Buinsa, Palgongsan

Quick facts

Address

967-28 Palgongsan-ro, Dong-gu, Daegu

About this place

Buinsa stands on Palgongsan in Dong-gu, Daegu, and is taken to have been founded in the reign of Queen Seondeok, the twenty-seventh ruler of Silla. It was the repository of the Goryeo first Tripitaka. The woodblocks were first kept in the Tripitaka hall at Heungwangsa, but with repeated invasions from the north they were moved and enshrined at Buinsa on Palgongsan. In the Mongol invasion of 1232, however, the blocks were entirely destroyed. The Buinsa site is designated a monument of Daegu, and the west pagoda of Buinsa is designated tangible heritage of the city.

Origin and history

Buinsa on Palgongsan is taken to have been founded in the reign of Queen Seondeok, the twenty-seventh ruler of Silla.

The temple was the repository of the Goryeo first Tripitaka. The woodblocks were first kept in the Tripitaka hall at Heungwangsa, but with repeated invasions from the north they were moved and enshrined at Buinsa.

In the Mongol invasion of 1232, however, the blocks were entirely destroyed.

The Buinsa site is designated a monument of Daegu, and the west pagoda is designated tangible heritage of the city.

What it is locally associated with

• Origin

  Blocks moved for safety

  The woodblocks were first kept at Heungwangsa but were moved here and enshrined as invasions from the north continued.

  documented history

• Origin

  Destroyed in 1232

  In the Mongol invasion of 1232 the woodblocks were entirely destroyed.

  documented history

• What people do here

  The ground and a pagoda

  The Buinsa site is a monument of Daegu, and the west pagoda is designated tangible heritage of the city.

  documented history

The woodblocks came to this temple for safety. Kept at first in the Tripitaka hall at Heungwangsa, they were moved here and enshrined when invasions from the north kept coming. Then, in the Mongol invasion of 1232, all of them burned. They were lost at the place they had been moved to for keeping.

What happened afterwards is told by another page on this site. The Tripitaka woodblocks held at Haeinsa in Hapcheon were carved with the intent of turning back the Mongol invasions. The set that burned here was the first; the set that stands there is the one that followed. Two temples’ pages divide one loss and its sequel between them.

Daegu’s temples return often to hiding and moving. The relics at Yongyeonsa in Dalseong were evacuated to Myohyangsan to escape the Imjin War and were divided on the way back; Eunjeoksa on Apsan takes its name from a cave where Wang Geon hid for three days. This temple is the case where the moving did not save the thing.

What remains now is ground and a pagoda. The site is a city monument and the west pagoda is city tangible heritage.

Related guides

• How to visit a Korean templeHands together and hands folded, how the bows work, and what to do at the threshold of a hall. Starting with what is different from visiting a Japanese shrine.
• The small hall behind the main one — sansingak and samseonggakUphill from the main hall of a Korean temple stands a smaller one, and inside it an old man with a tiger. This is where the indigenous religion sits, inside the Buddhist institution.
• Templestay — a night at a templeA programme that puts you inside a temple’s own timetable for a day or two. What you do, which type to book, and what to be ready for.
• Prayer sites and the one wishThe three great Gwaneum sites, the five relic halls, and the crowds before the entrance exam. Where the saying about one wish comes from, and where the record stops.

Sources

1. 팔공산 부인사(八公山 符仁寺) — 한국민족문화대백과사전 (accessed 2026-08-16)