The Imperial Regalia: Sanshu no Jingi 三種の神器

(This post comes to us from Jessica. Check out the art below. Thank you Jessica!)

The Japanese “Three Imperial Regalia” are objects symbolic of the Japanese Imperial line’s descent from Amaterasu and the first emperor who came down from Heaven, thereby giving the emperor his justification. The three objects are thought to be housed separately in the three Imperial jingu or Shinto shrines, but they are kept out of the view of the public as they are arguably the most important objects of the Shinto tradition and are seen only by the Imperial family. These three shrines are “Ise Jingu in Mie prefecture, Atsuta Jingu in Nagoya, and Meiji Jingu in Tokyo.” (http://www.jref.com/glossary/sanshu_no_jingi.shtml). In the twentieth century, the term sanshu no jingi is comically used to refer to the three most important comforts of modern life as they apply “such as the refrigerator, washing machine and vacuum cleaner in the 1950's, or the color televsion, car and cooler (three "C's") in the 1970's” (http://www.jref.com/glossary/sanshu_no_jingi.shtml). The three sacred objects are considered symbolic of the Imperial line’s knowledge, courage, and mercy (http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9806E3D8103DEE32A25753C3A9659C946397D6CF). Without these three virtues, symbolized by the actual possession of the objects by each Imperial heir, the emperor is not considered worthy.

The "yasakani no magatama" is a necklace of jade beads which was given to Amaterasu by her father, Izanagi after she is born of his self-purification after his visit to Yomi. The term magatama means “curved jewel or soul,” indicating that Izanagi gave to Amaterasu all of himself. Since the Imperial family is descendent from Amaterasu and the magatama beads are transmitted through the lineage, the Emperor holds in his possession the soul of Izanagi, the creator, giving him the right to rule. Eventually, the beads are also used by the gods in luring Amaterasu out of her hiding. “Amaterasu finally gave the sacred jewel together with the mirror and sword to her grandson Ningi no Mikoto, when she sent him down to earth. He again handed the three regalia to his grandson Jimmu, the first emperor of Japan” (http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2140.html).

Amaterasu, the Sun goddess, hid herself away from the world in a cave, depriving the world of its light because she was afraid of death at the hands of her brother, also a noble child of Izanagi, Susa-no-wo. In order to lure her out of her cave and to reintroduce her life-giving light to the world, the other gods pretended to have a celebration of sorts outside her cave. When she heard the noise outside, Amaterasu was curious and asked what was going on. The gods replied that they had found a goddess greater than herself and that celebrations were being prepared. In shock and curiosity, Amaterasu opened the door of her cave a crack and looked out, whereupon the other gods held up the "yata no kagami" mirror to her and showed her her own reflected image, drawing her out of the cave and tricking her so that she couldn’t re-enter; thus the mirror holds the promise of light in the world.

The "kusanagi no tsurugi" sword was discovered by Susa-no-wo in the tail of the eight-headed dragon he had slain. An old couple was frightened of the dragon who had eaten all but one of their daughters and was coming back for her. Susa-no-wo, on a mission of redemption after his terrible behavior toward his sister, Amaterasu, and his punishment by the other gods, tricks the dragon by getting each of its heads drunk and then slaying it in its slumber. Subsequently, Susa-no-wo finds in its tail a magnificent sword which he gifts to his sister and reconciles with her.

Art:

http://library.artstor.org/library/iv2.html?parent=true

https://www.uwec.edu/philrel/shimbutsudo/images/3_treasures.jpg

http://content.answers.com/main/content/img/oxford/Oxford_Mythology/0192177478.Amaterasu.1.jpg

http://www.lotus.org/images/religions/lg/Lotus436W.jpg

~guest blogger, Jessica Tatlow

Haniwa – Those mysterious sculptures

(This post is by Laura Nearing. Keep this one in mind for the next unit! Thanks so much Laura.)

