O still small voice of calm (From the hymn Dear Lord and Father)?
Our recent trip to Nikko, World Heritage site and beautifully preserved burial sites for Togugawa Iesu and many other Edo era great Shoguns, really got us thinking about Spirit, Belief and Practice. We were stunned by the richness and variety of temples and worship sites in this area. For a brief meander into the history of Nikko, click here. It being the major Golden Week holiday, the main temple attractions were swamped with tourists so we quickly took off along the little-used back trails and back temples to discover a world immersed in faith at every turn.
As we wandered and climbed and explored around ancient trees, shrines and temples I kept thinking more and more about what is Faith? Often and traditionally in the West we attend a church/synagogue/ mosque where we have a sacred day of the week. Celebrations, though they are very individual for many people, are often associated with certain days of the week and at certain main locations.
What happens when everywhere you look there is something sacred?
The trees, planted hundreds of years ago along ancient pathways, towering into the sky and beaconing us onwards...
from "ordinary" tree to tree....
Up ancient stone staircases winding through the trees with small shrines at each landing...
Through a Shinto gate lined with these ancient trees...
(Look carefully at the top of the gate and you will see a hole which legend holds that if you throw a rock through on your first try you will have good luck; if you miss you will have bad luck. As you might see when you look closely the hole has been enlarged from hundreds of thousands of pebbles thrown at it over hundreds of years. Shelley and I are not quite sure what the rules are when you get your pebble through... on the 5th try???)
to the "special" trees ringed with sacred ropes and shrines with messages hung near them. People come to these trees, touch them...
put their ears to the trunk, pray and leave a written message of faith on the wooden tablets at any time of day or night that they happen through.
Trees as a manifestation of Faith, prayer and belief even when they have been cut down...
Certain rocks seemed to emanate the Spirit and evoke Faith...as we have seen on precious blogs the zig-zag papers are there to mark the sacred of this spot. Unable to read the signs this is clearly a grounded celebration of....?
With its own beautiful planting, special lamp to illuminate it and a spot for collecting donations.
Is Faith and Prayer associated only with what is ancient?
Further up the hill what seemed to be a relatively recently implanted wooden post highlighted by a sacred rope was standing next to a carved and a naturally shaped stone heart.
Upon closer inspection every white flake was a wooden heart with an inscription on it. Broken hearts? Mended hearts? Soft hearts? Lonely hearts? Hearts of gold? Clearly a newly created Faith centre.
Right next to the heart, another recent shrine of some kind (just read the sign; it will tell you what this is!)
Faith is celebrated everywhere we go in Japan with a large variety of small shrines with their own unique character, their own history and their own stories and very sacred presence... we just do not know what those stories are...
Sacred pillars appear tucked under trees and around house corners.
Statues particularly brought a broad range of the Sacred in human form in a whole variety of positions and facial expressions.
It is particularly fascinating to see the knitted red bonnets and bibs on many of the statues who appear to be statues of Jizo Bosatso. All over Japan we see statues of Jizo as well as many other statues draped with what appear to be hand made red bonnets and bibs. Click here to find out more about the tradition of knitting red caps and bibs for the Jizo statues.
We enjoyed "connecting" with them.
All of these sites are low key. People seem to come individually or in groups on any day at any time to say a prayer and to leave a token.
These low key demonstrations are balanced by the huge, flashy and beautiful temples that are also part of Japanese spirituality. Nikko is particularly known for it"s temples related to the great Tokugawa dynasty who founded and led the Edo period for hundreds of years. Many of the great Shoguns are buried in these temples at Nikko with huge ornate gates, court-yards and temples.
The Toshogu Shrine (here) draws huge crowds; how spiritual are they just like the visitors to Notre Dame cathedral in Paris?
We did not chose to wait the hour or so to get into that temple. Instead we enjoyed the magnificence of some of the other temples up the valley linked to different generations of Tokugawa.
The Iemitsu Mausoleum (here) was stunning as a display of the opulence of the Tokugawa.
All of this that we saw in Nikko were manifestations of ways in which the Spirit, Faith is kept alive in the daily world here and is not boxed into a specific day or one specific building. When we ask our frineds whether they are religious, whether they are Buddhist or Shinto, they generally say no but... they go to temples and shrines, they make offerings, they pray to statues as well.
Interesting learning here.
