Saga Shrine & Matsubara Shrine

Saga Shrine & Matsubara Shrine

With lines of people waiting for their first shrine visit of the year, hatsumode, 5 full days already into the year, it is an indication of how popular Saga Shrine is with local inhabitants. It is also the main venue for Shinto-style weddings, car-blessings etc.

many miko, shrine maidens, were also in evidence. Mostly students hired for the new year period, the shrine's busiest, and most profitable, time of the year, major festivals may also see the hiring of temporary miko.

Saga Shrine is located just north of the moat of the old castle. The shrine is relatively new, founded in the Meiji period and enshrining the last two daimyo of the former Saga Domain, Nabeshima Naomasa and his sone Naohiro. A lot of the last generation of daimyo got themselves enshrined as gods, especially those daimyos who were pro-imperialist like the daimyos of Choshu, Satsuma, and Saga.

Immediately adjacent to Saga Shrine, and in reality not at all separate, is the older Matsubara Shrine, founded a century earlier, and enshrining the ancestors of the Nabeshima and their earlier generations.

Within Matsubara Shrine are many sub-shrines and other points of interest, but on this trip, it was so crowded and I just literally walked through. A few years ago while walking the Kyushu Fudo  Myo  pilgrimage I stopped in and explored more deeply, so will post much more later.

This was the end of my 56yj day walking the Kyushu pilgrimage, and I estimated that I had already walked more than 1500 kilometers, several hundred more than the whole of the Shikoku Ohenro, and I still had more of Saga, all of Nagasaki, and then back into Fukuoka before I would finish. Tomorrow I would head back home and return to Saga in February to continue on....

Miko Mai Rehearsal

While exploring Kagoshima Jingu I watched to miko practising for a ceremony later that night.

Miko Mai, or Miko dance is believed to originate with the dance performed by the goddess Uzume in front od the cave wherein the sun goddess Amaterasu had hidden herself.

It is often sid it is the origin of kagura. I have seen it performed by single miko and by groups of 4 miko, but never by 2.

An earlier post with video of 4 very young girls performing can be found here

The ceiling of the shrine was quite stupendous. The performance of the dance was a little surreal without any musical accompaniment.

Taga Shrine Nogata

Taga Shrine in Nogata is the main shrine of the area and when I visited just before the new year they were getting ready for the influx of visitors in the new year.

It is located on a small hill next to the railway tracks and near the local Coal Museum.

Two large, relatively modern, rather chunky, komainu guard the main path.

Housed inside the main gate are a fine pair of older, wooden komainu, the earlier form that komainu took before the exterior, stone ones that are  now most common.

It is not known for sure when the shrine was founded although it claims to go back to the "Age of the Gods". Certainly, in 717 it existed and was known as Hikaru Daimyojin after the mountain called Hikaruyama.

A couple of decades later it was referred to as Myoken Daimyojin. The more I learn, the greater it seems the Myoken cult was in ancient Japan.

The shrine was destroyed by war several times  and rebuilt and sometimes renamed. In the mid 17th century it was majorly rebuilt and called Myoken Shrine. In the late 17th century it was renamed Taga Shrine.

The main kami of the shrine are Izanagi and Izanami, and the crest is a pair of wagtails as it was by watching a pair of wagtails mating that brother and sister Izanagi and Izanami learnt how to procreate.

I visited on December 28th, day 4 of my first walk around Kyushu, and preparations were underway for the busiest time of the shrine year, New Year.

In one of the rooms in the shrine office many young girls, probably high school or university students, were taking a class for their part time job as shrine maidens for the new year period.

There were many sub shrines within the grounds.

Next stop was the nearby Coal Museum as this was a major coal-producing region of Japan until the mid 20th century

Vacation 2011 Day1: Sumiyoshi Shrine

The last part of my first day of vacation I was in Hakata and I visited the Sumiyoshi Shrine there.

The head Sumiyoshi Shrine is in Osaka, but the one in Hakata is believed to be the original one.

The main kami are Sokotsutsuo-no-kami, Nakatsutsuo-no-kami and Uwatsutsuo-no-kami, which are kami connected with navigation and safe travel by sea. the mythical "Empress" Jingu is also now enshrined here as the myths say she received oracles from the Sumiyoshi Kami before her mythical "conquest" of Korea.

