On the flat top of a steep hill in a far corner of northern Japan is the tomb of a traveling shepherd who, two millennia ago, settled there to grow garlic. Local legend says he fell in love with the daughter of a farmer named Miyuko, had three children and died at the age of 106. In the mountain village of Shingō, he is remembered by the name Daitenku Taro Jurai. The rest of the world knows him by another name: Jesus Christ.
Source | Flickr
It turns out that Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, worker of miracles and spiritual figure of one of the world's major religions, did not die on the cross on Calvary, as widely reported. According to local folklore, this was his younger brother named Isukiri, whose severed ear was buried in an adjacent tomb in Japan.
The bucolic backwater with only one Christian resident and no church within 30 miles, however, Shingō , however, calls itself " Kirisuto no Sato " (" Christ's hometown ""). Every year, about 20,000 pilgrims and pagans visit the site, maintained by a nearby yogurt factory. Some visitors pay 100 yen to the Legend of Christ Museum, a treasure trove of religious relics that sells everything, from Jesus roller coasters to coffee mugs.
Some attend the Spring Festival of Christ, a mix of syncretic rituals in which kimono-clad women dance around the twin tombs and sing a three-line litany in an unknown language. The ceremony, designed to comfort the spirit of Jesus, has been held by the local tourism department since 1964.
The Japanese are mostly Buddhist or Shinto, and in a nation of 126.8 million, about 1 percent identify themselves as Christians. The country is home to a large floating population of popular religious enchanted by the mysterious, the strange and the counter-intuitive.
In fact, the Japanese find spiritual fulfillment because they are eclectic. That is, you can have everything: a feeling of closeness, with Jesus, the Buddha, and many other divine figures, with none of the obligations that come from a more unique religious orientation and yet with extreme respect for all.
Source | Flickr
The Tomb of Jesus in Japan → In Shingo, the greatest story ever told has another plot: Jesus first went to Japan at the age of 21 to study theology. Thi Jesus first went to Japan at the age of 21 to study theology. This was during the so-called "lost years," an unexplained 12-year gap in the New Testament s was during the so-called "lost years," an unexplained 12-year gap in the New Testament. He landed at the west coast port of Amanohashidate, a strip of land that crosses Miyazu Bay, and became a disciple of a great master near Mount Fuji, learning the Japanese language and oriental culture. At 33, he returned to Judea through Morocco.
As soon as he arrived, Jesus, recognized by the Roman authorities, was arrested and sentenced to crucifixion for heresy. But he tricked the executioners into trading with Isukiri, who was not known. To escape persecution, Jesus fled back to the promised land of Japan with two memories: one of his brother's ears and a strand of Virgin Mary's hair. He traveled through the icy desert of Siberia to Alaska, a four-year journey, 10,000 kilometers and countless hardships. This alternate Second Round ended after he left for Hachinohe in a Shingō bullock cart.
Source | Flickr
Arriving at the village, Jesus retired to a life in exile, adopted a new identity, and raised a family. He is said to have lived his life ministering and helping the needy. With deep blue eyes, he was bald in the crown and sporting gray hair on the side of his head, wore a pleated cloak, and had a distinctive nose that, according to the local museum leaflet, earned him a reputation as a "long-nosed goblin." "
When Jesus died, his body was exposed on a hilltop for four years. According to the customs of the time, his bones were then wrapped in a white sheet pulcro and buried in a tomb, the same mound of earth that is now covered by a wooden cross and surrounded by a picket fence. Although the Japanese Jesus performed no miracles, he was considered a very kind and benevolent person who made no effort to help those in need and to feed those who were hungry.
This all looks more like Brian's life than Jesus' life. Still, the case of the Savior of Shingō is vigorously discussed at the museum and animated by folklore. In ancient times, residents are believed to have had strange traditions from the rest of Japan. Men wore clothes that resembled biblical Palestinian-like robes, women wore veils, and babies were carried in wicker-braided baskets like their own. from the Holy Land. The newborns were not only wrapped in embroidered clothing reminiscent of a Star of David but, like a talisman, their foreheads were marked with charcoal crosses.
Source | Flickr
The museum states that the local dialect contains words like aba or gaga ( mother ) and aya or dada ( father ) that are closer to Hebrew than Japanese and that the name of the old village, Heraimura, can be traced back to a diaspora of the Middle East. The explanation for this, however, according to religious scholar Arimasa Kubo, a retired pastor of Tokyo, is that Shingō may have been colonized by descendants of Israel's ten lost tribes.
