Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation

by Lafcadio Hearn

The principal incidents of the festival ceremonies within the great temples are the presentation of the offerings, the repetition of the ritual, and the dancing of the priestesses. Each of these performances retains a special character rigidly fixed by tradition. The food-offerings are served upon archaic vessels of unglazed pottery (red earthenware mostly): boiled rice pressed into cones of the form of a sugar-loaf, various preparations of fish and of edible sea-weed, fruits and fowls, rice-wine presented in jars of immemorial shape. These offerings are carried into the temple upon white wooden trays of curious form, and laid upon white wooden tables of equally curious form;—the faces of the bearers being covered, below the eyes, with sheets of white paper, in order that their breath may [141] not contaminate the food of the gods; and the trays, for like reason, must be borne at arms' length …. In ancient times the offerings would seem to have included things much more costly than food,—if we may credit the testimony of what are probably the oldest documents extant in the Japanese tongue, the Shinto rituals, or norito.* The following excerpt from Satow's translation of the ritual prayer to the Wind-gods of Tatsuta is interesting, not only as a fine example of the language of the norito, but also as indicating the character of the great ceremonies in early ages, and the nature of the offerings:—

[*Several have been translated by Satow, whose opinion of their antiquity is here cited; and translations have also been made into German.]

"As the great offerings set up for the Youth-god, I set up various sorts of offerings: for Clothes, bright cloth, glittering cloth, soft cloth, and coarse cloth,—and the five kinds of things, a mantlet, a spear, a horse furnished with a saddle;—for the Maiden-god I set up various sorts of offerings—providing Clothes, a golden thread-box, a golden tatari, a golden skein-holder, bright cloth, glittering cloth, soft cloth, and coarse cloth, and the five kinds of things, a horse furnished with a saddle;—as to Liquor, I raise high the beer-jars, fill and range-in-a-row the bellies of the beer-jars; soft grain and coarse grain;—as to things which dwell in the hills, things soft of hair and things coarse of hair;—as to things which grow in the great field—plain, sweet herbs and bitter herbs;—as to things which dwell in the blue sea-plain, things broad of fin and things narrow of fin—down to the weeds of the offing and weeds of the [142] shore. And if the sovran gods will take these great offerings which I set up,—piling them up like a range of hills,—peacefully in their hearts, as peaceful offerings and satisfactory offerings; and if the sovran gods, deigning not to visit the things produced by, the great People of the region under heaven with bad winds and rough waters, will open and bless them,—I will at the autumn service set up the first fruits, raising high the beer-jars, filling and ranging-in-rows the bellies of the beer-jars,—and drawing them hither in juice and in ear, in many hundred rice-plants and a thousand rice-plants. And for this purpose the princes and councillors and all the functionaries, the servants of the six farms of the country of Yamato—even to the males and females of them—have all come and assembled in the fourth month of this year, and, plunging down the root of the neck cormorant-wise in the presence of the sovran gods, fulfil their praise as the Sun of to-day rises in glory."…

The offerings are no longer piled up "like a range of hills," nor do they include all things dwelling in the mountains and in the sea; but the imposing ritual remains, and the ceremony is always impressive. Not the least interesting part of it is the sacred dance. While the gods are supposed to be partaking of the food and wine set out before their shrines, the girl-priestesses, robed in crimson and white, move gracefully to the sound of drums and flutes,—waving fans, or shaking bunches of tiny bells as they circle about the sanctuary. According to our Western notions. the performance of the [143] miko could scarcely be called dancing; but it is a graceful spectacle, and very curious,—for every step and attitude is regulated by traditions of unknown antiquity. As for the plaintive music, no Western ear can discern in it anything resembling a real melody; but the gods should find delight in it, because it is certainly performed for them to-day exactly as it used to be performed twenty centuries ago.

I speak of the ceremonies especially as I have witnessed them in Izumo: they vary somewhat according to cult and province. At the shrines of Ise, Kasuga, Kompira, and several others which I visited, the ordinary priestesses are children; and when they have reached the nubile age, they retire from the service. At Kitzuki the priestesses are grown-up women: their office is hereditary; and they are permitted to retain it even after marriage.

