HIKOSAN JINGU (英彦山神宮)

The sacred mountains that comprise the three peaks known as Hikosan, contain the secret origins of Japan and is the place where the Goddess Amataresu enshrined her son. Historically connected to Japanese imperial lineage, for more than a thousand years Hikosan Jingu was not a Shinto shrine at all. Built in 546 AD, it was the sacred mountain temple of the legendary Shugendo Yamabushi. The fearsome mountain monks who practiced the most rigorous training and sent forth some of the greatest swordsman the world has ever seen, including Miyamoto MUSASHI. Hikosan embodied an amalgamation of belief systems that worshipped the Gods of the Stars, the Mountains, Buddhism, Shintoism and Taoism. But most of all, they believed in enlightenment through harsh training and dedication to protecting the world around them. The Yamabushi were the protectors accompanying many of the first Japanese monks who journeyed to China and Korea to bring Buddhism to Japan in the sixth century. The origins of both Ninja and Samurai are said to have originated from Yamabushi training. In the age of “the Last Samurai”, the emperor Meiji outlawed the Yamabushi in 1872 and changed the official designation of the Shugendo Temple at Hikosan, to a Shinto Shrine. For most of the following century the already secretive Yamabushi became ghosts in their own land until after WW2 when “The freedom of religion” act restored their status and allowed them to come out of hiding. Now for the first time, they are revealing their secrets to the outside world.