Why Japan does not celebrate the Lunar New Year to the extent of its Asian neighbors
By Jessica Kennett Cork (CIR, 1997-2000, Hiroshima-ken)
With the large number of Asians in the U.S., it was hard to overlook the fact that the Year of the Dragon by the lunar calendar began on January 23. But had we been in Japan, January 23 would have passed quite uneventfully. Have you ever wondered why Japan does not recognize the lunar New Year to the extent of its Asian neighbors? And as we approach the Doll Festival (Hina Matsuri), has it ever struck you as odd that this festival is also called the Peach Festival, and yet March 3 is way too early for peach blossoms? The explanation is actually quite fascinating.I am sure that most of you are aware that the Meiji Period (1868 – 1912) was a period of rapid modernization in Japan. The new Meiji government undertook a variety of reforms intended to demarcate the new government from the old and shift the focus of the nation to the emperor. This is why the people of Japan awoke on the ninth day of the Eleventh Month (by the lunar calendar) of Meiji 5 (1872) to the startling news in the form of an imperial decree that the calendar they had been using for over 1,200 years is “false, has no factual basis, and hinders the development of human knowledge,” and the emperor would, in just twenty-three days hence “abolish the old calendar, adopt the solar calendar, and order the realm to obey it for eternity.”
The Meiji oligarchs, of course, were all for adopting the Gregorian calendar. Fukuzawa Yukichi went so far as to comment, “Those who doubt the reasonableness of the calendar reform are surely only the illiterate and uneducated, because anyone who is used to making efforts to learn must approve of it. Therefore, this reform serves as a test to distinguish the wise from the foolish among the Japanese people throughout the country.” But imagine the chaos that ensued among the general public which, thinking they had another month and a half until the New Year, were suddenly told that the New Year would begin in just three weeks. Asano Baidō’s (1816-1880) commentary catches the public reaction perfectly: “There was no time to make year-end rice cakes, so one had to buy New Year rice cakes at the rice cake shop. Some people put up the kadomatsu [New Year’s decoration] on the second day of the Twelfth Month and some didn’t put it up at all…There were no scenes of blossoming plums by which to write New Year’s poems…The cherry trees were in bloom completely out of sync with the calendar, the harvest moon was gone, and the moon rose on the thirtieth day of the month. The newspaper said that if there was a [visible] moon on the thirtieth day [of the month], then square eggs must exist.”
And the chaos continues today. Because the new calendar was adopted virtually overnight, most people continued to celebrate the old holidays by the new calendar dates without properly converting them first, which caused a disconnect between the calendar date and the proper season. The gosekku, five holidays brought to Japan from China, were originally celebrated on the seventh day of the first month, the third day of the third month, the fifth day of the fifth month, the seventh day of the seventh month, and the ninth day of the ninth month. This is the reason that even today, the Seven Herbs Festival is celebrated on January 7, in the dead of winter when there are no herbs to collect. The aforementioned Doll Festival, also known as the Peach Festival, is on March 3, although peaches do not bloom until April. Children’s Day, which originally was a day to pray for the health of sons during the rainy season, is now celebrated May 5, one month before the rainy season begins. The Star Festival, which was celebrated on the night of the first quarter moon (visible only in the afternoon and early evening) so that it does not hinder viewing the stars in the night sky, is now celebrated in most areas on July 7, in the middle of the rainy season and sometimes on full moon nights, often making it impossible to view the stars. The Chrysanthemum Festival is celebrated September 9, although chrysanthemums do not bloom until late autumn.
It is such a shame that most Japanese have forgotten about the lunar calendar because understanding it adds so much to one’s understanding of Japanese culture. How many times have you seen “welcome spring” on a New Year card and wondered why you are welcoming spring in the coldest part of winter? By the lunar calendar, spring starts on the first day of the year. And without an understanding of the old calendar, classical literature often does not make sense. Take this line from Poem 61 in the Kokin wakashū: “O cherry blossoms- / even in the longer spring / of this special year / must you refuse once again / to grant us satiety?” But armed with the knowledge that the old calendar had intercalary (leap) months which sometimes caused seasons to be four months long rather than three, the passage makes perfect sense. There are countless examples of this throughout Japanese literature. I encourage you to read up on the lunar calendar – it’s one of the keys to Japan’s past.
Obligatory shameless plug: If you would like to read more about Japan’s lunar calendar, please visit
http://www.dissertation.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1612337600
3 comments so far...
This was fascinating! Thanks! I remember a co-worker telling me a couple years back “Today is THE REAL tanabata”, and that was the first time I was made aware of such discrepancies. If I have time, I’d love to read the whole book someday.
Wow, this is really enlightening. But I have the sneaking suspicion it will be another nugget of (true) Japanese history that will perplex most Japanese people I mention this too.
“Man, that guy is such a history nut. We’re Japanese and we have no idea what he’s talking about.”
Great article! I knew that changing the calendar altered the seasons and thus the holidays, but I had no idea that the holidays had not been moved properly. Hoping to get a chance to read the dissertation soon.