Last week Reuters reported on the Hadaka Matsuri, or Naked Men’s Festival. This year’s festival, at the temple in Okayama, in western Japan, which pits cold and occasionally drunk men against each other in a battle for sacred sticks, turned tragic when one participant was crushed and later died. It was the first such death since 1987. The story roused my curiosity over the event, and I went looking for more information.
Blogger’s Note: Proceeding past this point may cause you to spontaneously tear your eyes from their sockets!
Although Hadaka Matsuri means “Naked Festival”, the participants aren’t nude in the strictest, since everyone involved wears loin cloths. The festival isn’t a national holiday. Different temples hold the festival on separate days, each observing a different set of traditions.
There is a Hadaka Matsuri held on January 14 in Kyoto at the Hino Hokai-ji temple, during which a loin-clothed wearing mob chants and “rub against one another.” In the Hadaka Matsuri in Okayama city held on February 3, hundreds of youth in loin cloths in outer temple hall try to catch a phallic talisman tossed by priests. The best known festival is held annually at the Konomiya Shrine in Inazawa, Aichi Prefecture on February 17.
In this bizarre festival, participants pursue a Shin-otoko, or “Naked Man”, through the streets, trying to touch him as he runs past. The “Naked man”, who has shaved off all of the hair on his body, runs through the streets stark naked, acting as a scapegoat. He absorbs the evils of the community and brings good luck to anyone who succeeds in touching him. At the end of the festivities, the Shin-otoko pays his respects to the Konomiya Shrine, puts on his clothes, and is banished from the town.
This festival is over twelve hundred years old. It attracts more than ten thousand participants and is seen by more than three hundred thousand spectators each year. Most participants use the festival as an excuse to drink heavily, and, subsequently, the festival results in a great number of injuries.
What really cracks me up about the Reuters report that originally inspired this post, is that the report characterizes the event as “one of the three most eccentric festivals in Japan.” I can’t wait to learn about the other two.
Read more about Hadaka Matsuri at ThingsAsian
Visit YouTube to watch videos of the Hadaka Matsuri
Source: Pictures courtesy Webshots Travel Site.
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