To feed this unlikely explanation, in 2004 Israeli ambassador Eli Cohen visited the tombs and dedicated a plaque in Hebrew to honor the ties between Shingō and the city of Jerusalem. Embassy spokesman Gil Haskel explained that while the Hebrew tribes might have migrated to Japan, the plaque was merely " a symbol of friendship, not an endorsement of the claims of the Japanese Jesus ."
Another theory raised the possibility that tombs contain the bodies of 16th-century missionaries. Christian evangelists first arrived in Japan in 1549, but bitter disputes over influence and conversions of Japanese led to a national ban on religion in 1614.
The believers went underground, and these hidden Christians, as they became known, faced fierce persecution. To eliminate them, the authorities conducted loyalty tests in which priests and other practitioners were required to step on a cross or an image of Our Lady and the child Jesus. Those who refused to deny their beliefs were crucified, beheaded, burned at the stake, tortured to death, or hung upside down in pits to intensify their suffering. For over 200 years, until an isolated Japan opened its doors to the West in 1868, Christianity survived in scattered communities, which may explain why Shingō's so-called Christian traditions are not practiced in the rest of the region.
The key to the worship of Christ in Shingō was on a scroll that was supposed to be the last will and testament of Christ, dictated when he was dying in the village. One team, which a museum pamphlet calls "archaeologists of an international society for ancient literature research," allegedly discovered the scripture in 1936. This manuscript, along with others unearthed by a Shinto priest at the same time, described the adventures of Christ. between Judea and Japan, and identified Shingō as their final resting place.
Source | Flickr
Interestingly and conveniently, these documents were destroyed during World War II, according to the museum, and today there are only modern transcripts, signed " Jesus Christ, Father of Christmas ", kept inside a glass bell jar. Even more curious is that Jesus lived during the Yayoi period of Japan, a time of rudimentary civilization without a written language, and his family multiplied across the region.
One of the clan members, a young man named Sanjiro, was known for his blue eyes, something rarely seen in Japan and, as nationalist historian Banzan Toya insisted, was proof that the Sawaguchi family was a descendant of Jesus. And Miyuko, to complicate matters further, was known as much as Yumiko, Miyo, and Mariko.
Source | Flickr
The original scrolls were allegedly brought to Shingō by Eastern wizards who included a Shinto priest, a historian, and a charismatic Christian missionary who preached that the Japanese emperor was the Jewish Messiah. They were joined by Shingō Mayor Denjiro Sasaki, eager to make the city a tourist destination, who most likely took advantage of some loose stories to create all this true " crazy Japanese Creole " samba.
The truth is that most historians attribute the legend to a sensational publicity stunt invented by Sasaki in the 1930s. He simultaneously and conveniently revealed the discovery of seven ancient pyramids, all considered earlier than those built by the Egyptians and Maya for tens of thousands of years. But history, instead of dissolving over time, has become increasingly woven into the identity of the city where Buddhism prevails, which may be one of the reasons for its success.
Source | Flickr
The truth is that Shingō's Christ has very little to do with Christianity. It is more about the Japanese folk religion and its sponge that has the capacity to absorb any influence, usually without coherence, even on the most intimate beliefs. This sponge is never more evident than during Christmas, a season that, stripped of Christian meaning, took on a meaning of its own. There is an urban legend that a Japanese department store innocently displayed a Santa Claus nailed to a cross. Apocryphal or not, the story had a cultural resonance.
Christianity there is not a religious practice, but a means of picnicking and meeting with friends and different people. In addition, it feeds the economy through tourism and chooses to celebrate a man they see not as the son of God, but a benefactor who traveled long distances to find food for the needy. Which is nonetheless a very nice tribute.
Source | Flickr
Shingō is modestly festive at Christmas, with frosted pines and sparkling lights, sparkling streamers, green and red garlands and lots of candles. In Japan, Christmas Eve is a kind of gathering night when many young women ignore Mary's example of chastity and lose their virginity. It's said to be Japan's most romantic holiday, even surpassing Valentine's Day. But on the exact day of Christmas, people gather the ornaments, ornaments and life that follows.
Junichiro Sawaguchi, the oldest member of the Shingō family, considered a direct descendant of Christ, celebrates the holiday as an ordinary Japanese citizen, in a secular way decorating his house and eating fried chicken. A retired mayor, he has never been to a church or read the Bible. - "I'm a Buddhist", he said.
Source | Wikimedia
Asked if he believes the story of the Japanese Jesus, Sawaguchi shakes his head and says shyly that he doesn't know. But it is good to remember that the Japanese tend to be quite diplomatic when they give their opinion mainly in controversial discussions. When do they insist on asking if he thinks it is possible that Jesus was his relative? Momentarily silent, Sawaguchi shrugs and extends his hands out, as if to say,
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