Janggyeon Panjeon of Haeinsa
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How it came to be
Haeinsa, on Mount Gaya in southern Korea, was founded in 802. It holds the Tripitaka Koreana, the entire Buddhist canon carved on some 80,000 wooden printing blocks between 1237 and 1248 as an appeal to the Buddha to protect the country from the Mongol invasions. The characters are so regular that they look like the work of a single hand.
The blocks have been at Haeinsa since 1398. The halls that hold them, the Janggyeong Panjeon, were built in the 15th century in early Joseon style: two long and two smaller buildings around a courtyard, set higher than the main hall. Natural ventilation keeps temperature and humidity steady, and has protected the blocks from insects and rodents.
The temple burned many times, but the halls survived. During the Korean War, in 1951, Colonel Kim Young-hwan of the air force was ordered to bomb the temple and refused, flying over without dropping a bomb. The halls were inscribed in 1995.
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