Geungnagam Hermitage (Gangwon)

This description was machine-translated from the Korea Tourism Organization's Korean original.

For Geungnakam, from the checkpoint in Daedae-ri, Ganseong, go about 2 kilometers toward Jinburyeong and there is a signpost on the right. From that signpost, following the village inner road and then a wooded path around a mountain bend, a modest and warmly familiar temple evocative of a mother’s embrace sits quietly amid an old pine grove. In the past, Geungnakam stood about 2 kilometers northwest of Geonbongsa and was a practice place for bhikkhuni (Buddhist nuns). It was founded in Myojeok-dong in 945 and was destroyed by a forest fire in 1878 together with Geonbongsa, but was rebuilt the following year. Until the Japanese colonial period it comprised a total of 49 kan including a one-kan Sansingak, making it the largest among Geonbongsa and its five mountain hermitages. It was a practice place where about 50 bhikkhuni lived together and was also used as a dormitory for female students who had come from afar to study at Bongmyeong School. The former site lies within the Civilian Control Line today, so access is impossible, and only the site remains about 1 kilometer beyond the northwestern ridge behind Geonbongsa’s Daeungjeon. In the past there was even a road between Geonbongsa and the hermitage wide enough for ox carts. After liberation it lay north of the 38th parallel, making normal religious activity impossible, and the bhikkhuni of Geungnakam scattered in all directions. Bhikkhuni Beopseon, who had lived at Geungnakam, newly built Geungnakam in 1956 at Gwangsan 3-ri, Ganseong-myeon, then relocated it in 1962 to the present site at 280 Gyodong-ri, Ganseong-eup (Hambak-dong), becoming today’s Geungnakam. (Source: Goseong-gun Office Culture and Tourism website)