The large tombs that characterized the Kofun period (C.E. 258-646), tumuli, were constructed for the elite. These tombs were covered with earth, forming burial mounds often in the shape of keyholes, and surrounded by moats. The tombs were furnished with extravagant burial goods, such as gold crowns and jewelry, bronze mirrors, glass objects, jade, and pottery. Perhaps the most striking tomb adornments, however, were the haniwa, sculptures placed outside the tombs. Haniwa figures surrounded the mound and the entrance to the tomb, and were positioned facing outward. Simple clay cylinders eventually evolved to more complex and even fanciful sculptures, including various human figures, animals, houses, and boats. Their exact meanings are unknown, but scholars believe that they acted as tomb guardians or provided some symbolic connection between life and afterlife – functioning not only as attendants to the departed, guardians of his tomb, and emblems of his status, but also as national symbols for a unified country.

Haniwa vary from 1 to 5 feet (30 to 150 cm) in height, the average being approximately 3 feet (90 cm) high. After smoothing and modeling the shapes, decorative details might be incised or combed with geometric patterns and painted with pigments of white, red, and blue. The features of the hollowed out eyes, noses and mouths gave the objects a mysterious charm. Haniwa were mass-produced during the 6th century, but after the arrival of Buddhism and the introduction to the practice of cremation, there was a decline in the building of tumuli and, thus, in the production of haniwa.

The makers of haniwa had to travel to the tomb sites, and some may have rented local Sue kilns to do their work. They may also have built a kiln to produce haniwa for a single tomb, and then abandoned it. The work done upon the death of a noble had to be completed quickly. It is suggested that the simplicity of their design, which imbues the haniwa with a mysterious quietness as one stares into their hollow eyes, may have resulted to the necessary mass production of figurines which needed to be quickly created for the tomb.

There is a theory that the soul of the deceases would reside in the haniwa. There are haniwa that are equipped with weapons and armor, and these are also thought to be containers for souls. The armor and weapons would drive away evil spirits and protect the buried from calamity. Since the horse another animal shaped haniwa were normally neatly arranged into a line, it is believed that they were part of a sending-off ceremony.

Perhaps these haniwa were similar to the idea of what we talked about in class for the Ainu. If haniwa were in fact part of a sending-off ceremony, perhaps they were similar to the idea of the Ainu sending-back ceremony. Here, the haniwa were in some way involved with the deceased and their move into the world of the dead, where the sending-back ceremony for the Ainu was to return the bear kami to the mountains - a seemingly much easier way to have a soul taken to where it now, rightly belonged. Perhaps this was because of the elites wealthier status. They could afford such extravagances and paid their way to a safe travel to the other world, rather than performing something similar to the much-involved sending-back ceremony of the Ainu. Of course the Ainu ceremony was for a kami, so perhaps I am completely off beat… but it was just a thought.

~guest blogger, Laura Nearing

Chopsticks (2)

(And here's another take on chopsticks, from Lara. Thank you Lara!)

Chopsticks: Bridges to the Dead, the Divine and the Delicious

While in the West chopsticks may seem to be entirely secular implements, serving solely to complicate the process of eating rice, in Japan, chopsticks are closely connected to death and the divine. Chopsticks are said to have originated over 5000 years ago in China. They became prominent in China as eating utensils, and not just cooking tools, when a lack of fuel and resources around 500BCE meant that food was chopped into small pieces to facilitate rapid cooking. The use of chopsticks spread to Japan around 500 CE where they were used solely in religious ritual. The Japanese name for chopsticks is hashi, which also can mean bridge. This is an apt correlation, for chopsticks were originally used in Japan to bridge the mortal and divine realms as they intermediated the feeding of food to the gods. This explained why chopsticks in Japanese religious ceremonies have tapered ends on both sides (unlike Chinese chopsticks which are uniform in thickness), as one end is said to be for the gods and the other for the mortal.

In Japan chopsticks are still shaped according to their purpose and owner. The Japanese style of chopsticks for common eating is tapered only at one end, and sized according to age and gender: chopsticks for men are longer and heavier than those for women which are shorter and lighter chopsticks. Chopsticks for children are fitted to a child’s small hands. In this drawing, the second, third and forth set of chopsticks from the bottom are made in the Japanese style, for the use of a child, woman and man respectively.

