MIKADO FEASTS WITH HIS GODS

Evening Star, Issue 20137, 30 March 1929, Page 22

MIKADO FEASTS WITH HIS GODS

OLDEST RITE OF JAPAN j Vigil was kept in_ many a home throughout the Empire of Japan on November 14 and in all the shrines of the Shinto faith, for between dusk and dawn His Imperial Alajosty met the gods, to talk to them, to offer them this year’s fruit of the soil, and to partake of a simple meal with them. At 4.25 p.m. tho doors of the Karaiiion, the most sacred gate in Japan, swung open, and the Emperor passed through on Ids way to Hie two primitive buildings, Hie Yukiden and bukidon, where he communed with the gods. < The Emperor wore military unitoim, but after the ancient ceremony of purification, wore robes of pure white silk. permitted a small group of newspaper to witness tho Emperor’s departure and hear the ancient music outside Hie Ynkidcn. Hie origin of the Daiio Sai, the Great New food festival, goes back to the days before the written word. The exact significance of the rite and of the few utensils used_ in it arc no longer known, but there is little doubtthat it is coeval with the founding of the Empire. Nowhere else in the world to-day is as archaic a state ceremony to be found. To sacred music, His Alajosty enters the outer chamber of the Yukiden and ritualists bear in Hie offerings of food, consisting of steamed rice, steamed millet, fresh and dried fish, limit, seaweed broth, and Awabi broth. His Alajcsiy enters Hie inner chamber aiono and offers a prayer to Hie unseen occupant of the ancient throne, known as Hie God Scat. His own fond and wine is then brought in, and ho partakes thrice of Hie rice, the millet, and two kinds of cake.