In the study of Buddhist architecture before the Goryeo Dynasty, the analysis of sectarian viewpoints is one of the effective means. In the study of Buddhist architecture before the Goryeo Dynasty, analyzing from the point of view of a Buddhism sect is one of the effective means. Until now, compared to the importance of the Beopsang school before the Goryeo period in the field of research on the history of Buddhist architecture, research on its temples was the least compared to those of other denominations. In this study, as one of the studies on Beopsang school temples, Geumsansa(金山寺), Beopjusa(法住寺), and Donghwasa(桐華寺), which were built as the Jinpyo’s Beopsang school temple in the late 8th century and maintained until the Goryeo Dynasty, were targeted. And I tried a rudimentary analysis on the building composition of those temples from the viewpoint of the beliefs and teachings of Beopsang school. This study is meaningful in that it is the first attempted study in the field of architectural history on the Buddhist temple of the Beopsang school, which led non-Zen sects of Buddhism along with the Hwaeom school until the Goryeo Dynasty.

The purpose of this study is to clarify the characteristics of Zen Buddhist temple’s building composition of the Northern Song dynasty, through the analysis of literature historical material, such as Seonwon chenggyu(禪苑淸 規), Cham cheontae odaesan gi (參天台五臺山記) and so on. The building composition method of Zen Buddhist temple in Northern Song dynasty, which grasped from the Seonwon chenggyu, reflects the actual situation of the temples in that time. And it was ascertained that, the Zen Buddhist temple’s building composition of the Northern Song dynasty was basically same to that of Southern Song dynasty. And the comparative analysis was attempted between Zen Buddhist temples and that of other Buddhism sect described in Cham cheontae odaesan gi. From this analysis, the common features as Buddhism temple and the characteristics of building composition as Zen Buddhist temple was clarified.