Tokyo Shrines

A shrine is a place where Shinto deities are enshrined.

The official name of the Inner Shrine is "Koutai Jingu," which enshrines the deity Amaterasu.

Originally white in color, torii gates are said to have been painted red to ward off evil spirits in Buddhism as a result of the syncretization of Shintoism and Buddhism.

The ranking of shrines in terms of the number of Hatsumode worshippers is Fushimi Inari Taisha in second place, Sumiyoshi Taisha in third place, Tsurugaoka Hachimangu in fourth place, and Atsuta Jingu in fifth place.

The northernmost shrine in Japan is Cape Soya Shrine in Hokkaido.

There are 22,000 priests in Japan, of which approximately 3,000 are women.

The entire 233-meter-high Mount Inari is the object of worship at Fushimi Inari Taisha, and Sei Shonagon wrote about his pilgrimage to the mountain in his "Pillow Book.

The prefecture with the fewest number of shrines is Okinawa Prefecture with 13 shrines.

The torii is the boundary between the secular world of human habitation and the Shinto realm, and serves as a gateway to the Shinto realm.

Dendenmangu Shrine at Horinji Temple in Arashiyama, Kyoto, enshrines Denden Myojin, the god of electricity and radio waves, and is visited by people in the TV and IT industries.

The basic architectural style of shrine pavilions is the gabled gabled roof, which can be broadly divided into the "Shinmei-zukuri" style, which has its roots in the Ise Jingu Shrine, and the "Taisha-zukuri" style, which has its roots in the Izumo-Taisha Shrine.

It is a basic rule to visit the Outer Shrine and then the Inner Shrine in that order.

The head shrine of Hachiman worship, of which there are said to be more than 25,000 throughout Japan, is Usa Jingu Shrine in Oita Prefecture, which was built in 725.

The most famous of these is the "three sacred objects" that Ninigi no Mikoto is said to have received from Amaterasu at the time of his descent from heaven in the "Chronicles of Japan.

Shrines have a rank that expresses their prestige, called "Shakkaku.

Sumiyoshi Taisha Shrine in Osaka Prefecture is the head shrine of the 2,000 Sumiyoshi shrines in Japan. The three Sumiyoshi deities were worshipped as gods of navigation and purification.

Tenmangu Shrine is dedicated to Sugawara Michizane, a scholar and politician of the Heian period. There are approximately 12,000 Tenmangu shrines and Sugawara shrines throughout Japan.

After the Meiji Restoration, shrines to which an imperial envoy was sent by the emperor on the occasion of rituals were called "imperial shrines.

Of all the Shinto shrines in Japan, about 20,000 are manned, and one priest often serves several shrines at the same time.

Shikinai-sha were divided into "kan'ei" and "kokun'ei," which were further classified into "osha" and "kosha," respectively.

The gojintai, the central object of a shrine, is also called "yoriyoshiro," and the place or object where the deity dwells varies from shrine to shrine.

Okinawa Prefecture also has the fewest number of shrines per 100,000 people, with 0.9 shrines per 100,000 people; Osaka (8.22) and Tokyo (10.68) are in second and third place, respectively.

By prefecture, Niigata Prefecture has the most shrines, with 4,727.

The Tokyo Gosha are Meiji Shrine, Yasukuni Shrine, Hie Shrine, Okunitama Shrine, and Tokyo Daijingu Shrine, which are considered historically prestigious among the approximately 1,800 shrines in Tokyo.

The shrine grounds generally consist of a torii gate as the entrance to the shrine, a hand-watering basin, guardian dogs, a hall of worship, a main hall of worship, and regent shrines.

Including annexes and outlying regent shrines, Ise Jingu is the largest shrine in Japan in terms of area.

The general etiquette for worshipping at shrines is "Nirei Ni-Beat-Itte-Ichirei" (two beats, one bow).

The southernmost shrine in Japan is Miyako Shrine on Miyako Island, Okinawa Prefecture.