Gilt-bronze Seated Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva of Seonunsa Temple, Gochang

This is a statue of Ksitigarbha, or the Bodhisattva of Great Vows, who took on the responsibility of rescuing unfortunate beings from hell and vowed to postpone Buddhahood until all beings are saved from the world of suffering. It is presumed to have been made in the early period of the Joseon dynasty (1392-1910).

There is a band across its head, and its neck and chest are decorated with an elaborate necklace. There is a square-shaped buckle for fastening the robe depicted on the left shoulder. The wide, flat face and the formal horizontal folds of the clothes are characteristic of Buddhist statues made in the early period of the Joseon dynasty.

This statue was stolen in 1936 during the Japanese colonial period (1910-1945) and returned to Seonunsa Temple two years later. Related to this incident, there is a legend about the miraculous power of the statue. The statue, which was sold to Japan after the theft, appeared intermittently in the dreams of the Japanese man who had purchased it, ordering him to return the statue to its home at Dosolsan Mountain in Gochang. The man disregarded these dreams, but his fortune gradually declined, and he became ill. The statue changed hands various times, and each time, the new owner met this same fate. Finally, the last owner contacted the police station in Gochang and requested them to take the bodhisattva statue to be enshrined, so in November 1938, the monks of Seonunsa Temple and the Gochang Police went to Japan and retrieved it.

The photograph above was taken at that time to commemorate the return of the statue (Photograph 1), and the back of the photograph bears a brief written explanation of what happened to the statue until it was returned (Photograph 2).

Source: Korea Heritage Service signboard ↗ · collected 2026-10-08