I had heard several times about Keumsan-sa temple near Kimjae where Byeokgol-Jae reservoir was located in.
Strangely enough, it was my first time to visit Keumsan-sa temple, even though I have traveled this area for several times before.
As I had posted before, the temples in this area were completely destroyed during the Japanese Invasion 1592 - 1597 AD.
It was not certain when this temple was built at first. But according to the record, the articles on this temple was found in the history of late Baekjae Dynasty.
Unlike other temple, I could drive very near to the temple.
It was hot summer, so it was happy for me not to walk for a long distance.
The first gate I could see was the Geumgang gate.
Here, Geumgang means the Diamond.
In Korean Buddhism, Geumgang seemed having various meaning.
In this case of Geumgang gate, Geumgang statue means strong power protecting Buddha and Buddha’s teaching.
With these two Geumgang statues, there were two children appearances of Bodhisattva.
I don’t know the reason why they arranged Geumgang statues and Bodhisattva statues together in one place.
I have looked around the Geumgang gate in many temples, but I didn’t have any questions on that.
In my guess, they put up those two contradictory characters of statues in same place to make the balance and the harmony between the strong and the weakness, the power and the wisdom.
The reason I guess so is the balance and the harmony seem the core of Buddhist thought in my opinion.