Encyclopedia of Shinto

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詳細表示 (Complete Article)

カテゴリー1： 5. Rites and Festivals
カテゴリー2： Individual Shrine Observances
Title
Karasade shinji
Text
Held at Sata Shrine in the town of Kajima, Yatsuka District, Shimane Prefecture, on November 25, the karasadeshinji (karasade rite) is a ritual for seeing off the kami at the conclusion of the kamiari matsuri ("kami are present" festival). The month when kami from all the provinces gather at Izumo Shrine is referred to as kamiarizuki, "the month when kami are present" (elsewhere, it is known as kannazuki, "the month when kami are not present"). To see the kami off, priests leave the shrine in the middle of the night and head for the pond at the top of Mt. Kannome, the kamiyama (a mountain where a kami is thought to reside) of Sata Shrine. The priests face the sea, wrap the nearby shinboku (sacred tree) pine with three layers of inoko vines, decorate it with heisoku (a kind of ritual wand; see gohei) and branches of kaniwazakura (a variety of cherry tree, sometimes referred to as birch-cherry), and offer shinshu (sake offered to the kami; see miki) in earthenware. They then stand twelve poles wrapped in shimenawa (a straw rope used to demarcate sacred space) in the pond and launch dugout boats with sakaki branches on board while intoning "kako, kako." This is called the funadeshiki (embarkation ceremony) for the kami. To send off those evil kami who did not return to their home provinces with the karasade rite, on the last day of November the shinshoku (priests) again climb Mt. Kannome, where they present sakaki and heisoku to the mountain pond and perform a similar embarkation ceremony. This is called the shiwagamiokuri shinji. Shiwagami, literally "stopped kami" (止神), may also be written with characters meaning "old kami" (老神) ("old" is likely a play on the word shiwa, which written with yet another character means "wrinkles"). Given that evil kami are involved, this is rite for chasing the kami out. No words are spoken during the shiwagami-okuri shinji, and the priests absolutely do not turn to look back when descending from the mountain. See kamiari matsuri.
— Mogi Sakae

Pronunciation in Japanese/用語音声

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