Proper chopstick etiquette is important, for mishandling of chopsticks can not only make one appear gauche, but can be quite offensive. Two things never to do with chopsticks would be to stick chopsticks vertically in a bowl of rice and to reach for the same piece of food as someone else. Not placing chopsticks vertically is not done because this is how food is offered to deceased ancestors. Not reaching for the same piece of food as another person is not proper because in Japanese funeral ritual after the body has been cremated, two relatives of the deceased transfer the bones into an urn by together grasping each bone part with chopsticks. In both of these scenarios, chopsticks once again act as bridges, in this case bridging the world of the living with the world of the dead.

A final interesting note regarding chopsticks revolves around privacy, pollution and purity. In China, chopsticks are treated much like cutlery as in the West: large amounts of identical chopsticks are kept for general use by the household. However, in Japan, each member of the house typically has her or his own set of chopsticks and rice bowl which is used solely by them. It is worth speculating whether this is indicative of the transitory aspect of chopsticks in Japanese culture; in acting as bridges between worlds, chopsticks are powerful tools and thus have a flush of the divine even when used in secular contexts. This connection death and other worlds helps to explain why sharing one’s chopsticks would, in the Japanese context, be opening up oneself to possible pollution. By keeping individual chopsticks, one can monitor and protect their purity, a question we have been investigating thoroughly this semester.

Links:

How to use chopsticks as weapons (video).

Chopstick table etiquette (video).

The vast world of chopsticks (to see how many styles there are and for ordering).

An article about the ‘true cost’ of disposable chopsticks (in China, but still pertinent I thought).

~guest blogger, Lara Hollway

Chopsticks (1)

(We have two submissions on chopsticks, so this will be a one-two punch. Here's the first post, from Will. Thank you Will!)

Chopsticks in Japanese folklore, ritual, and food culture

Most of us raised in the larger population centres of North America are at least passingly familiar with chopsticks as the exotic and, for some, confounding eating utensil (a few of my friends have sworn them off, out of frustration) traditional to Asian cuisine. What most of us in the west aren’t familiar with, however, is the lesser-known place of importance that chopsticks occupy in the material culture of Japanese religion. In Japan, chopsticks are connected with Shinto folklore and kami worship, as well as funeral rites.

Modern chopsticks are thought by archaeologists to have developed from kanabasami – tweezer-like utensils made of iron. These were among the items, like sake, offered to kami in ceremonial rituals. The belief was that when chopsticks were offered to a kami, its spirit inhabited the chopsticks, allowing it to dine with the humans. These offered chopsticks, are thought to have been what are known as ryokuchi-bashi, two sticks of white wood heavy in the centre and tapered at both ends. Most often, the wood used in the construction of the ryokuchi-bashi would be willow, from the ancient belief of the wood’s resistance to evil spirits and impurities. Also, due to the fact that it’s leaves form earlier in the spring then others, the willow is considered a lucky tree. Remnants of these beliefs subsist in modern Japanese food culture; the concept of a god inhabiting a pair of chopsticks with its vital energy and spirit, thus allowing their user to be imbued with this divine power, is likely the reason why special ryokuchi-bashi chopsticks are, to this day, used in weddings, new years celebrations, and other important festivals and feasts (Warrant 12). We see, in these traditional beliefs, chopsticks acting as a bridge between gods and humans, and accordingly the modern Japanese word for chopsticks, hashi (箸), means “bridge.”

Chopsticks are also important in traditional Japanese funeral rites, in the ritual treatment of the cremated remains. A blogger’s account of his grandfather’s traditional Japanese funeral details a ceremony in which the guests were offered a pair of mismatched chopsticks (one stick of wood and one of bamboo), and each encouraged to pick up, with the chopsticks, the bone fragments leftover following the cremation, transferring them to the urn in this way, starting with the feet to ensure the upright orientation of the body within the urn. Here, again, we see the effect of these rituals on common food culture: it is taboo to use mismatched chopsticks when eating. Other food-related taboos in Japan most likely related to the chopsticks use in the cremation ritual include the faux pas of passing of food directly from one person’s chopsticks to another’s – this resembles a ritual described in some funeral accounts of the bones being passed between guests in this way – and the taboo of sticking chopsticks in a bowl of rice and leaving them in a vertical position, which could come from a resemblance either to the customary incense offering in Buddhist funerals, or to the way in which a departed family member’s personal pair of chopsticks is stuck in the bowl of uncooked rice placed upon the family altar as an offering.

