MORALITY AND PURITY
=Moral Code.=—Shinto has hardly anything in the shape of a code
of morals. The Ohoharahi, a service in which the Mikado, by divine
authority, declared to his ministers and people the absolution of
their offences against the gods, makes no mention of any one of the
sins of the Decalogue. M. Revon, the author of a valuable treatise
on Shinto, challenges this statement, which I had already made in my
_History of Japanese Literature_. He maintains that from a comparison
of the Decalogue and the Ohoharahi, ‘Il résulte avec évidence que tous
les commandements essentiels du Décalogue (sur le meurtre, le vol, la
fornication, etc.), se retrouvent dans notre rituel.’[2] In view of the
importance of the subject, and of M. Revon’s acknowledged competence
as a writer on Shinto, it is desirable to examine this assertion more
closely. His ‘etc.’ puzzles me. I am unable to find in the Ohoharahi
the smallest trace of any of the seven commandments which it covers,
and can only suppose that it is a mere flourish of M. Revon’s exuberant
imagination. It will be seen that for the ‘adultery’ of the Decalogue
M. Revon has substituted ‘fornication.’ Is it not a _cas pendable_ to
tamper with the ten commandments in this way? But neither adultery
nor fornication are mentioned in the Ohoharahi. Incest _is_ included
in the latter’s schedule of offences, but, _pace_ M. Revon, incest
and adultery are distinct offences. Theft is _not mentioned_ in the
Ohoharahi. The planting of skewers (of offerings in rice-fields) is one
of its offences, but even if the commentator is right who conjectures
that this was done for a dishonest purpose, I submit that so highly
specific an offence is by no means the same thing as the far more
general theft of the Decalogue. The case of ‘murder’ of the Mosaic
code, and ‘the cutting of living bodies’ of the Ohoharahi is more
complicated. Murder is at the same time more and less comprehensive
than the corresponding Shinto offence. The Jewish prohibition is more
extensive, as it includes murder by poison, strangling, drowning,
etc., and it is more restricted as it omits minor injuries. But there
is a profound difference between the motives which prompted the two
prohibitions. It is the crime of taking away human life which is
condemned in the Decalogue: the Ohoharahi objects to wounds as nasty,
unsightly things, unmeet for a God to look upon or to be in any way
associated with. Self-inflicted wounds, the cutting of dead bodies,
or wounds inflicted by others, caused uncleanness just as much as the
wounding of others. Justifiable homicide required absolution equally
with felonious murder. In a word, the Japanese offence was ritual, the
Jewish moral.
[2] See his _Shintoisme_, p. 15, _note_.
There are moral elements in the Ohoharahi, but they are scanty, and
M. Revon greatly overestimates their importance. Not only does it
contain no explicit mention of any of the sins of the Decalogue—which
is all that I contended for—but it has hardly anything which even
implicitly condemns them. Shintoists do not deny this feature of their
religion, but claim that the absence of a code of ethics is a proof of
the superior natural goodness of the Japanese nation. It needs no such
artificial aids to virtuous conduct.
=Purity.=—But if ethics are conspicuously absent from Shinto, the
doctrine of uncleanness holds a prominent position. Actual personal
dirt was obnoxious to the gods, as is evidenced by the frequent
mention of bathing and putting on fresh garments before the discharge
of religious functions. Sexual acts of various kinds, such as the
consummation of a marriage, incest (within narrow limits), interference
with virgin priestesses, menstruation and child-birth, were accompanied
with disabilities for the service of the gods. Curiously enough,
adultery, though cognisable by the courts of justice, did not entail
religious uncleanness. Disease, especially leprosy (as in the Mosaic
legislation), wounds and sores involved various degrees of pollution.
