spring Break, part 4. Jesus's Grave

On the top of a steep hill in a corner of northern Japan lies the tomb of a shepherd who, two millennia ago, settled down there to grow garlic. He fell in love with a farmer’s daughter named Miyuko, fathered three kids and died at the ripe old age of 106. In the mountainous area of Shingo, he’s remembered by the name Daitenku Taro Jurai. The rest of the world knows him as Jesus Christ.

Japanese love their folklore and have many stories and traditions that they participate in on a regular basis. We discovered an interesting folklore and decided we needed to see and hear about it in person.

 

Shingo, is a city near where we live. They have the greatest story that they tell about Jesus Christ and this is how it goes......

Jesus first came to Japan at the age of 21 to study theology. This was during his so-called “lost years,” a 12-year gap unaccounted for in the New Testament. He landed at the west coast port of Amanohashidate, a spit of land that juts across Miyazu Bay, and became a disciple of a great master near Mount Fuji, learning the Japanese language and Eastern culture. At 33, he returned to Judea—by way of Morocco!—to talk up what a museum brochure calls the “sacred land” he had just visited.

Having run afoul of the Roman authorities, Jesus was arrested and condemned to crucifixion for heresy. But he cheated the executioners by trading places with the unsung, if not unremembered, Isukiri. To escape persecution, Jesus fled back to the promised land of Japan with two keepsakes: one of his sibling’s ears and a lock of the Virgin Mary’s hair. He trekked across the frozen wilderness of Siberia to Alaska, a journey of four years, 6,000 miles and innumerable privations. This alternative Second Coming ended after he sailed to Hachinohe, an ox-cart ride from Shingo.

Upon reaching the village, Jesus retired to a life in exile, adopted a new identity and raised a family. He is said to have lived out his natural life ministering to the needy. He sported a balding gray pate, a coat of many folds and a distinctive nose, which, the museum brochure observes, earned him a reputation as a “long-nosed goblin.”

When Jesus died, his body was left exposed on a hilltop for four years. In keeping with the customs of the time, his bones were then bundled and buried in a grave—the same mound of earth that is now topped by a timber cross and surrounded by a picket fence. Though the Japanese Jesus performed no miracles, one could be forgiven for wondering whether he ever turned water into sake.

 

It turns out that Jesus of Nazareth—the Messiah, worker of miracles and spiritual figurehead for one of the world’s foremost religions—did not die on the cross at Calvary, as widely reported. According to local folklore, that was his kid brother, Isukiri, whose severed ear was intombed in an adjacent burial mound in Japan.

All of this sounds like the life of an average Joe, but the truth for the Japanese remains the same.

The Shingo Savior is argued vigorously in the museum and enlivened by folklore. In ancient times, it’s believed, villagers of this city maintained traditions that did not resemble the rest of Japan. Men wore clothes that resembled the toga-like robes of biblical Palestine, women wore veils, and babies were toted around in woven baskets like those in the Holy Land. Not only were newborns swaddled in clothes embroidered with a design that resembled a Star of David, but, as a talisman, their foreheads were marked with charcoal crosses.

With all of these interesting facts and stories we needed to see where Christ was buried. So we traveled to this quaint little hill, the area is beautiful and peaceful. It has a short quarter mile walk with ponds, and crosses and little shrines, all while following a little stream. The Woods were beautiful and serene and we were grateful that we got to visit this beautiful place that they have deemed a holy place.

This is both Jesus burial sight and his brothers ear.

Stream while walking the grounds.