Yusanji Temple located in Muramatsu, Fukuroi City, Shizuoka Pref. is a temple belonging to Chizan school of the Shingon sect. The principal object of worship is Yakushi Nyorai. The temple name “Yusan (the mountain of oil)” originates in the episode that in 701, when the master monk Gyoki established the temple and placed the statue of Yakushi Nyorai to pray for national peace and people’s health, oil gushed from the ground.
Legend has it that in 749, when Empress Koken, who had suffered from an eye disease, prayed for curing of the disease at this temple and washed her eyes with water taken from the Ruri Waterfall in the precinct, she was completely cured. Thereafter the empress visited the temple as the Imperial prayer temple. The temple is believed to have the power to cure diseases, especially the ones in eyes. The guardian deity of the temple, Gunzenbo Daigongen, has been worshipped as the deity of strong legs by travelers along the Tokaido Road.
The temple gate, the vermillion three-story pagoda, the zushi (miniature Buddhist shrine) to enshrine Yakushi Nyorai in the main hall are all designated important cultural properties.