Formerly the Miko was more than a mere officiant: the songs which she is still obliged to learn indicate that she was originally offered to the gods as a bride. Even yet her touch is holy; the grain sown by her hand is blessed. At some time in the past she seems to have been also a pythoness: the spirits of the gods possessed her and spoke through her lips. All the poetry of this most ancient of religions centres in the figure of its little Vestal,—child-bride of ghosts,—as she flutters, [144] like some wonderful white-and-crimson butterfly, before the shrine of the Invisible. Even in these years of change, when she must go to the public school, she continues to represent all that is delightful in Japanese girlhood; for her special home-training keeps her reverent, innocent, dainty in all her little ways, and worthy to remain the pet of the gods.

The history of the higher forms of ancestor-worship in other countries would lead us to suppose that the public ceremonies of the Shinto-cult must include some rite of purification. As a matter of fact, the most important of all Shinto ceremonies is the ceremony of purification,—o-harai, as it is called, which term signifies the casting-out or expulsion of evils …. In ancient Athens a corresponding ceremony took place every year; in Rome, every four years. The o-harai is performed twice every year,—in the sixth month and the twelfth month by the ancient calendar. It used to be not less obligatory than the Roman lustration; and the idea behind the obligation was the same as that which inspired the Roman laws on the subject …. So long as men believe that the welfare of the living depends upon the will of the dead,—that all happenings in the world are ordered by spirits of different characters, evil as well as good,—that every bad action lends additional power to the viewless [145] forces of destruction, and therefore endangers the public prosperity,—so long will the necessity of a public purification remain an article of common faith. The presence in any community of even one person who has offended the gods, consciously or unwillingly, is a public misfortune, a public peril. Yet it is not possible for all men to live so well as never to vex the gods by thought, word, or deed,—through passion or ignorance or carelessness. "Every one," declares Hirata, "is certain to commit accidental offences, however careful he may be… Evil acts and words are of two kinds: those of which we are conscious, and those of which we are not conscious …. It is better to assume that we have committed such unconscious offences." Now it should be remembered that for the man of Old Japan,—as for the Greek or the Roman citizen of early times,—religion consisted chiefly in the exact observance of multitudinous custom; and that it was therefore difficult to know whether, in performing the duties of the several cults, one had not inadvertently displeased the Unseen. As a means of maintaining and assuring the religious purity of the people periodical lustration was consequently deemed indispensable.

From the earliest period Shinto exacted scrupulous cleanliness —indeed, we might say that it regarded physical impurity as identical with moral impurity, and intolerable to the gods. It has [146] always been, and still remains, a religion of ablutions. The Japanese love of cleanliness—indicated by the universal practice of daily bathing, and by the irreproachable condition of their homes has been maintained, and was probably initiated, by their religion. Spotless cleanliness being required by the rites of ancestor-worship,—in the temple, in the person of the officiant, and in the home,—this rule of purity was naturally extended by degrees to all the conditions of existence. And besides the great periodical ceremonies of purification, a multitude of minor lustrations were exacted by the cult. This was the case also, it will be remembered in the early Greek and Roman civilizations—the citizen had to submit to purification upon almost every important occasion of existence. There were lustrations indispensable at birth, marriage, and death; lustrations on the eve of battle; lustrations at regular periods, of the dwelling, estate, district, or city. And, as in Japan, no one could approach a temple without a preliminary washing of hands. But ancient Shinto exacted more than the Greek or the Roman cult: it required the erection of special houses for birth, —"parturition-houses"; special houses for the consummation of marriage,—"nuptial-huts"; and special buildings for the dead,—"mourning-houses." Formerly women were obliged during the period of menstruation, as well as during the time of confinement, to live apart. These harsher archaic customs [147] have almost disappeared, except in one or two remote districts, and in the case of certain priestly families; but the general rules as to purification, and as to the times and circumstances forbidding approach to holy places, are still everywhere obeyed. Purity of heart is not less insisted upon than physical purity; and the great rite of lustration, performed every six months, is of course a moral purification. It is performed not only at the great temples, and at all the Ujigami, but likewise in every home

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[*On the kamidana, "or god-shelf," there is usually placed a kind of oblong paper-box containing fragments of the wands used by the priests of Ise at the great national purification-ceremony, or o-harai. This box is commonly called by the name of the ceremony, o-harai, or "august purification," and is inscribed with the names of the great gods of Ise. The presence of this object is supposed to protect the home; but it should be replaced by a new o-harai at the expiration of six months; for the virtue of the charm is supposed to last only during the interval between two official purifications. This distribution to thousands of homes of fragments of the wands, used to "drive away evils" at the time of the Ise lustration, represents of course the supposed extension of the high-priest's protection to those homes until the time of the next o-harai.