Shuni-e

The Tōdai-ji Shuni-e ceremony was originally started by Jitchū, a monk of the Kegon school, as a devotion and confession to the Bodhisattva Kannon(Skt: Avalokiteśvara).

Sources show that the Empress Dowager, Kōmyō, was a devout patroness of Jitchū, and she originally allowed the use of her administrative office to perform the rite.

When she died later, and her office was abolished, Jitchū moved the rite to the current location of the Nigatsu-dō Hall in the temple of Tōdai-ji in Nara, Japan.

The core repentance ritual of the Shuni-e, closed to the public, is performed by a select group of eleven monks called rengyōshū, who engage in a repentance session six times a day:[4] In each session, the monks gather in the central worship hall (naijin) before the altar of the eleven-faced Kannon Bodhisattva.

However, if there is a practitioner who recites my name for even a short moment, the latter's merit will equal that accrued by the former...Every night, ten select believers (eleven on March 12) shoulder large pine torches as long as 8 meters and weighing as much as 80 kilograms.

Girded with swords and staves, the torch-bearers climb a flight of stairs and run along the balcony of the Nigatsu-dō, showering sparks on the public below.