Japan Navigator

The Yoshida Shrine sits on Mt Yoshida, next to the campus of Kyoto University. When you enter the university via the main gate, on Higashi Ichijo Street, you see the bright red torii at the end of the street. Mr Yoshida (also called Kagura Hill) is not much of a mountain, at 102 meters, but it seems to have been a place of worship from ancient times. Now it is a pleasant patch of green in the city.

[The university main gate and clock tower - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

The Yoshida shrine is now named after the family who have been its heriditary priests for many ages, the Yoshida (originally called Urabe, a clan of diviners) - classical author Yoshida Kenko of Tsurezuregusa fame was one of them as well - but that rather obscures its origin. It started life as the family shrine of the powerful Fujiwara clan, and was therefore a “subsidiary” of their main shrine in Nara, Kasuga Taisha.

[The bright red torii on Higashi Ichijo Street - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

The Fujiwara would have a heavy hand in politics during the whole Heian period and pour their blood into the imperial line by consistently marrying off their daughters to young imperial boys, who were forced to resign as soon as the baby was born so that “Father-in-law Fujiwara” could continue to reign as regent… They had a problem when the capital moved away from Nara. First stop was Nagaokakyo, and although the emperor resided there for only ten years, the Fujiwara managed to set up an offshoot of the Kasuga shrine in the vicinity, now called the Oharano Shrine. The move of the tutelary deities to Kyoto is usually put in 859, when Fujiwara Yamakage built a shrine for them on Mt Yoshida.

[The Yoshida Shrine - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

Although in the Heian period counted among the most important guardian shrines of the capital, after Fujiwara power waned (in later ages the Fujiwara would only reign in the field of classical poetry), the Yoshida Shrine saw many ups and downs, and in fact the Yoshida family would use it for a project of their own.

Yoshida Kanetomo (1435–1511) had the megalomanic idea to rebuild the Shinto religion according to his private philosophy and in 1484 he established an altar that had to serve as the center for all Shinto shrines in Japan, including Ise - the Sun Goddess apparently also had come to reside. His brand of Shinto would be called Yoshida Shinto (or Yuitsu Shinto, “Only Shinto”) and was based on eclectic ideas culled from Shingon Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism and Yin-Yang thought. Kanemoto wrote several books to systematize and propogated these ideas. His major tenet was that there existed a supreme primordial deity, who preceded heaven and earth, and who transcended the creative forces of Yin and Yang. This deity was the source of the countless other Shinto deities and was also the force giving life to all creatures. As a philosophical answer to Buddhism, Yoshida Shinto was very influential in the Edo-period, but lost its appeal in modern times when State Shinto was devised.

[The eight-sided, thatch-roofed Saijosho Daigengu - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

You now can see that lack of popularity on Mt Yoshida: the good old Yoshida Shrine is again the center of attention, here people come to pray. Last weekend it was busy with families visiting with small children for the shichi-go-san rites. The Yoshida Shinto altar, Saijosho Daigengu, was deserted. As a piece of achitecture it is quite interesting, by the way: standing in an enclosure, it is an eight-sided structure covered by a thatched and cross-beamed roof.

The Yoshida Shrine is famous among Kyotoites for its Setsubun Festival (Febr. 2 to 4), featuring a variety of rituals for purification at the coming of spring. At that time a million people seem to visit to cast out their evil spirits.

[Yamakage Shrine - Photo © Ad Blankestijn]

Yoshida also features a variety of smaller shrines, the most interesting among which is the Yamakage Shrine, dedicated to founder Fujiwara Yamakage in his guise as deity of the cook’s knife (hocho) and patron of cooks and restaurants. A knife ceremony is held annually on May 8 and the little shrine is surrounded by pillars encrusted with the names of restaurants.