Nikko Revisited

By Mike Femal

I first visited Nikko in 1999 without knowing exactly what I was seeing. I was impressed, but missed the cultural significance of what I was looking at. We also visited that strange theme park called Edo Wonderland. In the years that followed I learned allot about Japanese History and what Toshogu is. The one thing I discovered is that I had missed seeing Tokugawa Ieyasu’s tomb and visiting what is considered a place of spiritual power.

In the years since that first visit, I have studied the concepts of Shinto and been able to understand a bit more about a number of places we visited years ago. When asked if there was any place I would like to visit in our last few days in Japan, I immediately said Nikko. I knew the rest of the group had never been there and would enjoy it, and I wanted to visit the last resting place of one of the most influential figures in Japanese History.

The scenery around Nikko is awesome. Living in flat Florida really makes you appreciate the rugged terrain covered by old forest growth. The first thing we found was a small little shrine (青龍神社) called the Blue Dragon Shrine. It is tucked between houses on the main street of Nikko. It is a tiny shrine with a long entrance walkway covered in moss. I really felt a connection to this shrine. Going through the tori and down the moss covered walkway made you feel like you were going back in time. The purification fountain was an empty moss filled stone basin that did not allow visitors to follow the normal rituals. Places like this make me step lightly and make me aware that we are all visitors here. Shrines are not homes to anyone who still leaves footprints. That is much more apparent to me in these less visited shrines where nature has re-asserted itself as the main caretaker.

It seems that was the last free place to visit in Nikko. Shoyo-en Garden (逍遥園) was our first stop after getting admission tickets. The group snapped a huge number of photos in this Edo style Japanese garden. Every footstep seemed to reveal a new image that we felt obliged to capture. The garden is fairly small, but so much is packed into that space.

Shoyo-en Garden

The main attraction in Nikko is Toshogu (東照宮). This is the burial place of dynasty founder Tokugawa Ieyasu. It is amazing to think he had asked for a small shrine to be built for himself. The place reminds me more of China than Japan with all the intricate painted carving. It is an onslaught of elaborate detail the makes the head spin. It is awesome in its grandeur. We visited Yakushi-do Hall (薬師堂), the Hall of the Medicine Buddha. The dragon painting on the ceiling and echo effect of the monk striking blocks of wood to make the cry of a dragon is impressive. Rinno-ji Temple (輪王寺) with the three enormous Buddha figures looming over you, were awesome. These left less of an impact on me than the relatively simple tomb of Ieyasu Tokugawa. You leave the elaborate carvings behind and walk down a stone pathway through gigantic Japanese cedar trees. The pathway has 200 steps (none of us counted them at the time), and they large steps. A small shrine and a simple tomb are at the top of the steps. There is a simple path around the tomb, but it is apparent that you are walking outside the tomb, and the real entrance comes through the shrine and a simple locked gateway. You only hear hushed voices here. It is a place of reverence and silence up among the tall cedars. It would be easy to be at rest in this place.

Toshogu

By the time we reached Taiyuin-byo (大猷院廟), it was already closed for the day. Maybe I will be able to visit the tomb of Ieyasu’s grandson Iemitsu Tokugawa if I get another chance to visit Nikko.