Heaven Kings Gate and The Ruined Pace of the Wooden Pagoda.

The first gate was the heaven kings’ gate.
There were no other gate in this temple like one pillar gate.
You need to make a friend with Heaven kings in this world to enter the paradise easily in afterlife. If you are not friendly with them, it might’ve been not easy to enter the Buddhist paradise.

As walking through the gate, there was a ruined place of the wooden pagoda which had been built in Shilla dynasty.

The roof debris was piled in front of the ruined place.
That must’ve been the parts of the wooden pagoda.

The only thing left through the destruction was the corner stones.
Among those corner stones, the central stone is said the most important.
The record relating to the pagoda history and the relics were found under the central stones in other temples. But there was no explanation on that.

What attracted my attention was a stone structure near the ruined place.
It was similar to Sot Dae which was wooden birds looking at the polar bear where was the place our souls were resting after the death according to Korean traditional ancient religion.

It might be a first time for me to see Sot Dae in Buddhist temple. Even though ancient Korean people accepted Buddhism as their religion, the traditional religion still remain in our daily life as being seen in Sot Dae in Buddhist temple.