November 2019

Over the weekend, I visited Kinkasan Koganëyama Jinja again. This is a jinja on an island off the coast of Miyagi Prefecture in northeastern Japan, and the closest land in Japan to the epicentre of the 2011 earthquake. I first visited in 2013, and I have been at least once every year since, so I have seen the progress of the rebuilding, and I have talked about it on the blog before. The jinja is interesting in several ways. One is that it is on an island, and is the… Read More »Kinkasan Koganëyama Jinja

Today it was cold and raining heavily, and I went to see the Daijōkyū. The Daijōkyū is the complex of buildings in which the Daijōsai is held; it is built specially for the ceremony, and demolished again soon afterwards. However, for a few weeks it is possible for anyone who happens to be in Tokyo to go to see it. The Daijōkyū was first opened yesterday, when it had, according to the news, 20,000 visitors. One advantage of going in the cold and the rain was that there were not… Read More »The Daijōkyū

There are many ceremonies connected to the accession of a new Tennō, and last week’s Daijōsai is the most important Shinto ritual among them. The whole series is concluded with a performance of kagura, sacred music and dance, before the Kashikodokoro, where Amaterasu Ōmikami is enshrined within the Imperial palace. This time, the kagura will be offered in December, over the course of about six hours, starting around sunset. Jinja Shinpō carried a couple of articles about this on the 7th and 14th of October. Fifteen songs are performed in… Read More »Too Sacred To Hear

Tonight, the central ceremony of the Daijōsai will be held, in the Daijōkyū in the grounds of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. The Tennō will, in person, make offerings to Amaterasu Ōmikami, as the ancestral kami of the Imperial line, and to all the kami of the heavens and the earth. This ceremony is performed once by each Tennō, at the beginning of their reign, and it is the most important of all the Shinto rites performed by the Tennō. I have written two essays about the Daijōsai for my… Read More »The Daijōsai

The Daijōsai is one of the most important Shinto rituals. It is performed once each imperial reign, by the Tennō in person, to honour Amaterasu Ōmikami and all the other kami. The current Tennō will perform it in a week’s time, and I have just released a paid essay on my Patreon describing how the ritual is performed. If you are interested in seeing it, the Patreon Back Numbers page contains details on what to do: you should sign up to my Patreon, pledge $2, and ask me for it… Read More »The Ritual of the Daijōsai

Most jinja are located in Japan which is, as readers of this blog surely know, prone to natural disasters of many kinds. Because there are jinja all across Japan, almost every natural disaster affects at least one of them. Sometimes, they do a lot of damage. Much of the damage done to jinja is no different from the damage done to any other building, albeit often more expensive to repair than a typical family home. However, there is a unique problem. The kami at most jinja is thought to be… Read More »When Disaster Strikes