Hongluo Temple 红螺寺

About Hongluo Temple

Its Buddhist compound forms one part of a wider religious landscape that also includes Guanyin Temple and the Five Hundred Arhat Garden. That combination gives visitors a choice between a focused lower-temple visit and a more extensive hillside outing. Begin with the principal temple, then decide whether the arhat garden or the higher Guanyin area better matches your interests and energy. The mountain setting is central to the experience, but a full climb is not necessary to appreciate the temple’s place within it.

The temple was founded in 338 during the Eastern Jin dynasty by the monk Fotudeng (佛图澄), a teacher from the Western Regions who received official approval to ordain Chinese disciples under the Later Zhao rulers. It rose to prominence in the Tang dynasty as Daming Temple (大明寺) and was renamed Huguo Zifu Chan Temple (护国资福禅寺) in the Ming Zhengtong era; according to local tradition, its common name reflects a legend of a red-snail fairy. In 1694 the Kangxi Emperor visited, after which the temple gained an imperial seat and pavilion and was substantially expanded.

The temple has long functioned as a public monastery whose abbots were often appointed by imperial order. In the Qing dynasty the monk Jixing (Mengdong) served as abbot and founded its Pure Land practice, later counted as the twelfth patriarch of the Pure Land school; in the Guangxu era the monk Yinguang studied here before founding his own practice site at Putuo, giving rise to the saying ‘south Putuo, north Hongluo.’

After 1949 the site housed a normal school until the early 1980s. Since 1988 it has been managed by the Huairou district cultural relics authority (怀柔县文化文物局), which has not returned it to the Buddhist community; it is now a Beijing municipal cultural-relics protection unit and a national AAAA-level tourist area (国家AAAA级旅游区).

What to look for

• Hongluo Temple compound: examine the main Buddhist setting at the foot of the mountain.
• Five Hundred Arhat Garden: compare the grouping of figures with the temple architecture.
• Guanyin Temple area: consider the higher religious setting as an extension when access and your group’s fitness permit.

Location & getting there

Getting to Hongluo Temple

The matched listing places the temple on Hongluo Road in Huairou, at the southern foot of Hongluo Mountain.

• Choose the main temple as your arrival point and assess any mountain extension from there; current cable-car or slide operation is not assumed.