The death of a relative, attendance at a funeral, touching a dead
body, pronouncing or executing a capital sentence, all incapacitated a
man temporarily for the discharge of religious duties. Lafcadio Hearn
thought that the _miya_ or shrine was a development of the _moya_ or
mourning house, where the dead bodies of sovereigns and nobles were
deposited until their costly megalithic tombs could be got ready. This
view harmonises nicely with Herbert Spencer’s well-known theories, but
an ancient Shintoist would have considered it not only erroneous, but
blasphemous. As in ancient Greece, the gods had nothing to do with
such a polluting thing as death. Shinto funerals, of which we have
heard a good deal of late, were unknown in ancient Japan. They date
from 1868. Shinto shrines have no cemeteries attached to them. Eating
flesh was formerly not considered offensive to the gods, but later,
under Buddhist influence, it fell under prohibition. The fire with
which impure food was cooked also contracted impurity. To avoid the
danger of such defilement, fresh fire was made by a fire-drill for
all the more important ceremonies. Everything Buddhist, rites, terms,
etc., were at one time placed under a Shinto tabu. When a festival was
approaching, the intending participant was specially careful to avoid
(_imi_) all possible sources of pollution. He shut himself up in his
house, refrained from speech and noise and ate food cooked at a pure
fire. A special _imi_ of one month was observed by the priests before
officiating at the greater festivals. An _imi-dono_ (sacred hall) was
a hall in which purity was observed, _imi_-axes and _imi_-mattocks
were used to cut the first tree and turn the first sod when a sacred
building was to be erected. If, in spite of all precaution, defilement
took place, consciously or unconsciously, various expedients were
resorted to for its removal. Lustration was the most common. After
a funeral, it has been the rule at all periods of Japanese history
for the relatives of the deceased to purify themselves in this way.
Izanagi, after his visit to Hades, washed in the sea. Salt is sometimes
dissolved in the water used for this purpose, and is employed in
other ways to avert evil influences. Spitting, rinsing the mouth, and
breathing on an object to which the impurity is communicated, are
familiar practices. Human figures were sometimes breathed upon and
flung into the sea in order to carry off pollution. In modern times a
gohei is shaken over the person to be purified.
=Ceremonial= is the combination for some specific purpose of the
various elements of worship described above. The great ceremony of the
Shinto religion is that known as the Ohonihe or Daijôwe, which means
‘great-food-offering.’ It is the equivalent of our coronation, and its
cardinal feature was the Mikado’s offering in person to the god or
gods, represented by a cushion, the first rice of the new harvest, and
of sake brewed from it. A modern Japanese writer says:—
‘Anciently the Mikado received the auspicious grain from the Gods
of Heaven, and therewithal nourished the people. In the Daijôwe (or
Ohonihe) the Mikado, when the grain became ripe, joined unto him the
people in sincere veneration, and, as in duty bound, made return to
the Gods of Heaven. He thereafter partook of it along with the nation.
Thus the people learnt that the grain which they eat is no other than
the seed bestowed on them by the Gods of Heaven.’
The Ohonihe was a most elaborate and costly function. The preparations
were begun months in advance. In times of scarcity, it had to be
omitted as too great a burden on the nation.
=The Nihiname=, or new-tasting, is the annual harvest festival when the
new season’s rice was first tasted by the Mikado. The Ohonihe was only
a more sumptuous form of it. The English counterpart of the Nihiname
is Lammas, _i.e._ loaf-mass, in which bread made from the new season’s
wheat was used for the first time in the Holy Communion. There was, in
former times, a household as well as an official celebration of this
rite. Strict people will not eat the new rice until it is over.
=The Toshigohi= (praying for harvest) was another important ceremony
of the state religion. Not only the special gods of harvest, but
practically all the divinities were propitiated by offerings, and a
_norito_ recited in their honour, of which the following is a passage:—
‘If the Sovran Gods will bestow in ears many a hand’s breadth
long and ears abundant the latter harvest which they will bestow,
the latter harvest produced by the labour of men from whose arms
the foam drips down, on whose opposing thighs the mud is gathered,
I will fulfil their praises by humbly offering first fruits, of
ears a thousand, of ears many a hundred, raising up the tops of the
sake-jars, and setting in rows the bellies of the sake-jars, in
juice and in ear will I present them, of things growing in the great
moor-plain, sweet herbs and bitter herbs, of things that dwell in
the blue sea-plain, the broad of fin and the narrow of fin, edible
seaweed, too, from the offing and seaweed from the shore, of clothing,
bright stuffs and shining stuffs, soft stuffs and coarse stuffs—with
these I will fulfil your praises.’
