Shrine visits start year off right

For the Japanese, observing "sho­ga­tsu," or New Year’s rituals, ensures an auspicious start to the next 365 days, but in Hawaii local people of all races and religions join in the custom of visiting a Shinto shrine for a blessing and to pick up a variety of elaborately fashioned good-luck charms.

The annual shrine visit is called "ha­tsu­mode" and is usually observed the first three days of the new year, according to a news release from the Hawaii Koto­hira Jinsha-Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu, which described it this way:

"Hatsumode is a powerful ritual that lays an excellent foundation for the new year. The purpose is to enhance the new year with health, joy, abundance and positive energies which will uplift and empower our lives."

Japanese New Year’s traditions, including pounding and eating mochi, a glutinous rice treat, are simply part of Hawaii’s conglomeration of merrymaking, like the ubiquitous burning of firecrackers (a Chinese custom). Local Shinto priests say thousands of people of all ethnicities line up in the wee hours of New Year’s Eve and Day, rain or shine, for purification and blessing rituals.

Shintoism IS the indigenous, nature-based folk religion of Japan, preceding Buddhism as the predominant faith of the country. But Japa­nese religions are fluid and open to incorporating customs of other denominations, according to George Tanabe, professor emeritus of religion at the University of Hawaii.

Buddhist temples also hold services to welcome the New Year, but don’t offer amulets, or "oma­mori," as Shinto shrines do, because faith, not good luck, is what they preach. At midnight the Rev. Reyn Tsuru of Shingon Shu Hawaii will begin striking the temple’s 400-pound bronze bell, cast in Hiro­shima some 90 years ago, 108 times to symbolically cleanse oneself of all the bad karma of the past year and start out with a clean slate, he said.

Shingon Shu is a Buddhist temple, but Tsuru makes available an assortment of oma­mori because "Buddhism is flexible and is supposed to match the local culture. And locals love it (the oma­mori)!" he said in a 2006 interview.

Most Buddhists, including himself, also attend a Shinto shrine for the purification blessing. Shintoism dates back to 200 B.C. and emphasizes harmony with nature and the presence of gods in all living things, Tsuru said.

Buddhists FOLLOW the Chinese lunar calendar to observe the beginning of the Year of the Snake on Feb. 10, but they have celebrated the new year as Westerners do on Jan. 1 since 1873, when Japan adopted the Gregorian calendar, he said.

Tsuru’s prediction for 2013:

"Dragon years are always tumultuous for better or for worse; this dragon year (2012) was no different, and left life in disarray for many.The snake year promises to bring in some stability with its methodical and calculating ways. Things may not be looking stupendously rosy, but the snake will temper the chaotic and dynamic years that the strong tiger and dragon personalities left behind — much like that loud drunk uncle that is at every family party. It was a fun, sometimes dangerous encounter that we won’t be sad to see leave until the next get together!"