Daijō-sai

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Emperor Akihito Daijōsai (1990) .jpg
Memorial stone for the Daijō-sai carried out on the occasion of Akihito's accession to the throne

The Daijō-sai ( Japanese 大 嘗 祭 (sometimes also read "Ōname-sai"), "celebration of the great tasting") is the most important and last of three Shinto ceremonies that accompany a Japanese crown prince as he ascends the chrysanthemum throne. The other names for this ceremony are Daijō-e ( Japanese 大 嘗 会 ) and Senso Daijō-sai ( Japanese 践 祚 大 嘗 祭 ).

Origin of the ceremony

The Daijō-sai is one of the most important state ceremonies accompanying the accession of a new Japanese emperor. Already the Nihonshoki (720), the second oldest Japanese imperial chronicle, mentions such a ceremony for the reign of the Emperor Seinei (480–484 BC). Its origin lies in the Niiname-sai (harvest festival), which already existed before the Taika reform (i.e. before the middle of the 7th century). In the course of the Taika reform , the ceremony and its implementation were officially determined with the intention of uniting the provinces more strongly through a nationally uniformly celebrated ceremony.

Originally the ceremony took place on the day of the hare of the 11th lunar calendar month, after the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in the course of the Meiji Restoration (1868-1912) it was set for November 23rd.

Course of the ceremony in ancient times

Already in autumn, two fields to the west and east of the capital Kyoto were determined by divination . These fields were called suki (主 基) and yuki (悠 紀), they symbolized the Japanese empire and its provinces. The rice for the offerings was then planted in these two fields, whereby particular care was taken to protect it from ritual impurity ("kegare" (穢 れ, 汚 れ)). In preparation for the November ceremony, the emperor performed a series of cleansing rituals to spiritually prepare for the festival with the kami and his ancestors. He also submitted to a two-month fast.

On the second day of the hare of the eleventh lunar calendar month, the rice was then brought to the capital in the Daijō Palace, which was built especially for this ceremony and demolished again after its end. The preparations were completed there. During the Heian period (794–1185), the entire festival of Daijō-sai lasted four days in November and was divided into a total of 11 sections.

Even though this ceremony has undergone numerous changes in terms of length and details over the centuries, the four central rituals have remained constant:

  • Mitamashizume: The rejuvenation of the soul
  • Shinsen (also called Kyōsen): The sacrifice of the new rice of the year to the kami by the new emperor
  • Naorai: The food of the new emperor with the kami
  • Utage: The emperor's meals with the people in a festival held by him

Of these four rituals, Mitamashizume is the most difficult to interpret in the context of Daijō-sai. On the one hand, publicly accessible records have only existed since the beginning of the 19th century, which is why the original form of the ritual cannot be reconstructed. On the other hand, it is not carried out publicly, but in the closest circle of the imperial family, so that there is hardly any reliable information on the process and content.

The only thing that is certain is that the classical Japanese belief in the soul plays an important role. It was believed that the bond between a soul and the body of its owner weakened over time and therefore had to be ritually renewed at certain intervals. If it detaches completely, it can be captured again (tama-shizume) or replaced by another soul (tama-furi).

With Mitamashizume the emperor lies in the holy bed (ō-fusuma), which is on the holy ground (madoko). During this time one, sometimes two ladies-in-waiting perform a ritual to renew the bond between the emperor's soul and his body. The fact that the ritual is not performed publicly and its exact processes are not known for certain has led to the emergence of a number of theories and possible interpretations. The anthropologist Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney names the following three:

  1. The rejuvenation of his soul allows the emperor to perform the Daijō-sai with the greatest possible spiritual power.
  2. The presence of one or two ladies-in-waiting during the ritual suggests a sexual aspect. Production and reproduction are an important basis for the soul, with which this interpretation is also compatible with interpretation possibility 1.
  3. Some researchers believe that the body of the previous emperor also plays a role. According to this theory, he should also be on the holy bed and thus make it possible to connect his soul with the body of the new emperor.

