[17. The Great Purification.] But the ritual of the Great or General Purification is said to be "one of the most important and most solemn ceremonies of the Shinto religion." Professor Karl Florenz, who has given us a translation of this ritual,[33] informs us that it is by means of this ceremony that "the population of the whole country, from the princes and ministers down to the common people, is purified and freed from sins, pollutions, and calamities." It is celebrated twice a year, on the thirtieth day of the sixth and twelfth months. "The chief ceremony was performed in the capital, near the south gate of the imperial palace, and might be styled the purification of the court, because it was to purify all the higher and lower officials of the imperial court. In a similar way the ceremony was celebrated also at all the more important public shrines of the whole country." Besides the regular semiannual celebration of the "Great Purification" (called Oho-harahe), it is also performed on such special occasions as at the accession of a new emperor to the throne, or when an imperial princess was chosen as a virgin priestess and sent to the temple of Isè.
Without detailing the movements, positions, and practices of the assembled priests, officials, and common people at the service of the General Purification, we simply cite a few extracts from the ritual which may serve to show us the underlying concept of purification. While the ritual is only a part of the entire ceremony of the occasion, we are told that it is not infrequently recited without performing the ceremony. Moreover, while in ancient times the reader was always a member of the priestly Nakatomi tribe, at the present time the ritual is read by the officiating priest of each particular temple. The following excerpts are made from Florenz's translation:
"Hear, all of you, assembled princes of the blood, princes, high dignitaries, and men of the hundred offices. Hear, all of you, that in the Great Purification of the present last day of the sixth month of the current year, [the Sovran] deigns to purify, and deigns to cleanse the various offenses which may have been committed either inadvertently, or deliberately, especially by the persons serving in the imperial court: (viz.) the scarf-wearing attendants, the sash-wearing attendants (of the kitchen), the attendants who carry quivers on the back, the attendants who gird on swords, the eighty attendants of the attendants, and, moreover, by the people serving in all offices."
The ritual goes on to declare how the Sovran's dear progenitors, in a divine assembly, ordained that the "Sovran Grandchild's Augustiness should tranquilly rule the luxuriant reed-plain region of fresh young spikes as a peaceful country;" how they expelled with a divine expulsion the savage deities, and "silenced the rocks and trunks of trees;" how they let him go down from his heavenly place, "and dividing a road through the eightfold heavenly clouds," they sent him down and gave the land into his peaceful keeping. The ritual also makes mention of various kinds of offenses which need to be cleansed and purged away, and distinguishes them as "heavenly offenses" and "earthly offenses." Among the former are "breaking down the divisions of the rice fields, filling up the irrigating channels, and opening the floodgate of sluices," and the evacuation of one's bowels in improper places. Among "earthly offenses" are the cutting the skin of the living or the dead body so as to become defiled by blood, being affected with corns, bunions, boils, or proud-flesh; sins of adultery, the offense of using incantations, and various kinds of personal calamity.
"It is expected," the ritual adds, "that the heavenly gods will be favorably disposed by reason of these offerings, ceremonies, and ritual of the Great Purification, and will deign to purify and cleanse, and make all the specified offenses disappear, even as the clouds of heaven and the dense morning and evening mists disappear before the blowing winds." It is expected that "the goddess who resides in the current of the rapid stream that comes boiling down the ravines, from the tops of the mountains," and the goddess who resides in the currents of the briny ocean will carry them away, and "swallow them down with gurgling sound," and they shall be utterly "blown away, banished, and got rid of," so that "from this day onwards there will be no offense in the four quarters of the region under heaven, especially with regard to all people of all offices who respectfully serve in the court of the Sovran." The offenses were thought of as somehow swept away by the winds and the waves, and then swallowed into the depths of the sea, and so cast down into the underworld, the realm of death and pollution, whence all defilements were supposed to have originated. So they were cast down into the depths whence they came forth.
The concluding words of this ritual are a command for the "diviners of the four countries to leave and go away to the great river-way, and carry away the offenses by purification." Thus divination was honored, as moving in the will and way of the gods; but incantation is mentioned among the "earthly offenses." Probably these evil incantations refer to evil-minded witchcraft and invoking calamity on others.
This great ritual ceremony of purification, being one of the most solemn formal expressions of the Shinto cult, calls for the following remarks:
(1) The central idea is purification from certain forms of evil, or certain kinds of offenses.
(2) The offenses are conceived as either willfully committed, or committed inadvertently.
(3) They are also spoken of as heavenly and earthly. This distinction seems to us quite arbitrary and unnatural, but it probably had a mythical origin and the offenses called heavenly are mainly such as involve distress for an agricultural community. They are sins against the land of the gods, while the earthly offenses are mainly matters of personal defilement. In all cases it is conspicuous that the Shinto concept of offenses which need purging away is that of outward physical pollution and damage. They are all offenses committed against the interests of the community and likely to bring some kind of calamity upon the people.