Shinto shrine

Yayoi period village councils sought the advice of ancestors and other kami, and developed instruments, yorishiro (依り代), to evoke them.

[18] Village council sessions were held in quiet spots in the mountains or in forests near great trees or other natural objects that served as yorishiro.

[18] Many shrines have on their grounds one of the original great yorishiro: a big tree, surrounded by a sacred rope called shimenawa (標縄・注連縄・七五三縄).

[18] Archeology confirms that, during the Yayoi period, the most common shintai (神体) (a yorishiro actually housing the enshrined kami) in the earliest shrines were nearby mountain peaks that supplied stream water to the plains where people lived.

[21] The mountain provides water to the rice paddies below and has the shape of the phallic stone rods found in pre-agricultural Jōmon sites.

Fujiwara no Tadahira, his brother, took charge and in 912[24] and in 927 the Engi-shiki (延喜式, literally: "Procedures of the Engi Era") was promulgated in fifty volumes.

[26] In 1970, Felicia Gressitt Brock published a two-volume annotated English language translation of the first ten volumes with an introduction entitled Engi-shiki; procedures of the Engi Era.

The rōmon (楼門, tower gate),[note 7] the haiden, the kairō (回廊, corridor), the tōrō, or stone lantern, and the komainu, or lion dogs, are all elements borrowed from Buddhism.

With very few exceptions like Ise Grand Shrine and Izumo Taisha, they were just a part of a temple-shrine complex controlled by Buddhist clergy.

Having first appeared during the Nara period (710–794), the jingū-ji remained common for over a millennium until, with few exceptions, they were destroyed in compliance with the new policies of the Meiji administration in 1868.

This event triggered the haibutsu kishaku, a violent anti-Buddhist movement which in the final years of the Tokugawa shogunate and during the Meiji Restoration caused the forcible closure of thousands of Buddhist temples, the confiscation of their land, the forced return to lay life of monks, and the destruction of books, statues and other Buddhist property.

[29] Until the end of Edo period, local kami beliefs and Buddhism were intimately connected in what was called shinbutsu shūgō (神仏習合), up to the point where even the same buildings were used as both Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples.

[31] After a short period in which it enjoyed popular favor, the process of separation of Buddhas and kami however stalled and is still only partially completed.

[35] The founding of a new shrine requires the presence of either a pre-existing, naturally occurring shintai (for example a rock or waterfall housing a local kami), or of an artificial one, which must therefore be procured or made to the purpose.

[35] If a shrine has more than one building, the one containing the shintai is called honden; because it is meant for the exclusive use of the kami, it is always closed to the public and is not used for prayer or religious ceremonies.

[35] Often the opening of a new shrine will require the ritual division of a kami and the transferring of one of the two resulting spirits to the new location, where it will animate the shintai.

[39] The transfer does not necessarily take place from a shrine to another: the divided spirit's new location can be a privately owned object or an individual's house.

The first evidence of a Shinmei shrine far from Ise is given by the Azuma Kagami, a Kamakura-period text which refers to Amanawa Shinmei-gū's appearance in Kamakura, Kanagawa.

[45] The kami the two enshrine play fundamental roles in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, two texts of great importance to Shinto.

[45] Because of its physical remoteness, in historical times Izumo has been eclipsed in fame by other sites, but there is still a widespread belief that in October all Japanese gods meet there.

[49] Located on top of Mount Otokoyama, Usa Hachiman-gū is dedicated to Emperor Ōjin, his mother Empress Jingū, and female kami Hime no Okami.

[note 10][51] The religious significance of the Kumano region goes back to prehistoric times and predates all modern religions in Japan.

[54] The kitsune statues are at times mistakenly believed to be a form assumed by Inari, and they typically come in pairs, representing a male and a female, although sex is usually not obvious.

Almost all Inari shrines, no matter how small, will feature at least a pair of these statues, usually flanking, on the altar, or in front of the main sanctuary.

[62] After the forcible separation of Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines (shinbutsu bunri) ordered by the new government in the Meiji period, the connection between the two religions was officially severed, but continued nonetheless in practice and is still visible today.

The honden's roof is always gabled, and some styles have a veranda-like aisle called hisashi (a 1-ken wide corridor surrounding one or more sides of the core of a shrine or temple).

Sometimes the basic layout consisting of an elevated core (母屋, moya) partially surrounded by a veranda called hisashi (all under the same roof) is modified by the addition of a room in front of the entrance.

[64] Because its floor is raised on stilts, it is believed to have its origin in raised-floor granaries similar to those found in Toro, Shizuoka prefecture.

This single English word translates several non-equivalent Japanese words, including jinja (神社) as in Yasukuni Jinja; yashiro (社) as in Tsubaki Ōkami Yashiro; miya (宮) as in Watarai no Miya; -gū (宮) as in Iwashimizu Hachiman-gū; jingū (神宮) as in Meiji Jingū; taisha (大社) as in Izumo Taisha;[60] mori (杜); and hokora/hokura (神庫).

For example, at Usa Jingū and Izumo-taisha, it is correct etiquette to clap four times in front of the offering box rather than the usual twice.