Shodo (Previously: Shokai) Koshikidake

Head Priest of Koshikidake-Kannon-ji (Yamagata prefecture).

Shodo's journey spans over 25 years in the Shugen of Mt. Haguro's Kotaku-ji Shozen-in Temple, where he served as guide (sendatsu) under Rev. Kokai Shimazu, previous head-priest of the true school of Haguro Shugen. With this background he set about restoring his family's temple-lineage. He is a key figure in bringing together practitioners of Shugendo from various denominations and reviving practices which were banned or lost in the Meiji period persecutions.

What is Shugendo? Can you answer this question? Your answer may or may not be true. There was once a person who suggested what I think would apply as a perfect answer. He said, “Don’t think; feel.” You may have heard of him. His name was Bruce Lee.

Shugendo is a religion which developed out of a variety of schools of thought with the unifying thread of 'mountains'. I believe ritual related to kami worship was important ritual in Shugendo, but it was prohibited by the Meiji Government because it denied the concept that emperors were 'priest kings'.

It is not a philosophy based on the study of dogma but a practical learning path based on practice and experience. In this sense, Shugendo is similar to the approach of Mixed Martial Arts. Shugendo is a ritual system based on respect and gratitude for nature as the concealer of mystery and the keeper of natural law. En no Gyoja is revered as the first person to put this teaching into practice. He laid the path for Shugendo, but did not institute any texts or guidebooks.

In contrast to almost all other religious founders, Shugendo lacks rigid texts or dogmas because its source-origin is nature itself. The mystical experiences or revelations of one person may be subject to error and the subjectivities of the human condition. Even the greatest of dogmas built with the finest of words cannot surpass the spiritual realm of nature. In Shugendo one seeks and feels their way through each practice. So, I am going to talk about what I have been feeling.

In the mountain ranges of Kumano where En no Gyoja had practiced, Avalokiteśvara, Bhaiṣajyaguru and Amitābha are enshrined as the principal-images. According to the folk-beliefs of the area,  Avalokiteśvara provides practical benefits in this world, Bhaiṣajyaguru brings healing and Amitābha guides us to the realm of the Western Pure Land. The Kumano mountain range is seen as a sacred place where the deities grant these wonderful attributes and remove the barriers to our success in the past, present and future. In times gone past many people, including successive emperors, would visit Kumano to connect with these gracious deities in hopes of a ticket to paradise and a happy death.

The idea of a happy death is an important concept in Shugendo, which concerns itself greatly with death. A popular sutra called ‘Shakasan’ includes the term ‘naturally-arising-Buddhahood’. This means that humans have the potential to realise wakefulness via death. But how can we achieve wakefulness in this very body if we have to die? We can practice a spiritual death and reveal the power of the bodhisattva of compassion. That is the way of Shugendo.

There are practitioners who have died to save others. They had devoted themselves to severe ascetic practices and fasting which preserved the body after death. These practitioners were enshrined as ‘mummified priests’ who had attained awakening in order to save all beings beyond the boundaries of life and death. This is a true aspect of ‘natural-Buddhahood’.

What is the relationship between Shugendo and death? The term ‘naturally-arising-Buddhahood’ indicates that we can attain wakefulness through death. Mahayana thought tells us that we human beings are considered to be ‘originally awakened’. If this is so, then why must we die to realise it? The six sources of emotional confusion, clinging, aversion, hatred and so on are called ‘the six sense roots'. To purify the six sense roots is a primary practice in Shugendo. Shugen practitioners periodically devote themselves to practice completely isolated from the general world and seek to attain wakefulness through undergoing a spiritual death in the mountains. 

Why mountains as a place of practice? Well, over 70% of Japan is covered by mountainous territory. They are seen as places in which the gods and buddhas can be encountered. Many sacred mountains such as Omine are enshrined all over Japan and people worship them as objects of faith. Mountains have always been places of religious belief and practice across the world.

People enter the mountain in order to reveal the testimony of the divine. They venture into sacred places which separate them from casual life. This core practice, called 'the practice of the ten-realms', involves a pilgrimage through the ten realms, from the under-world of hell to the realm of a Buddha.

— ubasoku |  what is shugendo?

             The old wooden hall becomes their coffin
                    They shed their bodies in there
A funeral possession is formed in order to cross to infernal regions.
             The Sendatsu conducts the last water rites
                      Accepting their spiritual deaths

             The oi transforms from a coffin to a womb.