Quang Hoa Pagoda (Hà Nội)

Quang Hoa Pagoda is a pagoda located on Trần Bình Trọng Street, Hai Bà Trưng District, Hà Nội.

According to the stele "Quang Hoa tự thập phương bi" currently erected at Quang Hoa Pagoda, the pagoda was originally located in Quang Hoa village, to the west of Thiền Quang village (both villages are now within Thống Nhất Park). The stele, carved in the 12th year of the Tự Đức era (1860), records that the villagers of Pháp Hoa contributed money and resources to build the pagoda in 1860.

Around 1933–1934, the French colonial authorities relocated the three villages of Quang Hoa and Thiền Quang to other places to make way for road construction, and required the villagers to move to the current location.

Quang Hoa Pagoda faces south, with a tam quan (triple-arched gate), a main hall (tam bảo) in the shape of a string of pestles, consisting of a front hall with 7 bays, a rear sanctuary with 5 bays, a patriarchs' house with 10 bays, two rows of side houses, each with 10 bays, and a stupa garden. The pagoda currently preserves many artefacts and ancient statues in the artistic style of the 19th century, which are of great value. In 1989, the pagoda and its associated heritage cluster were classified as a scenic relic by the Ministry of Culture and Information. Quang Hoa Pagoda has a stele carved in 1880 that recounts the construction of the pagoda. The cluster of three pagodas—Thiền Quang, Quang Hoa, and Pháp Hoa—stand side by side at numbers 31–33.

Notably, the gate of Quang Hoa Pagoda features a unique system of parallel sentences (câu đối). The name of the pagoda appears in both lines of the couplets, either at the beginning or in the middle:

Parallel sentence in Nôm:

QUANG (Radiance) of the scenery is lush, at the Buddha's gate, people from the eight directions find ease;

HOA (Fragrance) is pervasive, on the worldly path, guests from the ten directions rejoice.

Parallel sentences in Han script:

蓮座光生長引金繩開覺路；

池塘花映接來寶筏渡迷津。

On the lotus seat, QUANG arises, long drawing the golden cord to open the path of enlightenment;

By the pond, HOA reflects, welcoming the precious raft to ferry across the sea of delusion.

無邊光景一時新，山水縈迴成畫本；

不盡花香三界舊，竹松幽雅獲清修。

Boundless QUANG (radiance) and scenery, all at once renewed, mountains and rivers winding like a painting;

Endless HOA (fragrance) of flowers, as of the three realms of old, bamboo and pine in tranquil elegance, attaining pure cultivation.

僧到佛來，光被萬家千古燭；

地靈天寶，花開十仗四辰蓮。

When monks arrive and Buddhas come, QUANG (light) shines on ten thousand homes, illuminating for a thousand ages;

The land is sacred and heaven bestows treasures, HOA (flowers) bloom ten trượng high, lotuses of all four seasons.