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Lord Enma and Lord Jizo, or Hell in Shinjuku. That is only possible at a dusty small temple called Taisoji, standing in the middle of rows of boring flats.

[The Enma statue, from the temple's pamphlet]

Enma has remained strictly Chinese in Japan. The Judge of Hell has remained a gaijin, perhaps because his kind of black-and-white instruction about hell and punishment does not appeal to the Japanese. In Taisoji, as everywhere in Japan, Enma still wears his Chinese crown and garb and looks a bit funny, like a judge from a puppet play. Even his anger is not believable.

The Taisoji statue was one of the Three Enma Statues of Edo. It sits in a hall of its own - you have to push a light switch to see him. He is 550 cm tall and dates from 1814, but was heavily restored after the real hell of the Great Kanto Earthquake shook up his toy-hell. His festival days were the 16th of January and the 16th of July and then shop boys in all of Edo would have a day off (their only holidays in the year).

[The Enma Hall]

The temple goes back to a meditation hut, Taiso-an, built here by a priest of that name in 1596. Gradually it developed into a temple, taking on more functions in the Naito-Shinjuku post station along the Koshu Highway, such as caring for the graves of the Naito Lords. In 1668, it officially became a temple thanks to a gift of land by the Naito clan.

[The bronze Jizo statue, one of Edo's Six Jizo]

Edo not only had Three Enma statues, the six routes leading out of the city were all graced by large bronze statues of Jizo, the Bodhisattva who can be your guide through hell - or on travels in this world. The Taisoji Jizo is one of those Six Jizo and is 267 cm tall; he dates from 1712. The statue stands immediately right of the temple gate and is no beauty - although the wickerwork hat is quite original as Jizo statues go. We’re all travelers, after all.

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See my article about Ennoji and its Judge of Hell in Kamakura