Ise Jingu and the Shrine That Is Rebuilt Every Twenty Years
The most sacred shrine in Shinto is never more than twenty years old. Since the seventh century its sanctuaries have been rebuilt in fresh cypress on an adjoining plot, most recently in 2013 and next in 2033. What the visitor sees, and what stays hidden.
Ise Jingu, in Mie prefecture on the east coast of the Kii Peninsula, is the principal shrine of Shinto. It is not one building but 125 shrines, centred on two. The Naiku, or Inner Shrine, is dedicated to Amaterasu, the sun goddess from whom the imperial family traces its descent, and by tradition is the home of the sacred mirror that is one of the three imperial regalia; the mirror is not shown to the public. The Geku, or Outer Shrine, several kilometres away, is dedicated to Toyouke, the deity of food and agriculture.
The twenty-year cycle
Every twenty years the main sanctuaries of both shrines are rebuilt. The practice is called Shikinen Sengu. Beside each sanctuary lies an empty plot of the same size, covered in white pebbles. A new sanctuary, identical in every dimension, is built on it. The deity is then transferred at night to the new building, and the old one is dismantled. Twenty years later the process is reversed.
According to the shrine, the first rebuilding took place in 690, in the reign of Empress Jito. The cycle was interrupted during the civil wars of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries but has otherwise continued. The rebuilding completed in 2013 was the sixty-second. The next is due in 2033.
It is not only the buildings that are renewed. The sacred apparel, furnishings and treasures offered to the deities are made again by craftsmen in each cycle. The work is spread over about eight years and some thirty ceremonies, beginning with the ritual felling of the first trees. The Uji Bridge, which leads into the Inner Shrine, is also rebuilt on a twenty-year cycle.
Why rebuild
The sanctuaries are in a style called shinmei-zukuri, thought to descend from the raised granaries of early Japan. They are of unpainted Japanese cypress, with thatched roofs, and their pillars are set directly into the earth without foundation stones. Such a building does not last. Rebuilding keeps it permanently new, a state the shrine calls tokowaka, everlasting youth.
The cycle also keeps skills alive. Twenty years is short enough for a carpenter who worked on one rebuilding as an apprentice to lead the next as a master. The form of the buildings has been passed on by making them, not by preserving them. Timber from the dismantled sanctuaries is reused, in the Uji Bridge and in shrines elsewhere in Japan.
What the visitor sees
Custom is to visit the Outer Shrine first. It stands in a wood a short walk from the railway stations of Ise. The Inner Shrine is reached by bus. Its approach crosses the Uji Bridge, a wooden span of about 100 metres over the Isuzu River, and follows a wide gravel path among very large cedars. At a place called Mitarashi, stone steps lead down to the river, where pilgrims rinse their hands.
At the end, a flight of stone steps rises to a gate hung with a white curtain. The sanctuary stands beyond it, inside four concentric wooden fences. Visitors pray at the outermost gate and see only the tips of the thatched roofs. Photography is not permitted beyond the foot of the steps. The reticence is the experience: the most important building in Shinto is one that almost no one may look at.
Outside the Inner Shrine, the street of Oharai-machi runs along the river, lined with shops and restaurants in traditional style. Halfway along it is Okage Yokocho, a reconstructed quarter of the Edo and Meiji periods. In the Edo period Ise was the great pilgrimage of ordinary Japanese; in the year 1830 some five million people are recorded as having made it.
For travellers
The shrines open early in the morning and close in the late afternoon or early evening, at hours that vary with the season. Allow an hour for the Outer Shrine and an hour and a half for the Inner, and go early: by late morning the Inner Shrine is crowded. Kintetsu limited express trains reach Ise in about 80 minutes from Nagoya and about two hours from Osaka or Kyoto.
The coast to the south, Ise-Shima, is a region of bays and pearl rafts; Amanemu, Aman’s hot-spring resort, is there. Travellers interested in pilgrimage can go on to the Kumano Kodo, further down the same peninsula.