Stories have been told about a sacred stone statue that proves the existence of a vanished civilization from more than twenty thousand years ago. The statue is said to be hidden in the deep woods of the territory of God of Tamaki Jinjya that is the sacred place for both Shinto and Shugen-do. This story was not known by the priests of Tamaki Jinjya.
I personally heard this story from a leader of a religious group. This man established a religious organization that became independent from Shugen-do (see last article for meaning). When I was at a meeting with a group discussing about Mt.Tamaki, the leader disclosed the story about a sacred statue. The secret of the secrets was revealed only because the people gathered at this meeting were limited to qualified members. The strictly confidential information was that a stone statue of Buddha was concealed in the deepest forest of Mt.Tamaki. It was told that only the best monks in Shugen-do were permitted to worship the figure.
Early in the Meiji Era, an anti-Buddhist movement took place. The movement led the removal or destruction of Buddhist icons from the sacred territory of Shinto. Most of the stone statues of Buddha in Mt. Tamaki were destroyed by the movement. However, some of the very special ones were sheltered to be escaped from the movement.
Even when the selected monks were allowed to worship the statue, they were strictly told by their master not to look at the figure. If one had looked into the figure, he would eventually lose his eyesight. The threat may have been thought only to hide the uncommon stone statue from the public. However, with the religions related to Mt.Ohmine, the actual forfeiture of eyesight truly occurs when a wishful prayer is made. Gan-kake usually means, “putting out a wishful prayer”, but Gan-kake can also be read as loosing an eye (eyes).
In spite of this saying, the religious leader (the man I heard the story from), when he went to worship this Buddha for his second time, he glanced up the image! He said that the statue had a foreign feature. The closest image he could express was the Moai statue found on the solitary island in the Pacific Ocean.
When I heard this story, it reminded of an incident.
Koujin-Take (荒神岳) was the mountain which I used to climb alone in the old days. The Koujin-Take is next to Kōya-San (高野山). God Shiva, which is a derivative of Susanoo, is said to descend to Koujin-Take while dancing in a blue form. And the Koujin-Take is the mountain where a spiritual existence threatened Kūkai (a notable monk, founder of the Shingon) every night. When Kūkai was preparing for founding of Koya-San, the existence appeared accompanied by a thunder storm and extorted Kūkai by saying, “Worship me. Otherwise my retainers of more than one hundred thousand shall destroy you.” Kūkai was obliged to show a willingness to compromise and erected a shrine to worship the intimidator.
On one clear day, when I had worshipped Mt.Ohmine from the Koujin-Take, I witnessed an image of a shining gold Moai statue with psychic vision. I didn’t know the meaning of the image at that time. But it was revealed that this image is the true form of Kongou-Zaoh-Gongen (the most supreme God for Shugen-do). Here today, the story of the stone statue completely coincided with my former experience.
This hidden story was revealed to me only because we are already in the Heisei Era. Was it all right to make this public? If it was the Showa Era, I may have been punished and destroyed.
To be continued・・・
Ikashite-itadaite arigato-gozaimasu
Thank you for letting us live
No comments:
Post a Comment