Han'Shan'Si or the Cold Mountain Temple is located in a small town named Feng'Qiao'Zhen or Maple Bridge on the outskirt of Suzhou, at a distance of some 3.5 km from chang Gate. First built between A.D501 and A.D.519 in the Liang Dynasty of the Period of the Six DYNASTIES IN Chinese history, it was initially named Miao'Li'Pu'Ming'Ta'Yuan which presumably is a transliteration of a Sanskrit phrase.
It is said that in the Tang Dynasty(618-907) two famous monks from Tiantai Mountain in today's Zhejiang Province were given charge of the temple and the name was then changed to Han'Shan'Si. Interestingly, it was perhaps the poem entitled "mooring by Fengqiao at Night" by Zhang Ji the Tang poet that made the temple a widely known tourist attraction in the world. Zhang Ji's poem runs as follows, as translated by Wu Juntao:

The crows caw to the falling moon; the frosty air fills the sky.
The fisher's lights gleam, the maples croon; with much sorrow I lie.
On the outskirts of Suzhou Town; from Han Shan Temple, Hark!
The idnight vesper bells come down, wafting to the rover's bark..

Sitting on the bank of the Grand Canal between Maple Bridge and River Village Bridge ( Jiang'Cun'Qiao), the temple has high and spacious halls that are neatly laid out. Within the walls of the temple are tall, venerable-looking pines under which flower-bordered paths lead to secluded recesses. When the temple bell is tolling, the deep strokes reverberate in the halls, mixing with the deep-toned chants of the monks and evoking thus solemn and reverent feelings in all that are present. In its long history, the temple has more than once been destroyed by fire, its influence now rising and now declining. The present teple was built towards the end of the Qing Dynasty at the time of Emperors GuangXu and XuanTong. The main architectural structures include the main hassll, the hall with a circular gallery, the sutra library, the bell tower a pavilion tower known as Feng'Jiang'Lou or Maple River Tower, etc., with many celebrated inscribed tablets scattered here and there and of course the well-known ancient bronze bell.

Before the temple gate stands a saffron yellow screen wall. On the gate is hung a horizontal board inscribed with Gu'Han'Shan'Si or the Ancient Cold Mountain Temple. Inside the temple gate, once one walks past a screen with carved images of Buddha in the front hall there come into view two statues on a huge lotus-shaped base, both with dishevelled hair and bare chests and unshold feet, one having in hand a ritual bottle and the other a lotus flower. These are the images of Monk Han Shan and Monk Shi De, both wearing broad smiles on their faces and looking extremely unworldly. There are many anecdotes and stories about the personal history of these two religious figures. One story has it that an old monk on Tiantai Mountain had at different times come upon in some desolate mountains two abandoned infants. He took them back to his temple where they were brought up. Not knowing who their parents were, he named one Han'Shan which means cold mountain and the other Shi De which means pick up since they were picked up in wild and desolate mountains. Later the two boys worked extremely hard in cultivating themselves, in the end becoming very accomplished buddhist monks. In the course of their travels they arrived at Suzhou where they assumed charge of the Cold Mountain Temple.

There is another story about the two monks. According to this one, the two were orphan brothers who had lived together since early childhood, relying on each other for survival. Later the elder one became a butcher by trade and the younger one his help. Living together in a village, they both remained unmarried although they were over 30, as they were very poor. Then a match-maker found a girl for the elder one from a neighbouring village, a poor girl without parents and siblings who could provide her with a dowry. Consequently, the only thing she had to give a wedding reception was the couple of pigs she had raised. As the bridegroom and his brother were the only butchers available in the region, they were asked to come and do the butchering for her. They came in apparent high spirits. After the killing and dressing was done, the elder one told his brogher to tidy up the thing and himself left in a hurry for a butchering job elsewhere. Hardly had he walked out of the village when it occurred to him that he had left his bristle scraper behind. He hurried back to get it and as he was drawing near the door of the girl's house he heard his brother and the girl talking to each other in a sobbing voice. He heard his brother say to the girl," my borther is a kins, honest man. He knows nothing about our love for each other. If he does, he definitely will not try and break us up. The only thing I can do now is to leave here and become a monk somewhere." It was only then that the elder brother realized that the girl had long been his brother's sweetheart. So he decided there and then to leave the place for good. Shortly afterwards he became a monk at Miao'Li'Pu'Ming'Ta'Yuan. He gave himself the Buddhist name Han Shan to show his determination to sever all earthly ties and remain for life in a cold mountain.