Chopsticks have been used in Japan since about the 8th century, so it is not surprising that they should have such significance. In Japan chopsticks are more than just simple eating utensils; they are important objects of tradition.

If you are one of those who have not yet mastered chopstick use or etiquette, and are inclined to participate in this aspect of Japanese culture, there are some links below to instructional resources on the subject.

Article on chopstick etiquette and use.

Instructional video on chopstick use.

The blog link to the full article containing a detailed account of a Japanese funeral.

~ guest blogger, Will Fox

Talking Trash in Japan

(This post comes to us from Andrea Damiano. I'm sure anyone who has lived in Japan will agree, trash is taken very seriously. Andrea, thank you!)

I still remember when garbage day was once a week and everything went out in a single black plastic trash bag. Now I have to get up at 7am every Tuesday and Friday to leave disposables at the curb and on Thursday the recycling.
I admit I hate garbage day and dividing up trash, but a sense of urgent environmental consciousness forces me out of bed three times a week. Probably nothing would happen should I fail to comply, maybe at worst a warning or small fine from a surly city waste collector.

It’s a good thing I don’t live in Japan, where in recent years most community’s have restructured garbage codes and institutionalized a ‘no-waste’ lifestyle. Imagine sorting through 10 different trash categories everyday of the week: burnable, non-burnable, empty bottles, empty cans, PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles, plastic containers/packages, large-size trash, mirrors, thermometers and paper containers/packages.

Now imagine that each piece had to be cleaned, delivered in personalized transparent garbage bags and were monitored by an organization of your neighbors. What if instead of 10 categories, like in Yokohama, there were 35 or even up to 44, as is the case in the environmentally conscious town of Kamikatsu. These are real examples of how garbage collection is being revolutionized across Japan, whose green record puts North America to shame.

The enforcement of recent laws in Japan has decreased the amount of solid waste sent to landfills to only 16%, while comparatively the United States sends about 70% and has a disappointing national recycling average of about 34%. Kamikatsu, Japan’s model community for environmental action now has an 80% recycling rate, up from 55% only 10 years ago.

I promise, I have a point!

Historically, Japan has been ahead of the pack. In 1962 the first law to control air emissions was implemented and 14 other environmental laws were either enacted or amended by 1970. The United States and Canada trailed behind with their first legislation on clean air passed with much contention in the mid-1970’s.

Internationally Japan is responsible for politicking the Koyoto Protocol and hosting the 2008 G8 Summit with a driving environmental agenda.

There are thousands of interesting examples of Japan’s initiatives, from business efficiency to community projects to technological advancements and to trading or extracting from electronic trash (often called ‘urban mining’). Unfortunately, the constraints of this blog have forced me to limit them.

So, what does this have to do our RELG 352: Japanese Religions course? I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Japan has become the premier example of forging environmental consciousness in our tragedy of the commons. Since studying our course lectures and readings, I believe that there is something about the traditions and religions of Japan which has facilitated its green progression at a time when the world scrambles in reaction to pollution.

The state of pollution has always been a central concern to the Japanese civilization as it has been thought to bring about danger, misfortune and bad luck. As such, purification rituals are commonly undertaken in order to remove such pollution and restore good fortune. Ritualization and purification of pollution for both the living and the dead are central to Japan’s primary religions: Shinto and Buddhism. Even the Kojiki, Japan’s oldest book, outlines the balancing relationship between objects of pollution and purity.

