Otaimatsu at Nara

Before Tokyo (Edo) was the capital of Japan there was Kyoto and before Kyoto there was Nara and at Nara for more than 1,250 years there has been Otaimatsu each year at Todaiji Temple.

The Temple precinct of Nara feels like the ancient capital it is, well-worn and burnished by time. Up a slope within the Temple complex is Nigatsudo Hall.

We came to experience a unique Buddhist ceremony. Eleven monks come to stay at the Temple to pray for peace and cleanse the world of sin. Bamboo poles are donated to the temple and the donor’s names are written on them. These poles are then transformed into torches with baskets attached to one end ready to be ignited for the ceremony.

Awaiting the night, people stand or kneel at the foot of the hall in the hope that sparks soon to come will land on them and protect them for the coming year. Upon the conclusion of the festival spring will have arrived. In preparation, workers with water tanks on their backs wet down the sides of the wooden structure and the slope just above the onlookers. Fire has destroyed quite a few temples in Japan, although they are quickly and faithfully rebuilt.

Each night during the annual festival the monks carry ten of the giant torches up into the hall, run across the upper porch and, culminating the firey display, waving the torches in circles and showering the crowd below with sparks, bringing oohs and ahs. Men with brooms patrol the porch above the crowd along the wooden wall, brushing the embers away.

After the ceremony the crowd goes up the steps and into the Hall, looking for bits of ashes to improve their prospects for the year . . .

and then head home.