Lingquan Temple 灵泉寺

About Lingquan Temple

Per the temple's own gazetteer, its first name, Shengfo Temple, followed the discovery of a stone Buddha image at the site after a three-day fog; it was renamed Zisheng Chan Monastery in 1008 and Lingquan Temple in 1490, and was listed as a Sichuan provincial key protected temple in 1958. The name Lingquan ('sacred spring') derives from a spring at the summit, now located beneath the lotus pedestal in the Guanyin Hall. The scenic area's forest cover reaches 93.3 percent, with close to ten thousand protected red-sandalwood trees, century-old cypresses, nanmu and banyan trees.

The lower temple's main hall was built in 1490, with a double-eaved xieshan roof entirely supported by dougong brackets rather than beams, a painted dragon ceiling, and eave brackets carved into dragon-head and elephant-trunk shapes; the Suining tourism bureau's page describes it as nicknamed 'Lu Ban Hall' for its craftsmanship and of significant value for the study of historic architecture. It also holds ten Ming-dynasty murals.

The upper temple's current buildings are reconstructions, centered on the Guanyin Hall, which displays a plaque inscribed by the Qing-dynasty official Lin Zexu and an inscription by the Song-dynasty scholar Su Dongpo still carved on a stone wall. The summit's seven-story, 49-meter Guanyin Pavilion, built in an antique style, opened to visitors in 2002 and is the scenic area's highest point and the center of the temple's Buddhist activities.

On the Guanyin-related festival days each lunar year, large numbers of devotees hold folk religious gatherings at both Guangde and Lingquan temples, drawing pilgrims from surrounding provinces, dozens of nearby counties and parts of Southeast Asia; the tourism bureau's page describes the scale as rare nationally and estimates nearly a million visitors.

What to look for

• the lower temple's Ming-dynasty main hall, its beam-less dougong-bracket roof structure known locally as 'Lu Ban Hall'
• the ten Ming-dynasty murals in the main hall
• the Guanyin Hall's Lin Zexu plaque and Su Dongpo's stone-carved inscription
• the summit's seven-story Guanyin Pavilion, the scenic area's highest point
• the named natural features include the Sanskrit Sound Pavilion's three wells, the Guandao Cypress, the Intertwined-Root Tree and the Guanyin Cypress

Location & getting there

Getting to Lingquan Temple

Check which interiors and courtyards are accessible. Active places of worship and protected monuments may have different visitor rules.

• Search for 灵泉寺 with 遂宁市 and 船山区.