When the younger one failed to see his brother come home, he went everywhere looking for him A few years later, he came to Suzhou. When someone told him that he was almost a look-alike of the abbot at the Colod Mountain Temple, he went at once to the temple. On his way, he picked up for luck a lotus leaf and a lotus flower from a roadside pond. On arrival there, he found that the said abbot was indeed his elder brother whom he had missed so much. When Monk Han Shan saw his brother, he presented him with Buddhist vegegarian food. They smiled lovingly at each other and talked affectionately together. The younger brother decided to stay on in the temple and become a monk too. The elder one thought that it was a great reunion after losing contact with each other for so many years, feeling as though he had picked up his brother accidentally somewhere. So he gave his younger brother accidentally somewhere. So he gave his younger brother accidentlly somewhere. So he gave his younger brother the Buddhist name Shi De or Pick up. The stone tabletin the temple today with the carved images of Han Shan and Shi De was set up in commenmoration of the meeting. The images were based on a painting depicting the meeting by Luo Pin of the Qing Dynasty who was among the eight dubbed the Eight Unconventional Artists of Yangzhou.In the picture one of the two brothers has in hand a lotus leaf and a lotus flower while the other holds before him a box containing Buddhist fare. In the Chinese language, lotus and box are homnyms, both being pronounced as "he". As hehe in Chinese means living in harmony together, the two brothers are often referred to as He'He'-Er'Xian or the two deities of peace and harmony.

Visitors to the Cold Mountain Temple, especially those from Japan, are very much interested in the poem by Zhang Ji and the ancient bronze bell. It is a popular belief among the japanese that if the temple bell is tolled 108 times at midnight on New Year's Eve, then all earthly worries can be done away with and a good future be ensured. In recent years, large numbers of Japanese tourists came to the Cold Mountain Temple on New Year's Eve to listen to the bells. At 11:40 pm on that day, the abbot would walk up the bell tower to ring in the new year. At the 108th stroke, it would be 0:00 am. On the odt on New Year's Day. Instantly the Japanese tourists would burst out cheering nad hurrahing in delight.

But the bell mentioned in the Tang Dynasty poem is no longer there in the temple, owing ot what happened to the temple in its long histroy. In the Ming Dynasty, between 1522 and 1565 to be exact, a new bell of a huge size was cast and a bell tower was erected. It is said that in casting bronze bells the ancient Chinese were very particular about the formula for mixing different metals together. Generally it was five parts copper and one part tin and this was the formula follwed in making the bell of the Cold Mountain Temple. In this way, the vibrations of a bell would be low while the reasonance would be enhanced, the sounds carried far and the tone quality constant. The Ming Dynasty bell was said to give a rich, sonorous vibration when struck and the sound could be heard miles away. Towards the end of Ming, the bell had somehow found its way to Japan.

Between 1875 and 1909 in the Qing Dynasty, a new bell of enormous size was cast on the model of the Ming bell, and the bell tower was rebuilt ot house it. This new bell tower which is the one we see today is a two-storey, six-sided structure, of an elegant, distinctive desigh. The bell measures two metres high, with a girth that takes three pairs of outstretched arms to encircle and itgives forth the same mellow, sonorous sounds as its predecessor. In the temple there is another bronze bell which is hung to the right of the main palace. This is one of the twin bells made by some Japanese craftsmen with money donated by Buddhist believers in 1906. the other remains in Japan in Guanshan Temple.

