SOKKURAM

Situated on the ridge of the mountain T'oham which was the object of awe of Shilla people for its closer location to the capital than other great mountains of Shilla (Kyeryongsan, Chirisan, T'aebaeksan, P'algongsan), Sokkuram was constructed at the lOth year of King Kyongdok (751) under the name of Sogbulsa by the prime minister Kim Dae-Song as a part of the buflding of Pulkuksa.
According to Samgukyusa by Ilyon (monk in Koryo dynasty), Kim Dae-Song was born to a poor family and thanks to his offering of farm to a temple he was reincarnated as a son of a highbrow Kim Mun-ryang.

Growing up, and hunting bear in the mountain T'oham, he was impressed by something invisible and unknown and he raised Pulkuksa for his parents of this world and Sogbulsa for his parents of the other world. But it is impossible to know how the original form of Sokkuram was, because there is no precise record left.  

Judging from the diary Udam Chong Shiham wrote during his stay at Sokkuram in 1688, "Sokkuram is an artificial architecture." Several statues of Buddha are engraved on the rocks on both sides outside stone gate and their ingenuity is beyond description. Stone gates are carved into a rainbow and in the gate lies a great stone statue like a thing alive.

The stone prop is uniformity and ingenuity itself. The lid stone and other stones on the cave are round and standing to be wellbalanced. The statues of Buddha standing along look alive and their grotesque images don't allow me to guess their names. Such spectacle is very rare", Sokkuram was preserved well until then.

But as national power declines and dark clouds of ruin are hanging over, the incense burner is put off and dilapidated, and this dilapidation persisted as Japanese colonial rule began.

It is in the colonial rule period that the beautiful marble pagoda which is said to have been located behind the principal statue of Buddha and two Buddhist images in the space were lost and Japanese repaired Sokkuram three times.

Through Japanese lavished much money for the care of S6kkuram for its beauty, their lack of background of profound principle of Sokkuram construction resulted in much damage to Sokkuram.

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