Fuji: Seven Sacred Trails

Pat Ormsby in her role as Shinto priestess

Green Shinto is very proud to present the following piece of original research by Shinto priestess Pat Ormsby.  As is evident from the article, she is personally familiar with the ancient pilgrimage routes, which in modern times have fallen out of use.  In the year when Mt Fuji comes up for World Heritage status, her work is of prime historical value.
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Reconnecting with the sacred paths of Mt. Fuji
by Patricia Ormsby

Mt. Fuji has been worshipped as a divine entity from as far back as anyone was keeping record, with pilgrimages undertaken to the summit in ancient times.  These days paved roads can take you half way up the steep slopes, and the climb from there is more popular than ever, but the old pilgrimage routes around the base and up the lower slopes have been all but forgotten.  There is not much of a view from the dense forests, and it takes real devotion to put in the long, hot climb required.  The ancient routes are nonetheless notable.

The Yoshida Trail
According to the City of Fuji-Yoshida, “The original Yoshida Climbing Route starts from the Fuji Sengen Shrine, where the pilgrims of over 500 years ago came to pray before they started their climb up the sacred mountain.  Today, traditionalists still claim that the only way to climb Mt. Fuji is from the Fuji Sengen Shrine.” (Ref 1)

This was the most easily accessed route from Edo, where the devotional Fuji confraternities (more on them later) were very popular during the Tokugawa rule.  Since it is the route of a marathon to the summit each July, it is the best maintained of all the hiking trails below the 5th Station.

Signboard on the Fuji-Yoshida Trail below the First Station. Guides took pilgrims up the mountain at night, and they replenished the oil in their lamps at each station.

The Murayama Route
The Murayama Route is the oldest trail up Mt. Fuji, followed by the nearby Suyama Route.  It was developed about 1000 years ago together with a temple complex in the village of Murayama, just south of the volcano, which became a lively center of ascetic Shugendo practice.  The trail fell into disuse in 1903, but has been revived in recent years. (Ref.2)

Several years ago, I attempted to follow the Murayama Route, but got lost when it entered a summer home community which had well developed recreational paths heading off in all directions, obscuring the ancient route.  Since then, however, more efforts to reestablish the trail have been made, and two years ago, accompanied by two Shugendo practitioners (ref. 3), I was able follow the entire route from the Murayama Sengen Shrine.

The route was well marked, with a few obstacles. At the 5th Station parking lot, it joins the crowded Fujinomiya Trail to the summit.  My companions, in full yamabushi (mountain ascetic) regalia, were delayed several hours on the latter by hikers wanting them to pose for pictures.

Dedicated practitioners start their pilgrimage from the port of Tagonoura in Fuji City.  Their journey has three sections, the first of which is the urban-suburban roadways of what once was a grassy plain, and represented “this world.”  The forests of the Murayama Route represented a transition, and the bare slopes higher up, the world of the dead, to which the pilgrim could go and return.

A yamabushi mountain ascetic in full regalia, blowing a conch horn

The Suyama Route
Similar to the Murayama Route, the Suyama Route has recently been rescued from oblivion.  It starts from the Suyama Sengen Shrine near Ashitakyama, an eroded volcanic remnant southeast of Mt. Fuji.  Its lower reaches pass adjacent to a golf course and other tourist facilities that lend it a certain quantity of litter and noise, but it is geologically interesting. (ref. 4)

Mizutsuka, one of several old cinder cones along the way, is one of the few places on the mountain with reliable surface water.  The trail gives views of all three of the Hoei-zan craters, site of Mt. Fuji’s most recent eruption in 1707, before reaching the Ochuudoh and Fujinomiya Trails at the 6th Station.

The Gotemba Route, which parallels it nearby, is the most difficult and picturesque route up Mt. Fuji, climbing through cinders from the Hoei eruption, but the trail appears to have no deep history.

The Subashiri Trail
From the vicinity of the Niihashi Sengen Shrine, established about 800 years ago in Gotemba (ref 5), east of Mt. Fuji, there is a trail going up to the small secondary peak of Kofuji near the Subashiri 5th Station.  I can find nothing on the history of that trail, but have heard that in old times women were allowed access to a smaller peak on pilgrimages, and I have long thought that peak might be it.

The main Subashiri Trail currently rises from the 5th Station and meets the Yoshida Trail at the 8th Station.  This causes confusion among hikers attempting to descend on the latter.  If the Ochuudoh route were better known, it would be a cinch for lost hikers to return to the proper trail at the 6th Station, taking about twenty minutes along a level course.

The Shoji Trail
The Shoji Trail is one of the most interesting routes, leading from Lake Shoji to the northwest of the mountain to the 5th Station, where it joins the Ochuudoh and Yoshida Trails.  There is no shrine associated with it, and it bisects the haunted forest of Aokigahara, where families once abandoned their elderly to die, currently a destination for suicides.

Compasses often do not work in the forest due to geomagnetic anomalies.  This is a shame, because otherwise, it is a most impressive route.  Devotees piled up basalt rocks to make the route smooth and straight, and the dense forest has largely protected their work from erosion.

The road was broad enough to accommodate royalty and is still easily passable, despite fallen trees, and unmistakable for its entire course.  The minimal signs are more than adequate.  The two yamabushi and I hiked down it at night.  This trail and the Ochuudoh provide a sense of the degree of devotion once shown by pilgrims, ascetic practitioners and lay followers alike.

