Yuanbao Temple
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| Yuanbao Temple | |
|---|---|
元保宮 | |
 Yuanbao Temple, located underneath a large metal canopy | |
| Religion | |
| Deity | Baosheng Dadi |
| Location | |
| Location | North District, Taichung |
| Country | Taiwan |
 | |
| Geographic coordinates | 24°09′46″N 120°40′34″E / 24.1628°N 120.6760°E |
| Architecture | |
| Completed | 1791 |
| Direction of façade | East |
Yuanbao Temple (Chinese: 元保宮; pinyin: Yuánbǎo Gōng) is a temple located in North District, Taichung City, Taiwan. The temple is dedicated to the Taoist deity Baosheng Dadi.
Historically, the area around Yuanbao Temple was known as Laicuobu, named after Lai family from Pinghe County that settled there. The clanspeople brought a copy of Baosheng Dadi from Xintian Temple in Zhangzhou and built a temple in 1791 for the deity, with the help of the following seventeen villages:[1]
The temple had a large influence on the region and was the religious center those seventeen villages. Major renovations were done to the temple in 1846 and 1924. In 1962, the seventh-generation keeper of the temple's son formed a committee and started several expansion projects to the temple complex, which added several new halls for more deities.[1][2]
After the end of Martial law in Taiwan, in 1988, Yuanbao Temple made a pilgrimage to Baijiao Ciji Temple in Longhai District, Fujian Province, to "refill" the spiritual energy of the deity. The pilgrims believed that Baijiao Ciji Temple is the successor to Xintian Temple, but when they arrived, they did not find any evidence of this claim. Later, they traveled to the nearby Qingjiao Ciji Temple, where they found documents belonging to Xintian Temple. Hence, Yuanbao Temple recognizes the latter as its predecessor.[3][4]
