Sapporo Sorei Jinja

Quick facts

Address

5-8-1 Minami-jo-nishi, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido

Spiritual entities

Amaterasu Ōmikami (天照大御神) · Ōkuninushi (大国主命)

About this place

Sapporo Sorei Jinja stands in Chuo-ku, Sapporo. Its deities are Amaterasu-sume-okami, the eight million gods of heaven and earth, the ancestral spirits of the parishioners, the three heavenly ancestral deities, Okuninushi, the tutelary deity of the soil, and the imperial ancestral spirits. In 1871, encouraged by Kuroda Kiyotaka and others of the Colonisation Commission, a spirit shrine was built at the entrance to the Akeno communal burial ground for the ancestral rites of adherents of Shinto. In 1877 Wakabayashi Yoshitomo, a negi of Sapporo Jinja, became its first priest; in 1885 a divided spirit of the deity was received from Sapporo Jinja and the main hall of the ancestral shrine was completed. It is also called Shinonome-shi. It stands today as the rite hall for the reburial and conversion into Shinto of the colonial militia and settlers. In 1911 a new hall was completed, the previous one having burned in an accidental fire the year before. A cloister was added in 1919 along with stone walls and fencing, and a stone torii was completed in 1926. Religious-corporation authorisation came in 1953; the hall was extended at the ninetieth-anniversary rite in 1961, and a parishioners’ hall was built in 1968. At the centenary rite in 1971 a commemorative volume was distributed. The annual festival is 23 September. No benefit that may be prayed for is stated.

Origin and history

In 1871, encouraged by Kuroda Kiyotaka and others of the Colonisation Commission, a spirit shrine was built at the entrance to the Akeno communal burial ground for the ancestral rites of adherents of Shinto.

In 1877 Wakabayashi Yoshitomo, a negi of Sapporo Jinja, became its first priest; in 1885 a divided spirit of the deity was received from Sapporo Jinja and the main hall of the ancestral shrine was completed. It is also called Shinonome-shi. It stands today as the rite hall for the reburial and conversion into Shinto of the colonial militia and settlers.

In 1911 a new hall was completed, the previous one having burned in an accidental fire the year before. A cloister was added in 1919 along with stone walls and fencing, and a stone torii was completed in 1926.

Religious-corporation authorisation came in 1953; the hall was extended at the ninetieth-anniversary rite in 1961, and a parishioners’ hall was built in 1968. A commemorative volume was distributed at the centenary in 1971, the worship hall and spirit hall were rebuilt in 1976, and a steel torii was raised at the 110th-anniversary rite in 1981. At the 130th-anniversary rite in 2001 the hall was repaired inside and out.

What it is locally associated with

• Origin

  At the gate of a burial ground

  In 1871, encouraged by Kuroda Kiyotaka and others of the Colonisation Commission, a spirit shrine was built at the entrance to the Akeno communal burial ground.

  documented history

• What people do here

  A hall for reburial and conversion

  It stands today as the rite hall for the reburial and conversion into Shinto of the colonial militia and settlers, the shrine records.

  documented history

• Origin

  A priest, then a god, from Sapporo Jinja

  In 1877 a negi of Sapporo Jinja became its first priest, and in 1885 a divided spirit of the deity was received from the same shrine.

  documented history

The ground this shrine was built on was not a settlement but the gate of a burial place. A spirit shrine built at the entrance to the Akeno communal burial ground, in 1871. Sapporo’s other shrines sit beside fields or inside militia villages. This one sits at the edge of where people were buried.

Its use is written down as well: it stands today as the rite hall for the reburial and conversion into Shinto of the colonial militia and settlers. A place for changing how the dead were buried, and what the living professed. No other entry on this list records its purpose in those terms.

The founding was urged from the official side. Encouraged by Kuroda Kiyotaka and others of the Colonisation Commission, the shrine writes. Elsewhere in Sapporo shrines are raised by militia settlers, by immigrants, by a founding council; here the encouragement is recorded as coming from the administration.

Its tie to Sapporo Jinja runs two ways. A priest came first, in 1877, and a divided spirit followed in 1885. Sapporo Mura Jinja, Naebo Jinja, Shiroishi Jinja and Maruyama Nishimachi Jinja in the same city also descend from Sapporo Jinja, but this is the one that took the priest before the god.

The list of deities holds something not found elsewhere here: the ancestral spirits of the parishioners themselves, named among those enshrined.

Related guides

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Sources

1. 札幌祖霊神社 — 北海道神社庁札幌支部 (accessed 2026-08-16)