The Ochuudoh
Literally, “the middle road,” this route circumscribes Mt. Fuji at the 5th to 6th Stations and was particularly beloved by the Fuji confraternity, who maintained at least one shrine along it which also provided lodging.  Representing the Buddhist injunction to avoid extremes, it was nonetheless the most difficult pilgrimage route, with a hazardous crossing of the Ohsawa Kuzure, an erosional gully on the west slope.

Fuji from the west, showing the deep chasm of the Ohsawa Kuzure gully

The route fell out of use several decades ago when the gully became simply too dangerous to cross, but I have traveled nearly all of it and was able to ascertain its current status last October.  The entire route on the Yamanashi (i.e., north) side is in good condition, passing through forests which protect it from rock slides.  Parts of it near the Yoshida 5th Station parking lot have been paved with hand-hewn stones, presenting a broad, currently popular route.  Like the Yellow-Brick Road, however, things get wild further on and care must be taken to stay on course.

The Fuji confraternity shrine is just short of the constantly rumbling chasm of the Ohsawa Kuzure in a dense foggy forest about 1.5 hours walk westward from the Yoshida 5th Station parking lot.  Eastward, just short of where it intersects the Subashiri Trail, there are the remains of another shrine.  Crossing over to the Shizuoka (i.e., south) side from there, however, the trail emerges onto bare slopes, where it was annually obliterated even when it had large numbers of travelers.

A sandy slog of about an hour, angling slightly upward takes you into view of the Hoei-zan crater, where the Ochuudoh is clearly marked and well traveled, running along the shoulder of the cinder cone, then descending into the crater, emerging at the Fujinomiya Trail 6th Station.  Westward from there, however, it has been entirely obliterated by bulldozer roads, and its point of reentry into the forests beyond can be hard to locate.  There is at least one brave soul, however, who makes the complete circuit regularly, descending to the base of Mt. Fuji to cross the Ohsawa Kuzure, and climbing again on the other side as a summertime exercise when his real passion of cross-country skiing is not possible.

An unnamed waterfall near a Fuji-kyo meeting house west of Mt. Fuji, where the basalt is picturesque. (This and above photo by Pat Ormsby)

Eight Inner and Eight Outer Lakes
The Fuji confraternity was a sect founded in the early 16th century by Hasegawa Kakugyo, an ascetic who bypassed the thriving Shugendo community at Murayama and undertook his own ascetic practice in the Hitoana lava cave to the west of Mt. Fuji.  Highly popular as a lay organization promoting Fuji pilgrimages during the Edo period, it seems to have been bypassed by modernity, the most recent Hasegawa heir shunning the leadership. The remaining members are mostly old enough to remember the deprivations of World War II or its aftermath.

Their liturgy mentions “uchisoto hakko no ryuujin,” meaning the dragon gods of the eight inner and eight outer lakes.  The inner lakes include the famous five lakes of Mt. Fuji and three other smaller lakes that are not famous.  The first of these is Lake Osensui, where the Dragon King of hand washing is said to reside.  That is the ritual of purification undertaken before entering sacred ground.  The second is Lake Yamanaka, where dwells the Dragon King of medicine.  The third is Lake Asumi, with the Dragon King of prophecies.  The fourth is Lake Kawaguchi, with the Dragon King of irrigation.  The fifth is Lake Saiko, with the Dragon King of green trees (that is to say, the haunted forest of Aokigahara), from where arise the seeds of our food.  The sixth is Lake Shoji, with the Dragon King of success.  The seventh is Lake Motosu, with the Dragon King of ancient origins from the mists of mythology.  The eighth is Lake Shibire, with the Dragon King of future outcomes.

Summer solstice at Futamigaura

The Fuji sect followers still undertake pilgrimages to these, but travel by car. The Tokai Shizen Hodo, established in recent decades from Tokyo to Osaka, passes fairly close to most of the lakes, making a pleasant trip on foot possible. It would be less strenuous than climbing Mt. Fuji—unless one undertook the traditional ritual bathing at each lake. Fed by Mt. Fuji spring water arising from deep below the surface, they are icy cold.

The eight outer lakes include Biwako, Ashinoko, Futamigaura, Suwako, Chuzenjiko, Harunako, Sakuragaike, and Kasumigaura.  Of these, Futamigaura is not actually a lake but a sea coast in Ise. However, it shares with the others the distant visibility of Mt. Fuji, if not directly, then from a mountain nearby.

At Futamigaura, which has the famous married rocks joined by a rope of rice straw (ref. 6), the sun rises from directly behind Mt. Fuji at the summer solstice.  Visiting all of these would have been a labor of great devotion in times prior to modern transport.

References
1 http://www.city.fujiyoshida.yamanashi.jp/div/english/html/climb.html
2 Rowlett, Roger (2005)  “Murayama Kodo Trail Opens on Fuji” http://americasroof.com/archives/392
3 For detailed information see: http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/shugendou.html
4 For a fascinating geological account of Mt. Fuji see : http://www.vulcanospeleology.org/sym05gui/ISV5G04.pdf
5 http://city.gotemba.shizuoka.jp/ehp/sightseeing/12.html
6  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meoto_Iwa