The mountain and its temple: Chūhō-sonja who became a tengu in 1456, the mask of 6.5 metres and the three great tengu mountains.
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