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The circular mirror: Shinto symbol

February 18, 2012 / John D. / 0 Comments

Back of an ancient bronze mirror, in the past a precious item and symbol of authority

The circular mirror of Shinto is a potent symbol. One often sees it when visiting shrines, where it stands on the altar as representative of the kami. It can play a more vital role too, for it sometimes functions as the ‘spirit-body’ (goshintai) of the kami. The idea is that the spirit enters into the object to take physical form. The mirror thus acts as an interface between the physical and spiritual realms of existence. What could be more appropriate for the meeting between them than the illusionary nature of a reflecting mirror?

Japanese mythology claims that the original ‘spirit-body’ was that of Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess, who gave a circular mirror to her grandson, Ninigi, when he descended to earth. It had been used previously in an elaborate ruse to lure her out of a cave in which she was hiding. Her absence had plunged the world into darkness, and to tempt her out she was told that there was another goddess as beautiful as herself. The mirror was held up so that when she peeked out she was greeted by her own radiance, and the momentary hesitation allowed a rope to be tied across the cave entrance so as to prevent her from re-entering. Sunlight was restored to the world.

Later when Amaterasu decreed that a mission be sent down to earth from the High Plains of Heaven, her grandson Ninigi-no-mikoto was chosen to lead it. Before he departed, she presented him with the very same mirror which had played such an important part in the rock-cave incident. ‘Take this and revere it as if it were myself,’ she told him. Within the reflecting surface something of her essence had become ingrained.

Mirror at Kuzuryu Shingu, near Hakone

According to the mythology, Ninigi passed the mirror down to his heirs, who formed the imperial line which continues to this day (the present emperor is the 125th). For a long time the mirror was kept in the palace of the king of Yamato, the dominant state in ancient Japan, but in the early centuries of the Common Era it was deposited at Ise Jingu. Since that time it has been kept secluded from human eye, acting as the unseen focus of worship for the millions of pilgrims and worshippers who file before it each year. As the ancestral shrine of the imperial family, Ise is considered Japan’s premier shrine, housing the country’s holiest of holies.

The idea of a circular mirror serving as spirit of a sun goddess might well strike some as odd. But it’s worth noting that the ancient Chinese believed the human soul to be a shining disc, a connotation that carried over to the circular mirror. For ancient humans it was seen as a means of spirit possession, just as some tribes in modern times were afraid of being photographed lest the camera steal their soul. Reflection and reality were colluded, as indeed they tend to be in the mind of the observer even now.

In modern shrines the mirror that sits on the altar represents the spirit of the enshrined kami. Purity, gratitude, awe are the feelings that it is intended to invoke. Yet in some shrines the mirror is fixed at such an angle that when worshippers pray, they find they are looking at their own reflection. How suggestive! People are praying to themselves! But it’s not a case of worshipping your own ego so much as worshipping the divine within yourself. As the children of the kami, humans too are part of the divine order and live in a sacred world. It’s this life-affirming assertion which is part of the appeal of Shinto.

The altar mirror reflects another world

Robots – a Shinto connection?

February 18, 2012 / John D. / 0 Comments

Our friend, Christal Whelan, has written an interesting article for Daily Yomiuri about the Japanese fondness for robots. The positive attitude of Japanese towards robots contrasts with the suspicion towards them in Western culture, where they are often depicted as a threat to humanity (think 2001). Japanese manga by contrast are more likely to view them as cute and helpful. Why the difference? Whelan hits on an interesting idea below with the traditional notion of a spirit inhabiting objects. It’s why there are so many pacification rituals (kuyo) for things like used needles, dolls and even old shoes.

Here’s an extract from Whelan’s article, which can be read in its entirety here.

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The willingness–or even desire–in Japan to coexist with mechanical beings is not solely explained by Shinto animism, often cited as the nation’s cultural basis. Nor can the impact of postwar robot icon Astro Boy account for the aspirations of humans who would readily live in symbiance with machines.

The concept of modern robots in Japan was triggered in 1924 by Czech playwright Karel Capek’s hit drama R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), which was staged in Tokyo two years after its Prague debut. Capek used the Czech term robota, meaning serf labor, to refer to the synthetic, mass-produced factory workers in his play.

Capable of feeling emotion, these robots soon revolted against their human inventors, and eventually killed them.

However, classic Frankenstein plots so pervasive in Western narratives lack resonance in Japan, a country where the bond between an artisan and his tools has deeper, enduring roots. Tools are revered in Japan not because they are “alive,” but because they are an extension of the craftsman’s body. Through daily use, a worker infuses his tools with his soul so that they acquire a kind of life of their own.

