The Meiji period in Japan, named for Emperor Meiji, represented the sea change from the closed period of shogun rule (over 200 years) to the opening of the country to the rest of the world. Needless to say, in a country as old as Japan, there are layers upon layers of history – for those who are interested, the Wiki article on Emperor Meiji is worth a read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Meiji
The Meiji Shrine, which we visited, was built in his and his wife’s honor. For the casual tourist, what will hit your eyeballs are the vastness of the grounds and the enormous torii gates.
Of course, there is much history as well behind torii gates, those beautiful, (often, but not always) red, giant wooden structures that symbolize Japan. In the Shinto religion, such a gate represents the transition from the everyday world to the sacred world. Japan isn’t alone in this – India, China, Thailand and Korea also use them. When I lived in Japan, I do remember hearing the below legend that explains the origin of torii gate. As with many stories that involve gods, there was a family spat:
As mentioned before, there is a variety of views regarding the origin of the torii. In the following, we will have a look at one version including the sun goddess Amaterasu. In Japanese mythology, Amaterasu is the daughter of the two creator deities Izanami and Izanagi. She is radiant, kind and brings joy to life; characteristics which stand in contrast to her brothers the moon deity Tsukuyomi and the storm god Susanoo.
The episode, which presents a possible explanation for the word torii, occurs shortly after Susanoo was banished from heaven by Izanagi. Before leaving Susanoo went to bid Amaterasu farewell. As Amaterasu did not trust her brother, she proposed a contest to prove his sincerity. But Amaterasu tricked him and won the challenge. Out of frustration Susanoo destroyed Amaterasu’s loom and her rice fields and killed her favorite attendant. Amaterasu was incredibly upset and hid herself away in the ama-no-iwato (天岩戸 ‘heavenly rock cave’). Due to Amaterasu’s status as the sun goddess, hiding in a cave resulted in an eclipse, and the people worried that they would never see sunlight again.
An old wise man advised to build a large wooden bird perch, placing all the roosters of the towns there. As they crowed, the big noise reached Amaterasu who was still inside the cave. Driven by curiosity, she took a peek out of the cave, and as soon as she opened the cave, strong gods quickly pushed the boulder aside, which was blocking the sun goddess and thus saved the world. The torii became a symbol of the entrance to the sacred, a gate that brings one from darkness into light.
According to this story a bird perch was the first torii gate, which explains the two kanji ‘bird’ and ‘existence’. As the world has been blessed with light again due to the very first torii, they have become a symbol of prosperity and good fortune in Japan.
courtesy of
https://www.wasshoimagazine.org
Our last stop before embarkation was a trip up an elevator in the Fuji TV headquarters to an observation structure – a giant sphere built into a building that looks sort of like it was constructed from Legos. It took a crane more than 10 hours to lift it into position.
Our embarkation process was efficient and rapid. The cabin is comfortable, spacious and we have a balcony – huzzah!
