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Hatsumōdë Manners

Quite a few of the responses to Jinja Shinpō’s survey on hatsumōdë dealt, in one way or another, with hatsumōdë etiquette. One problem that has come up before is that people are too well-mannered. They line up to pay their respects, and wait patiently in line, even when the line gets really, really long. One priest noted that they try to get four or five people to pay their respects at once, because there is plenty of space, but if they (the priests) go away again, it soon drifts back… Read More »Hatsumōdë Manners

Hatsumōdë Survey 2025

Jinja Shinpō published the results of its survey of its correspondent priests in the 3rd March issue. This survey is nominally about hatsumōdë, but the priests take the opportunity to write about lots of issues. The paper has been doing this for a few years (2024, 2023, 2022), but I think they have been expanding it over time. It is an incredibly valuable window onto the views of a wide range of priests, and I think that may be why it has been expanded. There will be six posts about… Read More »Hatsumōdë Survey 2025

Mountaintop Sanctuaries

The 24th February issue of Jinja Shinpō included an article about the rebuilding of the main sanctuary of a small jinja. This jinja, Misumiyama Jinja, is on top of a low (508m) mountain, Misumiyama, in Tottori Prefecture. The old sanctuary was built in 1845, and was designated as a tangible cultural property by the city. However, in February 2022, some hikers reported that it had been completely destroyed by fire (after a lightning strike, it seems). The chief priest, Revd Tanaka, went to the site, and was able to retrieve… Read More »Mountaintop Sanctuaries

Cashless Payments Revisited

The 17th February issue of Jinja Shinpō included an article reporting on the latest meeting of Jinja Honchō’s committee to consider contemporary issues, which basically means the questions of how jinja should deal with the online world, and what they should do about cashless payments. As I have mentioned before, since the pandemic Japan has become less and less of a cash-based society, and foreign tourists often do not have Japanese cash at all. This raises an issue for jinja, because they are not set up to take cashless payments,… Read More »Cashless Payments Revisited

Dedicating New… Toilets?

The 17th February issue of Jinja Shinpō had an article about the dedication of a new toilet block at Taga Taisha, in Shiga Prefecture. The previous toilets were built in the Shōwa thirties (between 1955 and 1964), and were difficult for the elderly and people with children to use. (That probably means that they were squat toilets, which were the Japanese standard sixty years ago, but are almost unknown now.) The rebuilding started last April, and the toilets were “reborn as facilities appropriate to the times”. On the day of… Read More »Dedicating New… Toilets?

Mihishiroki Hōeishiki

At the end of February, Isë Jingū announced the dates for the first large public events of the 63rd Shikinen Sengū, and this was reported in the 10th March issue of Jinja Shinpō. The Mihishiroki Hōeishiki will take place on June 9th at the Inner Sanctuary and June 10th at the Outer Sanctuary. This is the “Honourable Hishiro Tree Pull Offering Ceremony”, and it involves trees being pulled into the precincts of the Inner and Outer Sanctuaries. These are (almost) the most sacred trees in the whole ceremony — the… Read More »Mihishiroki Hōeishiki