For example in commenting on concepts of space in early Japan Professor of Anthropology, Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, notes that then trash had to be brought to a specific area west of the house and that polluted objects were to be left outside the house until its odor had disappeared. It has also been traditionally thought unclean and taboo for excrement to be on a certain shore or to come into contact with old blood, cut hair or a dead body. These materials have dangerous power.

Are these example of early purification rituals really so different from the contemporary division of 30 trash categories to preserve the nature of Japan?

Although there are logically several reasons for the emphasis on environmental improvement, such as limited land space of the island and rapid development of industry in the last few decades, it however can be argued the Japanese also have a stronger obligation to nature and social harmony. It seems as though the culture is ripe to institutionalize environmental preservation and individuals are willing to comply with extensive trash responsibilities.

~guest blogger, Andrea Damiano

Mikoshi: Miniaturization of the Shinto Shrine

(This post is by Ashley Mcrae--as she notes, it's a cool example of miniaturization. Thank you Ashley!)

In the Shinto tradition there are countless local festivals, or matsuri, that are dedicated to the kami of a Shinto Shrine. During many of these matsuri the kami is transported by a mikoshi to another sacred shrine, or to neighborhoods that support the Shinto shrine in order, to bestow blessings on the parishioners. This is the only time in the year that the kami is said to leave the Shrine. While the procession of the mikoshi is not the primary focus of matsuri it has become a highlight for the festive occasion; acting as a means to reestablish a bond between the kami and the community as well as creating a sense of solidarity amongst the community itself by the loosening of restraints - thought to be a dispensation of the kami (Ashkenazi) - or what can be termed as “carnival” according to Bakhtin.

It is commonly believed that the ritual of the mikoshi first started during the Nara period in 749 BCE when the kami Hachiman was transported to Toda-ji temple in Usa Jingu to oversee the construction of the daibutsu, or Great Statue of Buddha, ensuring health and prosperity (Japanese Architecture and Art Users Net System). However, the practice of carrying kami in mikoshi is believed to have only become ritualized in the Heian Era (794 -1192 BCE) in which the mikoshi would have, most likely, been in the form of a mirror with a branch of the sakaki tree or some other object of divine presence (Japan: An Illustrated Encyclopedia).

The mikoshi itself is commonly translated as a “portable shrine” but is in actuality a divine palanquin which is believed to be modeled after ancient Chinese forms of palanquins commonly used by the imperial family and the aristocracy (Askenazi). The architecture of the mikoshi resembles a miniature shrine with two or four pillars, walls, a roof, a verandah and a railing. Typically, the mikoshi is rectangular, hexagonal or octagonal in shape and are lavishly decorated with gold-plating and precious jewels which establishes the mikoshi as a work of art with ornate and detailed woodworking, metalworking, lacquer ware and died tapestries. The elaborateness of the mikoshi is believed to please the kami that is being transported inside. Some mikoshi may even have small torii inside to mark the sacred space of the kami inside.

The transportation of the mikoshi is handled by dozens or even hundreds of male individuals depending on the size of the palanquin – some can weigh up to several tonnes. The parishioners bare the structure on their shoulders by means of the poles and carry it through the streets, neighborhoods or to a sacred shrine/designated area for a period of time before returning to the primary Shinto shrine. Following the mikoshi are priests and crowds of people dressed in ancient costumes – often singing, chanting,dancing loudly or jumping up and down. During the procession it is common to see the carriers waving the mikoshi wildly back and forth or up and down – an action that is believed to be directed by the will of the kami for its own amusement.

Overall, it is interesting to note that the mikoshi is a form of miniaturization within Shinto religious tradition as well as a an element of carnival. The liminality and reversal of regulated norms that both the kami and the parishioners embody during the matsuri and mikoshi procession serves to bring the self into contact with the other and create or reestablish a relationship. In this sense, the mikoshi acts as a means for the parishioners of a local community to establish and maintain a relationship with the local kami through the processes of miniaturization and carnival in order to receive blessings of health and prosperity for the upcoming season, year or transitory phase.

Possible links for further interest in Mikoshi:

• Mikoshi Festival
• Mikoshi in Hachiohji Summer Festival 2006

~guest blogger, Ashley Mcrae

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