It is one of the most mysterious sites in the world, the megalithic site of Ishi-no-Hoden just south of Osaka, Japan. And I happened to be in the neighborhood and wanted to see it myself. The dates are ridiculous; many say it is 14,000 years old, which would put it in the Ice Age period and that of Gobeki Tepe in Turkey. There is plenty of evidence, and Ishi-no-Hoden is one of them, of a global culture that mass communicated and worked with large stones for purposes we are just beginning to scratch the surface of. Our previous assumptions have been pretty much shattered on this idea of evolutionary science that progressed through trade and a slow awakening of the human race. Ishi-no-Hoden shatters those beliefs, which is why it is one of the holiest sites in Japan and certainly one of their most mysterious places. So I wanted to see it for myself. Some of the most pervasive thoughts were that the creators tried to mimic a spaceship that landed in that part of the world many years ago but never finished carving it out of the rock. In that region of the world, a few miles south of Kobe, in a very dense area of suburbs along the coast, as bullet trains flash across the landscape, this strange enigma reminded me of the monolith from the 2001 Space Odyssey. It was there, and nobody understood it, so the people of Japan set up a Shinto shrine to worship it, which I witnessed several people do while I was present. It consisted of washing your hands outside from a dragon’s mouth; then you stepped into the shrine, clapping a few times, bowing a bit, and then clapping again before stepping inside. And to what god, to what force? That much isn’t all that important to the people of Japan. But showing respect and reverence was necessary, which is the real takeaway of this spectacular mystery.
I haven’t been to everything I want to see in life, all the things I have read about in books. But I’ve been to enough far-flung places in the world to see a pattern emerging that you get through diverse and voluminous reading. Then, it is validated through an actual site visit, which was undoubtedly the case with Ishi-no-Hoden. We are looking at a lost art of working rugged rock and transporting it over vast distances for unknown reasons. There are plenty of places in the world where these things have been significantly studied, but not so much in the oriental cultures of Japan, China, the Koreas, and down into India. Due to political currents and their religious nature, they don’t approach these kinds of mysteries like we do in the West, so putting the puzzle together has been slow. But the path to Ishi-no-Hoden is essentially a single-lane road that zig zags through numerous suburbs of very compact living by the Japanese people. Access to such an area is intended for tiny cars without much traffic. But once we did arrive at the site, it was pretty unspectacular from the outside. Not much of a parking lot and some industrial buildings in the surrounding vicinity. Ishi-no-Hoden was a project of carving this massive structure out of the mountainside, as many such quarries have been conducted in that precise region to get the foundation stones for the many castles and temples built all over Japan. If such a site had been in America or England, it would have had an amusement park entrance, much like Stonehenge. This site is just as spectacular as any place in the world. Yet, it is undoubtedly not presumptuous.
I love the amusement park-like tourism at Stonehenge. I think it’s good for science to make it so that so many people can visit it and get involved in its mystery. But there is nothing like that at Ishi-no-Hoden. There is nothing much on its history or relevancy. Only a shrine, the emphasis was on worship rather than understanding, which is good and bad, depending on what you want to take from the experience. During my visit to the area and interacting with the people, knowing what was happening around my home, I distinctly appreciated this site and its Japanese reaction. Ishi-no-Hoden has no relationship to modern-day Japanese culture, and they have not claimed it. Only to pay it respect, which says a lot about them as a people. It is just as logical to say that aliens landed from the planet Sirus, which many believe because of the high diet of ocean goods and reverence for dragons that are distinct from Western viewpoints, or to say that a race of giants was making some mechanical device that was to be used in some vast structure. When you see Ishi-no-Hoden and put your hands on it, its dimensions are exact and purposeful. And not applicable to the kind of cultures we have been studying throughout our historical understanding. Which is why I wanted to visit this site mainly. It is one of those places where you can still put your hands on the object and consider it as it was constructed, not as humans have attempted to interpret it meagerly.
I’ve been to Japan before, but this particular time, I couldn’t help but compare it to other places in the world that I’ve been and notice how polite and together the people of Japan are. As I interacted a lot with Kobe just to the north of Ishi-no-Hoden, I saw a lot of shrines with incense burning right in the heart of town. And the people are so polite, crime is way down, and the people themselves are good to deal with. These are cultural traits that come straight from their Shinto-Buddhist beliefs. I get along best with these people because I understand their firm convictions. In the West, we should have the same kind of reverence for our Bible. It’s not so much in believing that what you believe is correct but that you have some foundation of thought rooted in a belief in something. Visiting Ishi-no-Hoden and seeing these beliefs play out with so many people was interesting. The function of their rituals gave their souls comfort, leading to a productive society in all aspects, from business to buying a Coke in Chinatown. All the transactions with the Japanese people were respectful and effective, which comes directly from their belief systems. It doesn’t matter that Ishi-no-Hoden is connected to their Shinto religion. But what matters is that it is an object of mystery and deserves respect. Which they then functionally give it. And in that transaction of care, the essential elements of their culture are revealed in very productive ways. For them, it doesn’t matter where Ishi-no-Hoden came from. What does matter is that they honor its existence with respect, which comes from a culture that believes such things are essential because they are. The lesson of places like Ishi-no-Hoden, which can be applied worldwide, and to many different religions, isn’t the truth about the past, but in respecting what it has taught us, and using that knowledge for our future. And that belief is always paved with respect as the basic foundation, and from there, whatever happens, will at least be rooted in value.
Rich Hoffman
The Gunfighter's Guide: 