About the bell of the Cold Mountain Temple there is a story being circulated among the residents of Suzhou. It is said that after a torrential downpour one year an ancient bell was seen bobbing up and down in the river before the temple. As it rose and fell with the currents, the bell sometimes banged against the stone-paved banks, giving pleasant ringing sounds. As there was no bell at the temple, the monks believed this must be a divine gift from heaven and so set about getting it out of the water. This came to the ear of the two abbots in charge, Han Shan and Shi De, and they came to the river to see what had happened. Before them was a huge bell lying stranded in the shoal. In spite of efforts of the monks to haulit up the bank, it simply refused to budge. With a green bamboo stalk in hand, Shi De then jumped into the bell. With a push against the bank with his bamboo stalk, the bell was punted off into deeper waters. Surprsingly, once the bell reached deeper waters, it started moving off down the river, gathering speed as it went. Meanwhile, Shi De was sitting in the bell which then took him overseas to a stange place. When the natives found it was a Chinese monk that had come with the bell, they gave the stranger a hearty welcome. With their village. The green bamboo stalk Shi De stuck in the fields nearby and before long a bamboo grove was found growing lushly there. Shi De then resumed his practice of Buddhism, tolling the bell and doing obeisance to Buddha from day to day.

Meanwhile, Han Shan missed his brother very much as the latter seemed to have disappeared for good. It was not long, however, before his ears were greeted with the low, lingering notes of a distant bell. He listened attentively and soom came to the conclusion that these were the notes of that divine bell that had carried Shi De away. He was overjoyed and asked the monks of his temple ot go begging for donations so that a bronze bell could be cast for the Cold Mountain Temple, hoping that its strokes could reach the ears of Shi De. Han Shan then had some artisans cast a bell after the model of the divine bell. This he hung in the bell tower and every night when silence regned all over he would go and toll the bell to convey his deep longings for his borther. Cast in imitation of the divine bell, the new bell gave a sonorous vibration with notes that could be carried over great distances. As the popular saying goes, "tolled in one place and heard everywhere'. It is said that Shi De in the distant land would in the dead of night hear the bells from Suzhou and know that his brother Han Shan was sending his regards. To every faint sound of the distant bell he would respond with a toll from his own. In this way the two brothers, although separated by long distances, were able to communicated their deep and sincere feelings to each other by tolling their bells, according to the story, the place where Shi De found himself was today's Japan.

For more than a thousand years, Zhang Ji's poem about midnight bells has struck a responsive chord deep in the hearts of all his readers. A couple of years ago, a group of Japanese Buddhists visited Shanghai. During their tea break at the Jade Buddha Temple, they put the following question to the abbot:" According to Buddhist ritual, there should be matin bells and vesper drums. But why in China are bells also tolled in the night?" with a smile, the abbot took out a tablet rubbing of Zhang Ji's poem. "mooring by Feng'Qiao at Night." Although nothing more was said, the Japanese monks felt enlightened.

The Cold Mountain Temple is world-famous for its collection of inscribed stone tablets of which the one best known should be that inscribed with Zhang Ji's poem. The original carved inscription based on the calligraphy of Wen Zhengming of the Ming Dynasty was cracked by fire with the result that the inscription is now hardly legible. Thecarved inscription one sees now in the temple was done by Yu Yue the celebrated textual critic of late Qing. Yu's calligraphy has since his day been treasured by connoisseurs as it is characterized by forceful strokes that are brimming over with great inner strength. During the was against Japanese aggression and just before Suzhou fell to the invaders the local people made an imitation piece of the original inscribed tablet which they had buried deep underground for protection. In this way the original tablet with a carved inscription of Yu Yue's calligraphy has been preserved to this day. In addition to this, there are in the temple other valuable inscribed tablets such as those by Yue Fei the Song general, Tang Yin the Ming scholar, Dong Qichang the Ming calligrapher-minister, and so on and so forth.