The Bronze Pagoda of Yen Tu

A structure weighing 70 tons stands on a mountaintop 1,068 meters high. Getting it there was the challenge. There was no road for vehicles and no modern machinery, only a stone path and human strength.

The builders of Chùa Đồng, the Bronze Pagoda on the summit of Yên Tử, had to meet that challenge. Every part of it was cast by hand at the foot of the mountain. The casting fell to craftsmen from Ý Yên, in Nam Định, an area famous for traditional bronze casting. Once the casting was done, the pieces were taken apart one by one. Then they were carried to the summit by a system of cable pulleys set at six points, with a team of hired porters. On June 3, 2006, the Venerable Thích Thanh Quyết began the construction. On January 30, 2007, the pagoda was inaugurated and the Buddha statues were installed.

The design was the work of the architect Trần Quốc Tuấn, of the Institute for Monuments Conservation. The building has a T-shaped plan, a form that stands for a lotus in bloom. The pagoda itself is small. It is 4.6 meters long and 3.6 meters wide, and it rises 3.35 meters high. The floor covers just under 20 square meters. It stands on 16 bronze columns, each from 20 to 30 centimeters across. The bronze bell and the bronze chime together weigh more than 250 kilograms. Inside, the pagoda honors Shakyamuni and the Three Patriarchs of Trúc Lâm. Shakyamuni was the founder of Buddhism.

It has been called the largest bronze pagoda in Asia at such a height.

But this is not the first time a pagoda has stood on the summit of Yên Tử. The Bronze Pagoda has gone through at least four versions. The first came in the 17th century. Out of devotion, a consort of one of the Trịnh lords paid for a small shrine, with an iron frame and a bronze roof. The Trịnh lords were a noble family who dominated northern Vietnam. In 1740, a great storm wrecked the shrine, and thieves carried off what was left. The second version came in 1930, when a woman named Bùi Thị Mỹ rebuilt it in concrete reinforced with bronze. The third came in 1993, when a Buddhist named Nguyễn Sơn Nam cast a T-shaped bronze pagoda. And the present version dates from 2006.

To understand why this summit is held so sacred, it helps to know the man who bound his life to Yên Tử. Trần Nhân Tông was born in 1258, the eldest son of Emperor Trần Thánh Tông. Both belonged to the Trần dynasty, which ruled Vietnam from 1225 to 1400. In 1278 he took the throne of Đại Việt, an old name for Vietnam. Twice he led the country to victory over the armies of the Yuan, the Mongol dynasty then ruling China. In 1293, he gave up the throne to his son. In 1299, he went up Yên Tử to live as a monk, under the name Trúc Lâm Đại Sĩ. There he united the Zen schools of Buddhism of his day and founded the Trúc Lâm Yên Tử Zen school. It is the only Zen school of purely Vietnamese origin in the country's history. It joins the thought of Mahayana Buddhism with Confucian and Taoist values, and it binds faith to everyday life. In 1308, he passed away at the Ngọa Vân hermitage on Bảo Đài mountain, in his 51st year.

On July 12, 2025, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee held its 47th session in Paris. At that session, a group of monuments and landscapes was inscribed on the World Heritage List under two criteria. The group joins Yên Tử with Vĩnh Nghiêm. It also takes in Côn Sơn and Kiếp Bạc. Together they form Vietnam's ninth World Heritage Site. It stretches across the provinces of Quảng Ninh and Bắc Ninh. It also reaches into the city of Hải Phòng.

On the way up to the summit, the path passes Giải Oan Pagoda. Legend says this is where Trần Nhân Tông set up an altar to pray for the palace women, to free their souls from injustice. They had begged the emperor to return to the palace, and when he would not, they threw themselves into the stream. It is a legend, but it reflects something true: his resolve to leave the world was absolute.

Huệ Quang Tower holds the relics of the Buddha Emperor, Trần Nhân Tông. It is built of slabs of bluestone. Around it stand many tomb towers of monks and nuns, from generation after generation. Hoa Yên Pagoda is the central pagoda of the complex. Here the Trúc Lâm school grew strong under Pháp Loa, its second patriarch. The pagoda is one of the important places in the World Heritage Site.

And then comes the summit. When the clouds part, the view from 1,068 meters reaches across the wide land of Quảng Ninh. To the southeast lies the outline of Ha Long Bay.

In winter and spring, mist often wraps the pagoda from early morning. Many pilgrims climb through the night to arrive right at dawn. At that hour the bronze pagoda stands in a sea of white cloud, and the morning light falls on it. It is a sight that ordinary words cannot describe.

This is the mountain a man chose for his life as a monk, after doing everything an emperor could do. He had won. He had given it all up. And he had found what only this mountain could give him.