Most Shinto shrines shelter a sacred object -- a mirror, a sword, a jewel -- within their innermost hall. Omiwa Shrine in Sakurai, Nara Prefecture, has no such object. It has no inner hall at all. Step through the torii gate, approach the worship hall, and look beyond: there is only Mount Miwa, rising 467 meters above the Yamato Plain, wrapped in ancient Japanese cedar. The mountain itself is the god. This arrangement, called shintai-zan -- mountain as divine body -- represents the oldest layer of Japanese religious practice, predating the elaborate shrine architecture that would develop centuries later. Omiwa is sometimes called Japan's first shrine, and standing before it, you understand the claim. There is nothing between the worshipper and the sacred peak but open air and belief.
The Nihon Shoki, Japan's great eighth-century chronicle, records that Emperor Sujin turned to the gods when pestilence ravaged the country. The kami Omononushi -- the spirit of Mount Miwa -- spoke through an imperial princess, demanding proper worship. The plague would end, the kami promised, but only if the rites were led by his own half-divine son, Otataneko. The emperor searched for this man, found him, and installed him as head priest. The plague subsided. Crops grew again. Otataneko became the ancestor of the Miwa clan, and Omiwa Shrine traces its priestly lineage to that founding act. Whether the story records literal events or encodes an older political alliance between the Yamato court and the Miwa region, it anchors the shrine in the deepest stratum of Japanese sacred history.
A white snake is said to dwell near the shrine, and serpent imagery threads through the mythology of Mount Miwa. The kami Omononushi appeared to a woman of the Miwa clan as a handsome nighttime visitor; her parents discovered his divine identity by threading a needle through his hem and following the trail of hemp to the mountain shrine, where only three loops of thread remained -- giving the site its name, since 'miwa' can be written with characters meaning 'three rings.' Borromean ring motifs decorate the shrine buildings to this day. Beyond serpents and etymology, Omiwa holds another distinction: it is the tutelary shrine of Japan's sake brewers. One of its auxiliary shrines, Ikuhi Jinja, enshrines the kami appointed as Omononushi's sake brewer during the reign of Emperor Sujin. An ancient poem attributed to Empress Jingu celebrates the sacred sake brewed by Omononushi himself -- a tradition linking fermentation, divinity, and this mountain for millennia.
By the Heian period, Omiwa had attracted Imperial patronage. In 965, Emperor Murakami ordered messengers sent to report important events to sixteen guardian shrines; Omiwa was among them. It was designated the ichinomiya -- the chief shrine -- of Yamato Province, the heartland of early Japan. From 1871 through 1946, the shrine held first rank among all government-supported Shinto institutions. The shrine complex includes twelve sessha and twenty-eight massha -- smaller auxiliary shrines scattered through the cedar groves. Its subshrine Hibara is identified as the place where two of Japan's Imperial Regalia, the Yata-no-Kagami mirror and the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi sword, were first enshrined after their removal from the imperial palace. Hibara's most striking feature is a rare triple torii gate -- the miwa torii -- one of very few shrine gates that actually has doors, barring casual access to the sacred mountain. The 32-meter torii on the shrine's approach road, built in 1984, stands as the second tallest in Japan.
Mount Miwa is publicly accessible, but not casually. Visitors who wish to ascend must register the same day at the Sai Jinja office within the shrine complex, a practice that reinforces the mountain's sacred status. Japanese cedar blankets the slopes, considered holy trees here since antiquity. The Fujiwara clan -- the most powerful family in classical Japan -- judged the kami of Mount Miwa the mightiest of all, and palaces and roads were built in the surrounding area to benefit from its presence. Six keyhole-shaped burial mounds from the Kofun period, dating between 250 and 350 AD, ring the base of the mountain. Twice as large as comparable tumuli found in Korea, these mounds contained mirrors, weapons, ornaments, and finely crafted wood and bamboo coffins -- evidence that the rulers who chose to be buried here commanded extraordinary resources and wanted to spend eternity in the shadow of the gods.
Located at 34.53N, 135.85E in the Yamato Basin of Nara Prefecture. Mount Miwa (467m) is a distinctive conical peak visible from altitude, rising east of the basin floor among rice paddies and low hills. The shrine complex sits at the mountain's western base. Best viewed at 3,000-5,000 feet AGL approaching from the west to see the mountain's profile. Nara Airport is not a major field; the nearest significant airport is Osaka Itami (RJOO) approximately 30 nautical miles west-northwest, or Kansai International (RJBB) approximately 40 nautical miles southwest. The cluster of Kofun-period burial mounds around the mountain's base may be visible as raised earthworks from lower altitudes.