This idea is common currency in Polynesia, where it is referred to as mana. Since a person and his tools make human livelihood possible, the product of this relationship is one of profound gratitude, a central value prevalent in Japanese culture that fosters a subjunctive mood. The tools are “as if” they are alive, but not mistaken for living things.

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(For an example of the Japanese propensity for robots, see the article about the role of robot seals in Japan Today about healing tsunami victims.)

High-tech fluffy seals that respond to human touch are the latest weapon in the battle against depression for survivors of Japan’s tsunami disaster.

More on Sacred Groves

February 15, 2012 / John D. / 2 Comments

Naturalist Kevin Short, writing for the Daily Yomiuri, provides further thoughts below on the subject of sacred groves. I imagine the title is not of his choosing, but he seems to have done his Shinto research well enough…. (The full article can be found here; for his previous article, click here.)

Many Shinto shrines, like Omiwa Jinja pictured here, are deeply embedded in sacred groves

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Sacred groves amuse nature lovers, offer spiritual refreshments

Kevin Short / Daily Yomiuri Columnist (Feb. 2, 2012)

Visits to shrines and temples are an important part of any tourism experience here in Japan. Visitors enjoy the beautiful historic architecture and sense of peace and tranquility found in the precincts. Shrines and temples, many of which are surrounded by venerable old sacred trees, are also good spots to study nature or simply commune with the natural environment.

Two basic categories of big sacred trees can be found at Japanese shrines and temples. One includes individual trees, often considered especially sacred to the kami or hotoke deities enshrined there, that have been planted in front of the buildings or along the sando, or avenue of approach. At Shinto shrines, these trees will usually be marked off by a shimenawa, a twisted straw rope decorated with strips of paper cut in a zigzag shape, tied around the trunk. This type of tree may include some local native species, such as zelkova (keyaki), but frequently consist primarily of nonlocal types such as camphor (kusunoki), cryptomeria (sugi) or gingko (icho).

Woodland at Togakushi Shrine

Another category of big tree is found in small sacred groves that are allowed to flourish behind and around the sides of the main building. These trees are often local native species, and in many instances the sacred groves actually preserve small remnants of the original primary forest cover. The Tadasu Grove of the Shimogamo Jinja shrine in Kyoto, for example, contains a rare chunk of primary deciduous forest native to the heavily developed Kyoto Basin.

Sacred groves called chinju no mori are an almost required feature at Shinto shrines, but rich groves can often be found at Buddhist temples as well. The Yushima Seido, a Confucian temple located just adjacent to Ochanomizu Station in central Tokyo, is surrounded by a fine grove consisting of both native and nonnative trees. A more general term for sacred groves, regardless of their religious affiliation, is shajirin.

Today, the spiritual essence of the kami deities worshipped at a Shinto shrine are believed to reside in sacred objects known as shintai, which are housed within a special inner chamber, a sort of holy of holies, inside the honden, or main hall, of the shrine. In front of this stands the haiden, or worship hall, where visitors pay their respects with claps, bows and offerings.

Pathway up the slopes of sacred Mt Miwa

Many historians and folklorists, however, believe that this shintai and honden complex, along with impressive shrine buildings themselves, are later developments. Originally the essence of the kami were thought to reside in specific natural features, called kannabi, such as groves of trees, large or unusually shaped rock formations, waterfalls, or even entire mountains.

Some shrines still preserve this original kannabi arrangement. Omiwa Jinja, the most important shrine in Nara Prefecture, for example, totally lacks a honden. The worship hall opens out directly onto the heavily forested slopes of Mt. Miwa. The deity enshrined here, Omononushi, is considered to be the spiritual embodiment of the mountain itself.

Trees at an utaki in Okinawa

This ancient layout is also well-preserved at shrines on the Ryukyu Islands, called utaki. Here, simple pavilions open out to groves of trees, in which the deities are believed to reside. Only female priests, called noro, are allowed to pass beyond the outer pavilion and tend the grove.

In the southern Kanto region, sacred groves are usually dominated by huge chinquapins (sudajii) and several species of evergreen oak, which are generically called kashi in Japanese. These are the same species that form the stalwarts of the region’s primary old-growth forests. They are evergreen trees with thick, shiny leaves that allow very little sunlight to pass. Several of these trees usually overlap their upper branches to form a dense canopy, keeping the atmosphere inside the grove cool and dimly lit. Only occasional shafts of bright sunlight thrust through small gaps in the branches.

