Sensoji -
Tokyo Jamboree

It is difficult to imagine: on the place where now the metropolis of Tokyo stands, once was nothing but a bay with swampy inlets and marshes covered with reeds. The straw roofs of a small fisher's village were the only signs of life in the wide distance. Here lived two brothers, Hinokuma Hamanari and Takenari, who eked out a meager fishermen's existence on the bay.

The year was 628 CE. Fishing among the reed stalks, the brothers made an extraordinary catch: they found a small gilt-bronze statue in their net. Afraid (and presumably not wanting to bother with something our of the ordinary), they threw it away a few times, but the statue kept coming back into their nets. Finally, they decided to take it to the village headman, Haji no Nakatomo, who recognized it as an important idol and enshrined it in his house. A golden dragon was observed dancing in the sky, as a token of heavenly joy that the statue had found a safe haven. Such is the founding legend of Sensoji in Asakusa.

The Hidden Statue
The first temple hall presumably was built in 645 by the priest Shokai. And, surprisingly, the legend is not far off the mark here: excavations undertaken after the temple was destroyed in 1945, have brought fragments of tiles and objects to light that do date from the seventh century.

The temple's image, a statue of Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy, has always been treated as a 'hidden' Buddha, too holy to gaze upon. It may have been one of the small portable bronze statues brought to Japan by Korean immigrants in the sixth and seventh centuries.

The temple (called Sensoji) was often rebuilt after fires and other disasters in the following centuries. As benefactors we find the names of Ennin (a 9th century Tendai priest, who traveled in the Kanto and northern Japan and has since been credited with rebuilding a good many temples in the area), the first Kamakura shogun Minamoto no Yoritomo (who is indeed documented as having rebuilt many temples; to the north of the grounds stands a stone lantern he dedicated in 1146) and Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the Edo shogunate.

Hagoita Market in Late December

A Temple as Playground
In Edo (1600-1868) the temple reached a peak of popularity, but this may have been due to an external circumstance: in the middle of the 17th century, Edo's licensed quarters, the Yoshiwara, were relocated to an area just north of Asakusa, so that the temple became the final station for townsmen on their way to the red lights.

The shogunal administration did not forbid pleasure, but kept it at a distance. At least, people should have to go out of their way to find it. Asakusa was situated in watery suburban lands, in itself an unfortunate location, but thanks to the shogunal policies to keep pleasure out of the city proper it was turned into a booming amusement district.

The temple grounds developed into an entertainment center, with hawkers, acrobats and entertainers. This, by the way, was no exception: places for mass pilgrimage in Japan, such as Ise, the Yasaka Shrine in Gion, the Kitano-Temmangu Shrine in northern Kyoto, all had their own amusement district before the gates. Religious centers in Japan have normally welcomed pleasure to their sacred precincts.

Popularity rose further when in the 1840s the shogunate banished the popular Kabuki theater to Asakusa, considering the theater as another vice that was best kept out of the city proper. Kabuki was enormously popular, actors were cultural heroes in the same way as pop stars or sportsmen and -women are today.

Asakusa kept its character after Edo started modernizing and turned into Tokyo: in 1890, the first 'skyscraper' was built here. This was the Junikai, a twelve-story brick tower, that was Tokyo's tallest building until it was toppled by the 1923 earthquake. A sort of Tokyo Tower avant-la-date, it was fitted out with Japan's first elevator, and the home to various shops, exhibitions, and an observation platform with telescopes. Asakusa boasted of other first things Western, too, from movie theaters to the Asakusa dance review.

The red lights have been extinguished (Yoshiwara is still there, but only as a dreary conglomeration of soaplands and seedy 'love hotels'), and modern architecture now selects more fashionable parts of the city, as do the young. Though not en vogue anymore as it used to be, Asakusa continues to prosper as Tokyo's racy downtown, with cinemas, theaters, a Kabuki theater, a playground, numerous restaurants, stalls and deliciously old-fashioned shops.

Sensoji's Main Hall

Tokyo's Great Kannon Temple
The environment is so exhilarating that it does not matter that the temple buildings are almost entirely of recent date. On a dreary Sunday, I stand again in front of the The Kaminari-mon or Thunder Gate (vintage 1955 and named after the Thunder and Wind Gods residing there). It is three years ago I last visited the temple, and it feels like coming home. The huge red lantern hanging under the eaves - and reminiscent of ukiyoe prints - extends a nostalgic welcome to me.

Sensoji is always full of people. Among the crowd, I walk along Nakamise-dori (or street with Shops Inside the Grounds), noticing that even in a traditional spot like this one kimonos have become scarce. Everything is sold on this 250 meter long approach, from junk to fine crafts, from kimono cloth to tourist rip-offs, and from ingredients for the Japanese cuisine to rice-crackers that give a thunderous sound when you bit into them (it may be the sound of your teeth breaking).

Passing under the Hozo-mon or Treasury Gate (1964), looking back as usual at the oversized straw sandals hanging on the rearside, I approach the Main Hall. Of extraordinary size, too, is the incense burner standing here. Incessantly, worshipers are adding lighted incense sticks to the already fuming stock, with their hands wafting the incense over ailing parts of their bodies - temple incense is popularly believed to have healing powers.

Inside the wide, ferro-concrete main hall (1958), the altar space is fenced off by not very elegant chicken wire, as a precaution against the omnipresent doves. The cavernous hall somewhat resembles a train station, and the bustle is the same. Religion, in Asakusa, is businesslike, too. Notable is the great dragon painting on the ceiling (by the modern painter Kawabata Ryushi), while on the walls hang some enormous votive paintings from the Edo period.

There are a few older structures left, too. To the right of the main gate, past the Shinto Shrine dedicated to the two Hinokuma brothers and their village headman (together called the Sanja or Three Worthy Ones), stands the Niten-mon Gate from 1618. On the opposite side of the grounds are an old stone bridge and a few buildings from the 17th century. In fact, on repeated visits Asakusa keeps rendering discoveries, in the form of small shrines, weird stones and statues.

Signs along Nakamise Street

Downtown Culture
The great Kannon temple of Asakusa ruled both religion and pleasure inexorably from 1840 to 1940. The pulse of Edo and Tokyo, it drew crowds from all over the city. It was the favorite haunt of authors like Nagai Kafu and Kawabata Yasunari, who immortalized it in their works.

Since then, youth and fashion have moved elsewhere, but Asakusa remains the perfect place for a good whiff of the down-to-earth culture of typical Edoites. It still retains the echo of what it used to be, a grand jamboree.