Mimusubi

As the first wave of COVID-19 comes to an end in Japan, businesses and other activities have started to reopen. The state of emergency has ended across the whole country, but new infections are still being detected, albeit at a fairly low level. This means that there is a lot of caution about restarting things at jinja. Jinja Honchō has gone back to normal working practices, but most jinja still seem to be restricting formal prayers inside the prayer hall, and keeping numbers at matsuri down. Because there is a… Read More »Continuing Adaptation

A few weeks ago, Jinja Shinpō had a full page article about the opening of the Okayama Peace Museum. This facility belongs to Okayamaken Gokoku Jinja: the jinja enshrining the war dead from Okayama prefecture (“ken” in Japanese). The Gokoku Jinja (“Nation-Protecting Jinja”) were, as I have mentioned before, founded before the war to enshrine people who had died fighting for the Tennō, much like local versions of Yasukuni Jinja. They were not really formalised until the 1940s, with some only being founded during the war, and as a result… Read More »Okayama Peace Museum

The National Association of Young Priests (for priests under 40, or maybe 45 — “Youngish” might be better) conducted a survey of its members to discover the impact of the pandemic on individual jinja. The survey was conducted from April 24th to 30th, so the results are a bit out of date now, but they had 740 responses with a good coverage of the whole country, so they are probably representative for that period. 75% of the priests reported a reduction in the number of personal matsuri being requested. For… Read More »Jinja and COVID-19 Survey

A few weeks ago, Jinja Shinpō had a short article about some unique omamori that a chief priest had made for his jinja. The jinja is Takuhirëshi Jinja, in Toyama Prefecture (on the Japan Sea side of central Japan). The jinja’s precincts border on a river, the Shinzū River, which is famous for ayu (sweetfish) fishing, and the chief priest himself is a keen angler, so the new omamori were inspired by this. They are modelled on the nets that anglers use to keep fish that they have caught before… Read More »New Omamori and Matsuri

Jinja Shinpō continues to report the impact of COVID-19 on the Shinto world. The latest issue reports that Jingū had closed down all kagura (sacred dance — personal prayers to the kami at Jingū), and the opportunity to pay one’s respects within the outermost fences. Other jinja were holding festivals with fewer people, or with people sitting outside rather than in the prayer hall. One priest wrote an article about the importance of purification in this time (wash your hands!). However, the article I want to write about concerned Amabië.… Read More »Amabië

A few weeks ago, Jinja Shinpō had a full-page special about a jinja that has recently built a new jinja office. This sort of article is fairly common, because it is an important event for the jinja in question, and positive news to share with the Shinto community as a whole. The jinja in question is in Tokyo, which probably explains how they can afford to do it, and the new building does look nice, and very useful for matsuri preparation: it has a kitchen for preparing offerings, for example,… Read More »Matsuri for the Dead