The temple's elaborate 1:10 scale model of a shogun's mausoleum was displayed at the 1910 Japan-British Exhibition in London, then gifted to King George V and stored in the Royal Collection for over a century before returning to Zojoji in 2015.

Six Tokugawa shoguns are buried here, and the temple once covered 826,000 square meters with 48 attached temples and 3,000 resident priests—making it one of the most powerful Buddhist centers in Edo-period Japan.

Painter Kano Kazunobu spent 10 years creating 100 scrolls depicting 500 arhats' daily lives—bathing, studying, floating over hellish scenes—before dying at age 48; his wife directed a student to complete the final four scrolls.

The "Black Image" of Amida Buddha enshrined here is said to have repeatedly saved shogun Ieyasu Tokugawa from danger in battle, earning it a reputation as a victory-bringing deity still worshipped today.