Japan stops holding naked festivals

Hundreds of nearly naked men scramble for a bag of wooden charms in a dramatic finale to Sominsai, a thousand-year-old festival in Japan. Their passionate chants meant to ward off evil echo through the cedar forests of northern Iwate.

At Kokuseki Shrine, this year will be the last year of the festival. Although the naked men festival attracts hundreds of participants and thousands of tourists each year, the event has become a burden for local elders, who find it difficult to keep up with the rigors of the ritual.

The Sominsai festival, considered one of Japan's strangest, is the latest tradition to be affected by the country's aging population crisis. Daigo Fujinami, a priest at the temple, which opened in 729, said:“It is very difficult to organize a festival of this scale.”

“You can see today – there are a lot of people here and it's all very exciting. But behind the scenes, there's a lot of ceremony and a lot of work to do,”he added.

Japanese society is aging faster than most other countries, a trend that has forced countless schools, stores and services to close, especially in small or rural communities.

The Kokuseki Temple Sominsai Festival usually runs from the seventh day of the Lunar New Year until the following morning. But during the COVID pandemic, it has also been scaled back to prayer ceremonies and smaller ceremonies. This year’s final festival was a shortened version, ending around 11 p.m., but it attracted the largest crowd in several years, locals said.

As the sun sets, men in white loincloths go to the mountain temple, bathe in a stream, and parade around the temple grounds. They clasp their hands against the cold winter wind, chanting jasso joyasa.

Some held small cameras to record their experience, while dozens of camera crews followed the men through the stone steps and dirt paths of the temple.

As the festival reaches its climax, hundreds of men crowd inside the wooden temple shouting, chanting and jostling for a bag of amulets.

Toshiaki Kikuchi, a local who received the charms and has helped organize the festival for many years, said he hopes the ritual will return in the future, albeit in a different form.

Many participants and visitors expressed regret and sympathy at the end of the festival.

Other temples across Japan continue to hold similar festivals, with men wearing loincloths and bathing in freezing water or competing for charms.

In addition to the Kokuseki naked festival, some festivals are adjusting their rules to accommodate changing demographics and social norms — such as allowing women to participate in rituals that were previously reserved for men.

From next year, Kokuseki Shrine will replace the festival with prayer ceremonies and other ways to continue spiritual practices.