Sacred groves often play an important role in conservation of local biodiversity. In urban areas they may represent the only substantial chunk of greenery for miles around. Even in countryside habitats, where the overall forest cover ratio remains high, the groves may be vital to regional species richness. Typical countryside forests, such as managed coppices, orchards and timber plantations, are mostly secondary or artificial in nature, containing younger trees that are harvested at regular intervals. Only in the protected sacred groves can trees grow to their full size and develop into primary forest habitat.

Sacred groves are found the world over. In Nigeria, for example a sacred grove at Osogbo, dedicated to the Vodoun goddess Osun, has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Surveys in India have identified well over 10,000 sacred groves, mostly managed and protected communally by individual villages.

Here in Japan, the total number of sacred groves must be as high as several tens, or even hundreds, of thousands. These include immense forests surrounding major shrines such as Ise Grand Shrines and Kasuga Grand Shrine, the latter of which is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. On the other end of the scale are groves found at uncountable tiny local shrines and temples, which may contain only several to a dozen or so trees each. Even isolated roadside stone Buddhas and commemorative mounds are usually protected by one to several sacred trees.

Sacred groves are fine spots for studying botany or watching birds. They also provide ideal sanctuaries for prayer, meditation, quiet contemplation, yoga and other forms of spiritual refreshment and empowerment.

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Short is a naturalist and cultural anthropology professor at Tokyo University of Information Sciences.

Woodland on the hill of Fushimi Inari

Shintai (spirit-body)

February 14, 2012 / John D. / 2 Comments

At the secret heart of the Shinto shrine is the spirit-body of the kami, locked away in the honden sanctuary and never seen or exposed to public view. It’s a physical object in which the immaterial spirit of the kami is thought to reside. Typically it’s a bronze mirror, though it can also be a sword, magatama jewel, gohei, rock, or simply a wooden tablet with the name of the kami.

The kind of ancient bronze mirror used as shintai. The non-reflecting side, as here, is decorated with patterned shapes and sometimes images.

Why is a mirror the most common spirit-body? In Shinto mythology, Amaterasu the sun goddess gives a mirror to her grandson Ninigi no mikoto when he descends to earth. Imported originally from the continent, mirrors were a shamanistic tool for repelling evil spirits. As rare and expensive items, they were also a sign of spiritual authority. ‘Regard this mirror exactly as if were our august spirit, and reverence it as if reverencing us,’ Amaterasu says to her grandson.

In exceptional cases the shintai is a natural phenomenon outside the shrine visible to all, such as a mountain (known as shintaizan), large rock (iwakura), sacred tree, or waterfall as at Nachi. Omiwa is the most famous case of a sacred mountain as shintai, and it’s possible to make a pilgrimage to the top. Direct worship of natural phenomenon reflects how kami worship originally took place, before the building of shrines following the arrival of Buddhism in the sixth century.

It’s said that the use of shintai arose through the practice of offerings. Mirrors and other items were hung on trees during rituals and festivals (as in the Rock-Cave Myth in Kojiki). These offerings were valuable items, and with the spread of Buddhism came the notion of housing them in a sanctuary (honden). As in religious practice elsewhere, the object became identified with the spirit itself, as if the kami had looked into the mirror and entered it. Only with the spread of permanent shrine buildings in mid-Heian times is the term shintai found (with the honorific it’s usually referred to as goshintai).

At the consecration of new shrines there is a special rite to draw down the kami into the shintai. Thereafter it’s locked away in the honden and only seen by the chief priest at the time of festival outings. In some cases, as at Ise, it is kept wrapped in a cloth covering and never seen even during removal. In other cases it remains undisturbed for generations, and the priest himself may not know what kind of object it is. Mystery of mysteries, indeed!

The shintai is carefully veiled from public view during a festival outing at Hakone Jinja

Shimenawa (rice rope)

February 13, 2012 / John D. / 7 Comments

One of the most striking symbols of Shinto is the rice rope used to denote sacred space, called shimenawa. The earliest rites of Shinto are generally held to be associated with the introduction of rice culture in the Yayoi Age (300 BC – 250 AD), and as the staple food rice was treasured as a gift from the gods. Consequently it plays a central part in the religion, from offerings of rice to rice wine as well as planting and harvesting festivals.

The word shimenawa breaks down into two parts: shime mean ‘to indicate or mark’; nawa is a rope. It is usually made with a left-hand twist, but the thick end is normally hung to the right. White paper strips, known as shide, are often attached which probably originated as offerings of cloth.

According to Gunter Nitschke in From Shinto to Ando, knots were a means of denoting land occupancy since ancient times. It provided ‘a binding agreement’ and a sense of being tied to the land. Over time it came too to signify a connection with the spirit world. ‘It is well documented that some of the earliest deities, not only of Japanese, but of many other mythologies are deities of binding,’ he writes.

