Xiangshan Temple -- The Old Temple Taking On A New Look

Xiangshan Temple , which ranked the first among the ten temples at Longmen, is situated in the middle mountainside of the East Hill. The East Longmen Hill is teemed with spices name "Xiangge", hence the name Xiangshan. Then the temple was named Xiangshan Temple. The present Xianshan Temple was reconstructed in about 1707, during the Qing Dyansty, on the basis of an old temple. In 2002, Xiangsha Temple was expanded on the basis of the Qing Xiangshan Temple by Longmen Grottoes Administration, with the Beltry, the Drum Tower, the Wing Room, the Hall of Mahavira and Hall of Nine Persons newly constructed. Besides, the Hall of Arhats, the stele of Emperor Qianlong, the belfry, the Palace of Emperor Qianlong, Wing-room, Eighten Arhats, the Villa of Jiang Jieshi and Song Meiling, the stairs, the plank roads and the bouding wall within the temple have all been remedied. A new gate was constructed to the south of the temple.

Bai Juyi, after praising the scenic beauty of Longmen as the finest in luoyang, went on saying: "Of the ten temple atrractions at Longmen, the first is Fragrant Hill." These words are indeed true. The Hill faces the Yi River and the rock grottoes on the opposite bank. As you step inside te temple gate, you are overwhelmed with a sense of quietness and seclusion. The ancient red walls and green tiles along the slopes; the zigzagging lanes of hoary gray; the melancholy tones of mountain birds heard but seen conjure up thoughts of remote antiquity and you are totally lost to the present.

Fragrant Hill Temple was built more than thirteen centuries ago, a magnificent palatial complex at the very beginning with towers and balconies which seemed to stretch out into the clouds. When Empress Wu Zetian was on the throne, she ordered the Temple extensively reparied and renovated, and she used to visit it with her ministers, always at the head of a procession of hundreds of carriages and thousands of steeds. Seated in one of the stone towers, she would order her ministers to compse poems to eulogized the temple. This was carried out in the form of a contest, in which the winners were awarded robes of brocade. Here goes the saying: "At the Fragrant Hill Temple they compse poems to win the brocade robe."

In 832 A.D., or the 6th year of the reign of Emperor Wenzone of the Tang dynasty, Bai Juyi composed an epitaph for his friend Yuan Zhen, for which he he received a handsome reward. He used the money to refurnish the Fragrant Hill Temple as a result, in his own words,"the impressive mountain pass, the beautiful dragon pool, the spring and rocks on the Hills, and the wind and moon of the stone tower will appear again as new in the eyes and ears of passer-by." Since Bai Juyi lived in his late years at Xiangshan (Fragrant Hill) near Luoyang he took the pen-name Retired Scholar of Fragrant Hill. The compsed the following lines to extol the beauty of the hills on a summer evening and show his indifference to fame and fortune:

"Wearing a silken scarf, straw sandals, and robes of thin bamboo,
I descend the Fragrant Hills on an evening, treading the grass so green.
A cool breeze accompanies me eighteen li on the road,
As reclining in a bamboo sedan I return home in my dream.

The Temple today was rebuilt in the reign of Emperor Kangxi （1654-1722）of the Qing. The survived buildings are the Great Buddha Hall, the Pagoda of the Buddhist Mantle and Alms Bowl, and a tablet with the characters "御碑" (imperial stele) in the handwriting of Emperor Qianlong (reigned 1763—96).

Fragrant Hill Temple has been largely repaired and is open to the public. Visitors linger around the relics of the Tang poetry and the Society of Nine Elders, a society formed by Bai Juyi and eight of his poet friends. Resting against the rails, a vista of grand mountains confronting each other cross the clean waters of the Yi River. The poetic beauty of the present brings back memories of a poetic past, the golden years of Chinese poetry of Bai Juyi‘s time.