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David Chart

Filming at a Jinja

On Monday, I spent most of the day at a jinja that shall remain nameless, assisting at the filming of two videos for Jinja Honchō. During the morning, we were filming for an “image video” aimed at non-Japanese, and in the early afternoon we were filming for this year’s hatsumōdë promotion video (which, of course, is promoting next year’s hatsumōdë). The plan is for both of these to go up on Jinja Honchō’s YouTube channel, and so unless something goes horribly wrong I will write about the content then. I… Read More »Filming at a Jinja

Etiquette Poster

The 29th September issue of Jinja Shinpō carried a second article connected to me, this one about one of the projects I have worked on at Jinja Honchō. This is a poster explaining basic manners for visiting a jinja. With the massive increase in foreign tourists in Japan, this has become a bit of a problem. The events that get a lot of publicity are things like influencers doing chin-ups on torii, but the things that become a real issue are more subtle. I mean, most reasonable people realise that… Read More »Etiquette Poster

Against Xenophobia

The September 29th issue of Jinja Shinpō includes an article by me. It was written in response to the Japanese Upper House elections in July, in which Sanseitō (“Democratic Participation Party”, literally) took fourteen seats, adding to one that they already held. (The Upper House elections are for half of the seats every three years.) This is a problem because their slogan was “Japanese People First” — and I really don’t think they mean me. On the one hand, fourteen seats is only about 10%, so they are not going… Read More »Against Xenophobia

A Patriarch, a President, and a Rabbi

A week or so ago I was in Kazakhstan again with Jinja Honchō for the eighth Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions. This year the Pope wasn’t there, but we did have a cardinal, the two Chief Rabbis of Israel, the Patriarchs of Moscow and Jerusalem, and numerous representatives of the Islamic world, from Iran to Indonesia. There were also representatives of Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, and us, for Shinto. In total, there were 101 delegations, and the event was chaired by the President of Kazakhstan. Jinja Honchō has… Read More »A Patriarch, a President, and a Rabbi

Year of the Snake

As I have mentioned on this blog before, every year I visit Koganeyama Jinja (黄金山神社) on Kinkazan (金華山), an island off the coast of Miyagi Prefecture, in northeast Japan. This year, I went straight from Shikariwakë Jinja, so I spent three hours on rural local trains, rather than on the Shinkansen, but the boat over to the island was the same as ever. This year is the year of the snake on the Chinese zodiac, and the jinja has a special matsuri every time this rolls around. There are a… Read More »Year of the Snake

Jinja Structures

After talking about the matsuri, I want to write about the buildings at Shikariwakë Jinja. I don’t often talk about jinja architecture, but this time I talked to the architect, so I will make an exception. The architect in question works at a company that is physically located inside Jinja Honchō, although I believe it is legally separate. Obviously, the connection is very close, and the firm unsurprisingly specialises in jinja. They worked on the rebuilding of Shikariwakë Jinja, and the architect was there because the dedication ceremony for the… Read More »Jinja Structures