A hakoguruma for a parent and child

Six old carts called hakoguruma remain on the Shikoku 88 pilgrimage: three at Byodoji, and one each at Daihoji (temple 44), Eifukuji (temple 57), and Okuboji (temple 88).

A hakoguruma is a wooden box large enough for a person to fit inside, fitted with wheels. Someone who could not walk rode inside while another person pulled or pushed it. It served the role of what we now call a wheelchair.

This page introduces the hakoguruma of Tsutsui Rinnosuke, kept in the main hall of Byodoji, based on the written account preserved at the temple.

At first glance, the hakoguruma at Byodoji looks like a small, weathered wooden hut. Tsutsui Rinnosuke, a blacksmith from Tosa Jizoji village (now Jizoji, Tosa Town, Tosa District, Kochi Prefecture), and his father Fukuji dedicated it to Byodoji in 1923.

Originally it had three wheels and a handle, and was pulled from the front like a rickshaw. The front panel is latticed glass.

According to the temple's account, in 1921 Rinnosuke, then thirty-one, developed a spinal illness. His lower body went numb and walking became difficult. His father Fukuji was fifty-four at the time. He took his son to many doctors and tried various treatments, but there was no recovery and the condition gradually worsened. Two years later the paralysis had reached the upper body, and Rinnosuke could no longer even use crutches.

Fukuji built a hakoguruma, placed Rinnosuke in it, and set out on the Shikoku pilgrimage, beginning at Kiyotakiji, temple 35.

In October 1923, father and son travelled through Ehime, Kagawa, and Tokushima in order and arrived at Byodoji, temple 22. They stayed at the temple for four weeks. Rinnosuke drank the Kobo spring water that rises at the temple and received kaji prayers from Taniguchi Shinryo, the head priest at the time.

One day, Rinnosuke recovered enough to walk with a single kongozue, the pilgrim's staff. The hakoguruma, no longer needed, was dedicated to Yakushi Nyorai, the principal Buddha, and Rinnosuke is said to have walked the remaining temples on his own feet and returned home to Tosa.

Some recent guidebooks to the Shikoku pilgrimage say that people who could not walk were abandoned by their families, put in a hakoguruma, and carried off to the next village. That is not what this hakoguruma is. A father built it for his son, and the two travelled Shikoku together in it.

Hakoguruma are also kept at Daihoji (temple 44), Eifukuji (temple 57), and Okuboji (temple 88). For the hakoguruma at Eifukuji and Okuboji, see the following pages.

The hakoguruma in the main hall is the record of Rinnosuke, who could no longer walk, and of his father Fukuji, who built the cart and pulled it. Byodoji offers prayers for healthy legs and hips in connection with this account.