The , or the ''Great Rite of

Āṭavaka Āṭavaka (Sanskrit; Pali: ''Ālavaka'') is a popular figure in Buddhism. He is a yakṣa and regarded as a Wisdom King in Vajrayana, esoteric tradition. Origin Story Introduction The Pali Canon provides the story of Āṭavaka as follows: ...

'', is one of the of

Esoteric Western esotericism, also known as the Western mystery tradition, is a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas and currents are united since they are largely distinct both from orthod ...

Shingon Buddhism is one of the major schools of Buddhism in Japan and one of the few surviving Vajrayana lineages in East Asian Buddhism. It is a form of Japanese Esoteric Buddhism and is sometimes called "Tōmitsu" (東密 lit. "Esoteric uddhismof Tō-j ...

. Its name is also sometimes pronounced Daigen no hō. The ritual is performed with Āṭavaka in the role of

honzon , sometimes referred to as a Gohonzon ( or ), is the enshrined main image or principal deity in Japanese Buddhism. The buddha, bodhisattva, or mandala image is located in either a temple or a household butsudan. The image can be either a statue ...

, and it may be considered a military

curse A curse (also called an imprecation, malediction, execration, malison, anathema, or commination) is any expressed wish that some form of adversity or misfortune will befall or attach to one or more persons, a place, or an object. In particular, ...

Early history

In the year 839, the monk Jōgyō, a disciple of

Kūkai , born posthumously called , was a Japanese Buddhist monk, calligrapher, and poet who founded the Vajrayana, esoteric Shingon Buddhism, Shingon school of Buddhism. He travelled to China, where he studied Tangmi (Chinese Vajrayana Buddhism) und ...

, introduced the Imperial Court to the procedures of the Daigensuihō as part of the systematic importation of Tang esoteric practices. A decade later in 851, the

Daijō-kan The , also known as the Great Council of State, was (i) (''Daijō-kan'') the highest organ of Japan's premodern Imperial government under the Ritsuryō legal system during and after the Nara period or (ii) (''Dajō-kan'') the highest organ of Jap ...

issued a document ordering the annual implementation of the Daigensuihō. As a result, it is believed to have been formally established in that year. Since then, the ritual was performed every year between the 8th to the 17th days after the New Year at the facilities of the Ministry of the Imperial Household. The necessary equipment was to be procured from

Akishino-dera is a Buddhist temple in Nara, Japan. Founded in the eighth century, its Kamakura-period Hondō is a National Treasure. History The ''Shoku Nihongi'' of 797 places the origins of the temple in Hōki 11 (780), while the of 1139 ascribes it to ...

Yamato Province was a province of Japan, located in Kinai, corresponding to present-day Nara Prefecture in Honshū. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric (2005). "Yamato" in . It was also called . Yamato consists of two characters, 大 "great", and 和 " Wa". At first, th ...

, which was associated with Jōgyō. Jōgyō's promotion of Daigensuihō put him in direct conflict with

Ennin , better known in Japan by his posthumous name, Jikaku Daishi (), was a priest of the Tendai school of Buddhism in Japan, and its third . Ennin was instrumental in expanding the Tendai Order's influence, and bringing back crucial training and ...

of the

Tendai , also known as the Tendai Dharma Flower School (天台法華宗, ''Tendai hokke shū,'' sometimes just ''Hokkeshū''), is a Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition with significant esoteric elements that was officially established in Japan in 806 by t ...

sect who instead lobbied for the implementation of the as the ritual of national defense. The Daigensuihō was originally formulated as a prayer for and the and was therefore performed only in the immediate presence of the Emperor. Vassals (i.e. the court aristocracy) were not allowed to perform it on their own initiative. In the of 995, Interior Minister Fujiwara no Korechika was banished from the capital and relegated to a post in the Dazaifu on the pretext that he had conducted the Daigensuihō himself. It is known that

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods. He was the and regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. He is sometimes referred as the "Demon Daimyō" and "Demo ...

, who at the time held the reins of government, cooperated with Emperor Ōgimachi in the restoration of the image of Āṭavaka in 1575. In the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

, the Daigensuihō was once again revived at the Imperial palace in

Kyoto Kyoto ( or ; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan's largest and most populous island of Honshu. , the city had a population of 1.46 million, making it t ...

. It was held there until the

Meiji Restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

Modern military use

In 1904, of

Yokohama is the List of cities in Japan, second-largest city in Japan by population as well as by area, and the country's most populous Municipalities of Japan, municipality. It is the capital and most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a popu ...

produced a standing image of Āṭavaka which was used in a Daigensuihō performed in prayer for victory in the

Russo-Japanese War The Russo-Japanese War (8 February 1904 – 5 September 1905) was fought between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and the Korean Empire. The major land battles of the war were fought on the ...

. Later, during the

Pacific War The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War or the Pacific Theatre, was the Theater (warfare), theatre of World War II fought between the Empire of Japan and the Allies of World War II, Allies in East Asia, East and Southeast As ...

, the Daigensuihō was carried out for the last time in an invocation of a by the

Imperial Japanese Army The Imperial Japanese Army (IJA; , ''Dai-Nippon Teikoku Rikugun'', "Army of the Greater Japanese Empire") was the principal ground force of the Empire of Japan from 1871 to 1945. It played a central role in Japan’s rapid modernization during th ...

. points out the connection between the title , which was used by the Emperor as the commander-in-chief of the Japanese armed forces, and the name of the Daigensuihō, which contains the same characters and was meant to be carried out solely in the Emperor's presence.

References

{{reflist Shingon Buddhism Vajrayana practices Curses Japanese Imperial Rituals Russo-Japanese War Military of the Empire of Japan Military history of Japan Military history of Japan during World War II Japanese Vajrayana Buddhism

Early history

Modern military use

See also

References