Kirishima Jingu

Kirishima Jingu is a Shinto shrine in Kirishima, Kagoshima Prefecture. Its principal deity is Ninigi-no-Mikoto, who is said to have descended to Takachiho-no-mine at the command of Amaterasu-Omikami, and six other deities, beginning with his consort Konohanasakuya-hime, are enshrined alongside him. According to the shrine's history, it has been linked since the age of the gods with Takachiho-no-mine, the peak that rises behind it, and it is recorded as Kirishima Shrine in Morokata District, Hyuga Province, in the Engishiki of the Heian period. On the summit of Takachiho-no-mine stands the Ama-no-Sakahoko, a heavenly upside-down spear.

The shrine buildings were lost to eruptions and fire several times and were restored each time. According to old records cited by the shrine, it was first enshrined between Takachiho-no-mine and the Ohachi crater, but it burned in an eruption, and in 950 the Tendai monk Shoku rebuilt it at Takachiho-gawara. It was damaged again in a great eruption in 1234, and in 1484 the Shingon monk Kenkei rebuilt it on the orders of Shimazu Tadamasa. Later it burned down completely in a fire that spread from Karin-ji, the temple that managed the shrine, and the present buildings were rebuilt in 1715 with a donation from Shimazu Yoshitaka, the 21st head of the Shimazu family.

The present Main Sanctuary, Offering Hall and Worship Hall became Important Cultural Properties in 1989 and were designated National Treasures on February 9, 2022. From the Chokushiden (Imperial Envoy Hall) you pass along a climbing corridor to the Worship Hall and the Offering Hall, and the Main Sanctuary stands at the highest point. Between the Worship Hall and the Main Sanctuary, steep stairs create changes in level, giving a dynamic layout that makes use of the height difference. The Main Sanctuary is five bays wide and four bays deep with a hip-and-gable roof, and five sets of chigi and katsuogi ornaments sit on its copper-plate roof. The Worship Hall is seven bays wide with a hip-and-gable roof and a chidori-hafu gable on the front.

The buildings are finished in lacquer with vermilion and rich colors, and the Main Sanctuary is lavishly decorated even in the inner sanctum that no one sees. Inside, the Main Sanctuary has an outer chamber, an inner chamber and a room behind them; paintings of the four arts (the zither, go, calligraphy and painting) fill the small walls above the beams, and paintings of the Twenty-Four Filial Exemplars, tales of devotion to parents, cover the three surrounding sides. The transoms of the outer chamber are carved with Chinese lions and heavenly maidens playing music, and on the dragon pillars of the front porch, a dragon with an open mouth and a dragon with a closed mouth holding a jewel form an a-un pair. The shrine says the local character unique to the Satsuma Domain seen in these dragon pillars was one of the points valued in the designation.

The main approach climbs steep stone steps from the vermilion sacred bridge and then continues to the second and third torii gates. From a lookout that juts out to the west along the way, on clear days you can see as far as Kagoshima Bay, Sakurajima, the city of Kagoshima and Kaimondake. The grounds also have the Kaguraden (sacred dance hall), the sazare-ishi stone and the Monument to the Divine Descent. The wall paintings and dragon pillars of the main sanctuary are not normally open to the public, and the paintings are covered with fog screens. You can go up into the halls only during special viewings held for limited periods by reservation; after a purification rite and worship, you hear an explanation of the buildings.