=Kiu no matsuri= (praying for rain) was a service in which the gods of
eighty-five shrines were asked to send rain. To some of these a black
horse was offered as a suggestion that black rain-clouds would be
welcome.
=Ohoharahi=, great purification or absolution. This is one of the most
curious and interesting of the great ceremonies of the state religion.
It is often called the Nakatomi no Ohoharahi, because a member of
the Nakatomi priestly clan performed it on behalf of the Mikado. It
was celebrated twice a year, on the last day of the sixth and of the
twelfth month, with the object of purifying the ministers of state,
officials, and people from their ceremonial offences committed during
the previous half year. It was also celebrated on occasions of
national calamity, such as an outbreak of pestilence, or the sudden
death of a Mikado. The offerings made were thrown into a river or the
sea, and were supposed, like the scapegoat of Israel, to carry with
them the sins of the people. The offences more specifically referred
to are various mischievous interferences with agricultural operations,
flaying animals alive, flaying backwards, cutting living or dead
bodies, leprosy and other loathsome disease, incest, calamities from
the high gods and from high birds, and killing animals by bewitchment.
There were also local and individual purifications. In the latter case,
the person to be purified had to pay the expenses of the celebration,
and so a regular system of fines for such offences came into existence.
=Ho-shidzume no matsuri=, or fire-calming-ceremony. The object of this
rite was to deprecate the destruction of the Imperial Palace by fire.
The Urabe made fire with a fire-drill and worshipped it. The service
read is anything but reverent. The Fire-god is reminded that he is ‘an
evil-hearted child’ who caused his mother’s death when he came into the
world, and that she had come back from Hades purposely to provide the
means of keeping him in order. If, however, he would be on his good
behaviour, he should have offerings of the various kinds specified.
Numerous other services are mentioned in the _Yengishiki_, such as the
‘Luck-wishing of the Great Palace,’ the _Michiahe_, which is a phallic
ritual for the prevention of pestilence, a festival in honour of the
Food-goddess, one in honour of the Wind-gods, etc.
=Modern ceremonies.=—At the present day, most of the former elaborate
ritual of Shinto is neglected or shorn of its ancient magnificence. One
of the most important state ceremonies which is still kept up is the
_Naishidokoro_, so-called from the chamber in the palace where it is
performed. It is here that the regalia are kept, consisting of a mirror
which represents the Sun-goddess, a sword, and a jewel or jewels. The
ceremony, which is performed by the Mikado in person, was formerly in
honour of these sacred objects, but is now apparently addressed to
the tablets of the Emperors from Jimmu downwards—an instance of the
progressive development of ancestor-worship in Shinto. In many private
dwellings there is a Kami-dana (god-shelf) where a harahi, consisting
of a piece of wood from the Ise shrine, and tickets with the names of
any gods whom the household has any special reason for worshipping,
are kept. Lafcadio Hearn says that nowadays there is also a Mitamaya
(august-spirit-dwelling), which is a model Shinto shrine placed on a
shelf fixed against the wall of some inner chamber. In this shrine
are placed thin tablets of white wood inscribed with the names of the
household dead. Prayers are repeated and offerings made before them
every day. The annual festivals (_matsuri_) of the Ujigami or local
patron-deity are everywhere important functions. Offerings are made,
and the god, or rather his emblem, is promenaded in a procession which
reminds one of the carnivals of Southern Europe. There are Kagura
performances which go on all day and late into the night. There are
also booths for the sale of toys and sweetmeats, wrestling, fireworks,
races, conjurors and tumblers’ performances. In short, the _matsuri_ is
not unlike an English fair. With the pilgrimages, it does much to help
to keep alive the not very ardent flame of Shinto piety.