Now that the May Fever (Japanese concept of "spring fatigue") has subsided, it's time to restart the newsletter series.A soul-searching pilgrimage was made to Ise Shrine in May and here are some thoughts from that journey.
Ise Shrine has always occupied a special place in the psyche of Japanese people. Holiest of Holies, if you will, from ancient spiritual practice that has continued to this day. However, this month’s newsletter is not about rehashing the mythological basis of how exceptional Ise Shrine is. Rather, this piece explores the meaning and effects of its cyclic re-construction. It is well propagated that Ise is reconstructed every 20 years, and while cosmological rationale for this tradition is supposedly deeply rooted in the residing sun-goddess’s affinity for eternality and dislike for decay, a more earthly rationale is more interesting to the discipline of architecture and design.
In fact, Ise Shrine is not the only Shinto shrine to have the cyclic re-construction program: Shimogamo Shrine rebuilds in part or in whole every 21 years, and perhaps the longest span is Izumo Shrine every 60 years. Major differences among them is that Ise, enshrining the sun-goddess at the apex of cosmological hierarchy and therefore the most venerated shrine of the land tied to the lineage of imperial household, has continued its 20-year re-construction cycle for over a millennium, with very few exceptions or delays. A gargantuan effort, the preparatory process from project organization to planning takes around a decade and eight years for the actual physical re-construction of the shrine anew, and the remaining two years for purification and inaugural transference processes.
"Torii Gate of Shichiri-no-Watashi" in Kuwana is such refinished and reused torii gate from Ise Shrine
There was a beautiful statement that the process starts from cultivating the forest. Indeed, the major components are harvested from forests that have been protected as sanctuaries and the selection of trees to be used undergoes a stringent evaluation process. Once selected, the trees are treated as sacred, animate objects and venerated along its passage to the main precincts. Once in the staging area, these trees are cured and treated with utmost care by skilled hands of master carpenters, miya-daiku, a chosen few who coalesce from various corners of the country. What is not well known outside of Japan but a noteworthy fact, is that the old 20-year old building elements, such as columns and beams, aren’t discarded. They themselves go through a kind of metabolic process wherein weathered top surfaces are shaved away to reveal a good-as-new raw finish, and given to other shrines elsewhere that are in need of good pieces of timber for a new building, repair or re-construction. The sustainable cycle does not close-loop and end at Ise but emanates from it.
It is a false statement that traditional Japanese carpentry does not use nails. In fact, Wa-kugi Japanese nails are frequently used, which is soft and flows with the grain or bends against knots, thereby creating a strong connection and preserves the structural integrity for reconstitution.
Raw, unfinished timber, Hinoki in this case, does only last about 20-years at a glance, but correct maintenance and resuscitation allows a very long life-span of use, until a mammoth column dwindles down to a set of chopsticks. The 20-year cycle is also synchronized with the generational changing of the guard. The skills must be passed down from one generation to the next. There are no cutting corners or hiding imperfections, especially when the details become so sophisticatedly strip-down minimal. The building not only encapsulates the consummation of the physicality of its perfections, but the craft and metier necessary to exact this very output. It is as much an educational program as it is a cultural, architectural, and spiritual program.
With the above-mentioned processes in mind, it would be remiss of our contemporary society to narrowly refer to Ise as a source of rationale, as if by some selective amnesia, that objects must be replaced rapidly and frequently due to some technological advancements or changes in cultural value system, when in fact the truth is the qualitative dilapidation of fast-and-easy consumption. Nay, things can last with care, maintenance, and at times creative re-formulation or metier of continuously recontextualized objects. Rather than scrap-and-build a 20 to 30 year-old structure, which has reached its amortization period and simultaneously reached a market value of zero ironically, the entire construction and real-estate industry backed by the society’s changing mindset should start afresh with a sustainable system that allows things to retain actual value and reinvent the components if and when necessary. Ise has been doing this for almost 1,500 years.
Author: Kaz T. Yoneda, FRSA
Reader: Gregory Serweta, AIA
Editor: Hinako Izuhara
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Thank you for your time and kind attention.
Until next time!