There are also different interpretations of the rice sacrifice following the Mitamashizume. It is not clear to which kami exactly the sacrifice of the “new rice” was made. One theory suggests that it was originally Amaterasu , the mythological ancestor of the emperors. According to another, the sacrifice is addressed to the entire pantheon of the kami, the so-called Tenjin Chigi ( 天神 地 祇 "gods of heaven and earth").

Revival of the ceremony since the Edo period

In the time of the warring states, the Sengoku period (戦 国 時代) (approx. 1477 to 1573), Daijō-sai was initially no longer practiced. At the beginning of the Edo period (1600), however, it was revived in order to bring the emperor to the fore as a symbol of the unity of the empire. The modern form of Daijō-sai was established by the 1909. The first Daijō-sai under the current constitution took place in 1990 as part of the accession of Emperor Akihito to the throne .

Even in its new form, the Daijō-sai has retained the four basic rituals Mitamashizume, Shinsen, Naorai and Utage. The sacrificial rice for the Daijō-sai as well as for the annual Niiname-sai is no longer grown on the two sacred fields in the vicinity of Kyoto, but in the grounds of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo by the emperor personally.

symbolism

The fact that the annual Niiname-sai harvest festival and the Daijō-sai succession ceremony take place on the same day indicates the intimate connection between fertility and sovereignty (of the imperial family) in Japanese mythology . The motif in the myths of Japan, which combines fertility and sovereignty, tells of a male kami who marries a human girl. The child from this union becomes the founder of the imperial dynasty. Examples of these symbols can be found in many of the myths of Japan, such as in the Descent of Heaven by Ninigi , or in the myths of Ōkuninushi and Suserihime .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko ,: Rice as self: Japanese Identities Through Time . Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ 1993, ISBN 1-4008-2097-9 , pp. 48 .
  2. ^ Encyclopedia of Shinto - Home: State Rites: Daijōsai. Retrieved March 6, 2018 (Japanese).
  3. ↑ Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko ,: Rice as self: Japanese Identities Through Time . Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ 1993, ISBN 1-4008-2097-9 , pp. 48 .
  4. ↑ ogoshi, Yasuo: To Dream of Dreams: Religious Freedom and Constitutional Politics in Postwar Japan . University of Hawai'i Press, Honolulu 1996, ISBN 0-8248-1166-6 , pp. 207 f .
  5. ↑ Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko ,: Rice as Self: Japanese Identities Through Time . Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ 1993, ISBN 1-4008-2097-9 , pp. 45-51 .
  6. ^ Teeuwen, Mark .: A New History of Shinto . Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester 2010, ISBN 1-4051-5515-9 , pp. 137 .
  7. ↑ Ueno, Chizuko, Miyata, Noboru, 上 野 千 鶴子, 宮 田 登.: Nihon ōkenron . Shohan edition. Shunjūsha, Tōkyō 1988, ISBN 4-393-48206-9 , pp. 52 .
  8. ↑ Kumar, Ann: Globalizing the Prehistory of Japan: Language, Genes and Civilization . Routledge, New York 2009, ISBN 0-7103-1313-6 , pp. 144 .
  9. ↑ a b Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney: The Emperor of Japan as Deity (Kami) . In: Ethnology . tape 30 , no. 3 , 1991, pp. 199-215 , doi : 10.2307 / 3773631 , JSTOR : 3773631 .
  10. ^ Emperor Akihito Plants Rice at Imperial Palace in Annual Early Summer Event . In: Mainichi Daily News . May 23, 2017 ( mainichi.jp [accessed March 14, 2018]).
  11. ^ Hynes, William J., Doty, William G .: Mythical Trickster Figures: Contours, Contexts, and Criticisms . University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa 1993, ISBN 978-0-8173-8285-8 , pp. 141-158 .