Centering on Emperor Meiji’s sacred poems, this essay examines the Emperor’s role as the chief Shinto priest, the primacy of prayer over governance, and the spiritual foundation of Japanese civilization rooted in Ise Shrine. It reveals dimensions of the Imperial institution long ignored by postwar constitutional discourse and the media.

May the people live in peace forever,
I pray, O Great Deity of Ise, protect my reign.
2016-11-05
The following is a continuation of the previous chapter.
Mr. Hirakawa had written an essay entitled, “What Is the Shinto Culture Inherited by the Emperor?”
Omitted text preceding this.
Which of the sacred and the secular duties, then, is most important for the Emperor of Japan.
The year following the Russo-Japanese War, Emperor Meiji composed the following poem.
(Only after bowing at the sacred precincts of Ise can I truly listen to the affairs of state each morning.)
For the Imperial House, “matsurigoto” means that rituals come first, and the Emperor is прежде of all the chief priest of Shinto for the people.
Therefore, only after “bowing at the sacred precincts of Ise” does he, as king, lend his ear to the second “matsurigoto,” namely political affairs.
“To pray” is to “continue” with one’s ancestors.
Omitted.
Although it is not written in the current Constitution, and therefore legal scholars do not mention it, bureaucrats are not conscious of it, and newspapers do not report it, the Imperial House is the symbol of the eternal life of the people because it “continues” to the ancestors through prayer, and its very existence has meaning.
We should not forget that the Imperial House has historically possessed these two aspects, sacred and secular.
Culture and art developed together with religion, such as Christian culture or Buddhist art.
Each has its own characteristics, and while Islamic art excels in architecture and crafts, because God is an invisible being and idol worship is forbidden, there are few portraits or sculptures of the human body.
Shinto also has similar religio-cultural characteristics.
Unlike kings such as Louis, the absence of a single grand portrait or equestrian statue of Emperor Meiji is likely due to the feeling that depicting the Emperor would be irreverent.
The first, sacred aspect—Emperor Meiji’s poems praying to Amaterasu—were included in elementary school textbooks before the war.
“May the people live in peace forever,
I pray, O Great Deity of Ise, protect my reign.”
“Our country is the end of the gods; never forget the ancient ways of honoring the gods.”
These poems may be understood as admonitions to Emperor Meiji’s descendants and to the people.
With reverence, I pray for the peace and prosperity of the Imperial House.
*Needless to say, I myself had been entirely unaware of prewar elementary school textbooks until now.
It should no longer need saying, but Asahi Shimbun continued to deny Ise Grand Shrine because it appeared in prewar elementary school textbooks.
For such an absurd reason, they continued to deny that ultimate beauty.
And thus, Kenzaburō Ōe denied Yasunari Kawabata’s Nobel Prize lecture, “Japan, the Beautiful, and Myself.”
They are the true great fools.
Does not the supreme clarity with which André Malraux, the foremost connoisseur of Japan among Western intellectuals, identified Japan’s highest qualities silently testify to this truth.