Zenkō-ji ［善光寺］: A temple in Nagano Prefecture, Japan, affiliated with the Tendai and the Pure Land (Jōdo) schools. Built in the seventh century, it enshrines a statue of Amida Buddha flanked by those of the bodhisattvas Perceiver of the World’s Sounds and Great Power. According to this temple’s tradition, the statue was Japan’s first Buddhist image, sent by King Sŏngmyŏng of the Korean kingdom of Paekche to the Japanese emperor Kimmei in 552 (the traditionally accepted date for the formal introduction of Buddhism to Japan). The Mononobe clan, who opposed Buddhism and claimed it to be the cause of epidemics, repeatedly discarded the statue. According to tradition, however, it was retrieved each time by the Soga clan, the pro-Buddhist faction. In 602 the statue was transported to Shinano Province (present-day Nagano Prefecture) and enshrined in 642 at Zenkō-ji temple, which was built that year.