I recently read that the 3 kami were originally aspects of the undersea Dragon King, a kami long associated with distant lands.

Travellers and emissaries going from Yamato to Korea and China would first stop at the Sumiyoshi Taisha in Naniwa (Osaka) and then visit other Sumiyoshi Shrines along the Inland Sea until finally leaving from Hakata.

Its a nice oasis of green in an otherwise built-up area and has some fine Zuijin and komainu.

There is a secondary shrine to Amaterasu in the grounds, and an Ebisu shrine in front.

As a major shrine it is able to employ Miko.

Behind the main hall are 2 Inari shrines.

More ceremonies at Shunki Taisai

As well as the main ceremony at the Shunki Taisai there were several other ceremonies going on during the day. In one of the secondary shrines Miko Mai was performed several times during the day.

Three priests also took part in the ritual and no-one else was within the shrine.

As is obvious to anyone reading this blog, I am quite fascinated by Miko and their costumes. Lots of previous posts can be found here.

In the main hall of the shrine there was a continuous set of purification ceremonies going on all day for those wishing to pay for the service.

Down below the main shrine was a special shrine just for cars. Most areas will have a shrine or temple that specializes in rituals for car blessing and driving safety, but this was the first time I had seen an area specifically set up for it.

The number of ceremonies and services offered by shrines has increased in the post-war years as shrines do not have access to the lucrative funeral business that funds Buddhism.

Shunki Taisai

Yesterday was the Grand Spring Festival down in Tsuwano at the Taikodani Inari Shrine. Before the main ceremony could begin the miko assisted the participants with water purification, starting with themselves.

As well as the 4 miko there were 8 priests (or 6 priests and 2 trainee priests) and 4 representatives from the town taking part.

After everyone was ready the Guji (head priest) came out and then lead the procession to the ceremonial area.

The ceremony took place in a Himorogi, a sacred enclosure which probably is the form earliest shrines took before buildings were introduced after the introduction of Buddhism. The big umbrella is for the head priest.

The ceremony was short, and as far as I could tell there were no norito (prayers)

The Miko were holding sprigs of cherry blossoms, though as the cherry blossoms had passed 3 or 4 weeks ago these were plastic, fitting perhaps as most of the shrine is concrete.

Then everyone headed inside the main building which was full of paying customers who had paid handsomely for the privilege of a purification ceremony.

A gallery of Miko

Iwashimizu Hachimangu, Kyoto.

Miko, commonly translated as "shrine maiden" in English, can be seen at many shrines in Japan.

Iwashimizu Hachimangu, Kyoto.

At larger shrines they will be full-time employees with duties that include office work, cleaning, sales, and assisting with ceremonies.

Dazaifu Tenmangu.

They are not female priests, or priestesses. There are female priests, though they are  not a large percentage of the priesthood.

Iwaishima, Kanmai Matsuri

At smaller, local shrines, elementary-school girls will fulfill the role of miko in some ceremonies. A common scenario being Miko Mai, a dance performed by a single miko or a group. I have several videos of Miko mai, one performed by 4 village girls at the Tsunozu matsuri, and another of two full-time miko rehearsing for a festival at Kagoshima Jingu. Both posts also have lots of photos.

Takachiho Shrine.

Nagaoka Tenmangu.

The most common time to see miko though will be over the New Year period when shrines are at their busiest in the whole year. Big shrines will hire lots of university students as Miko to handle the influx of visitors.

Nagaoka Tenmangu

The full-time Miko will perform the more ceremonial duties, commonly inculuding purification rituals.

Hatsumode, January 2nd, Kyoto

Though technically Hatsumode refers to the first shrine visit of the year, and of course there can only be one first, many people, myself included, take the opportunity to visit more than one.

The first place we went in Kyoto was Yoshida Shrine where there were no lines of people.

There are quite a few sub-shrines scattered around the hillside, all with offerings laid out in front of the honden.

Omota Sha is a shrine I have been wanting to visit for a long time, but is usually closed, it only opens a few days a year. It features a unique octagonal building.

Omoto Sha also features shrines for all of the provinces of Japan.

The sunny day caused the snow on the roofs to constantly melt and drip.

Nearby is Munetada Shrine, again not so many visitors.

Here we were given Omiki.