Shimenawa can be found at shrines, house altars and other sacred sites. They’re also found on a sumo Grand Champion (yokozuna), who wears one during the ceremonial ring-entrance ceremony. They come in a variety of styles, such as Ise, Shirakawa and Yoshida, though the best-known and most spectacular are undoubtedly those of Izumo. They don’t come bigger than that!

Big is best: Izumo-style rope at Iya Jinja in Shimane prefecture

What is Shinto exactly?

February 12, 2012 / John D. / 0 Comments

[The following was written in conjunction with Timothy Takemoto of the Shinto Online Network]

Shinto is a ‘natural religion’, which has developed organically over time. As such it has no founder, no doctrine, no dogma, and no holy book. This makes defining Shinto difficult. It is a pluralistic religion with no unified system. Local practices differ one from another, shrines maintain their own traditions, and priests may hold contrasting opinions.

There are many disagreements among experts about what Shinto is exactly. Amongst the main points of contention are when it first came into being; whether it is an indigenous religion or a collection of imported ideas; whether it is basically animist or ancestor worship; whether it is for Japanese only; whether it is an independent religion; indeed, there is even argument about whether it is a religion at all!

Though Shinto may defy simple definition, its polytheist framework is an intrinsic part of the Japanese mindset and its torii (gateway) has become a symbol of Japan as a whole. Shinto practice is interwoven into the fabric of Japanese culture, and its beliefs underlie many Japanese customs. Here is what some commentators have written:

‘The term Shinto covers a many-hued array of Japanese religious traditions.’ (Mark Teeuwen and John Breen)

‘Shinto is a collective term that includes ceremonial customs and religious views present in the Japanese people from ancient times.’ (Haida Harahisa)

‘Shinto is a crystallized system of rites for the veneration of personalities closely connected with our existence and our national history’ (Tsuzuki Keiroku)

Shinto is ‘one of the last great truly natural, human a-rational philosophy systems’. (Stuart Picken)

‘It is a combination of the worship of nature and of their own ancestors.’ (Percival Lowell)

Lowell’s definition offers an easy way into Shinto, for the definition suggests the blend of animism and national rites that characterises the religion. This can be seen in the example of the primal deity, Amaterasu. Her name means ‘Heaven Shining’, and the deity is thought to have originated with a shamaness-ruler in ancient times (ancestor worship), whose radiance was compared to the sun. In time she became identified with the spirit of the sun and worshipped as the sun-goddess (animism). As such, she was claimed as the founding mother of the imperial line and the supreme deity.

One could say then that the tension between nature worship and magico-political rites lies at the core of Shinto. It is neither simply ancient paganism nor simply a vehicle for social cohesion, but it contains elements of both. What unites the two is the concept of kami, a term that is difficult to understand but which roughly equates to ‘spirits’. The definition of kami will be dealt with elsewhere.

Shinto as a nature religion – but it is also in a sense a religion of Japaneseness

National Foundation Day at Kashihara Jingu

February 11, 2012 / John D. / 0 Comments

February 11 is National Foundation Day, and what could be more appropriate than to celebrate it at Kashihara Jingu in Nara prefecture (ancient Yamato). The shrine is supposedly located on the very palace where Emperor Jimmu started the country in 660 BC. At least that’s the mythology. Nearby lies his alleged grave, identified by the Meiji ideologues who introduced Shinto as the national religion after the restoration of the emperor system in 1868. As such the venue is a popular meeting place for nationalists.

The date originally coincided with the new year on the old lunar-solar calendar, but was fixed as Feb. 11 in 1873. The holiday was big in prewar times, but military displays as at Kashihara are restricted now to the small paramilitary far right groups from around the country.

A couple of years ago I was able to walk around the car park and see vans from all over western Japan. The paramilitary groups form up and march up to the shrine to pay respects, with orders being shouted out and their best uniforms on display. Some are well drilled, some are somewhat amateurish and comical. It’s all very surreal, as visitors and shrine priests politely ignore them. At the same time in the large courtyard in front of the shrine there’s an exhibition of martial arts put on by local groups, including aikido, kendo and swordsmanship.

Recently a law was passed to outlaw the vans of the far right groups, so whether things are quite the same I’m uncertain. Personally I find nationalism abhorrent, but intrigued by what kind of people would want to spend their free time marching around in uniform I got talking to a couple of members from a group in Nagoya. Like most Japanese, they turned out to be perfectly modest and civil. We didn’t talk politics, though!