北鹿ハリストス正教会 生神女福音会堂
Church building
For more than 10 years since 1879, the believers in the Magata area had used Ichinosuke Hatakeyama's house as a temporary prayer hall as the "Magata Gospel Association". Ichinosuke came to Tokyo on March 8, 1894 for the consecration ceremony of the Tokyo Resurrection Cathedral (commonly known as Nikolai Hall), and was impressed by the Byzantine-style brick cathedral with a round dome.
He asked Bishop Nikolai to dispatch Simeon Kando, a member of the Tokyo Kanda Church, as chief carpenter, and with the guidance of local carpenters, the construction was completed in about three months. The church, built with Akita cedar on the Hatakeyama family property at a total cost of more than 350 yen, was consecrated by Father Boris Yugoro Yamamura, a priest, as the "Theotokos Evangelical Church" on July 31, 1892.
On the day of the event, members from Odate, Hanawa, and Noshiro churches visited the church, and it is reported that the crowd of spectators was so large that it formed a market in front of the gate.
Report on the Conservation and Repair of Magata Harististist Church Cathedral
(Odate City Board of Education)
The Magata Orthodox Church stands in a corner of the Magata area, about 6 kilometers east of the center of Odate City.
According to the "prayer book" posted in the temple, this church was built by Ichinosuke Hatakeyama, a wealthy farmer named Ioan (John) Hatakeyama, who was the first believer in the area, with his own private funds.
Before the construction of the church, Hatakeyama's private residence had been used as a temporary prayer hall for more than ten years, but as the number of believers increased, it became inconvenient, so he decided to build the church building.
The hall was dismantled and repaired in 1985, but no record of the designer, builder, etc. has been found. Of course, the partial repairs (walls, apertures, windows, paint, etc.) of this repair also led to their discovery, but the headquarters of the Japanese Orthodox Church (Tokyo Kanda Surugadai Nicolaidō Hall), where the records from that time are believed to have been kept, is also unknown because its materials were destroyed by fire in the Great Kanto Earthquake.
According to one theory, Simeon Kando, a layman, came from Tokyo at the invitation of Hatakeyama and was joined by two local carpenters who designed and constructed the cathedral. Simeon Kando was involved in the construction of Nikolai Hall and was instructed by Josiah Conder, then a professor at the Department of Architecture, College of Engineering (now the Department of Architecture, Faculty of Engineering, University of Tokyo).
The one-story wooden building was constructed with good quality Akita cedar timbers from Hatakeyama's forests, and after its construction, it has undergone numerous repairs.
It is the most oldest existing wooden one-story Orthodox church in Japan, and from this standpoint, it is an extremely valuable structure.
Akita Prefecture Designated Cultural Properties
Designation of Cultural Property: March 22, 1966
The entire structure of the church consists of an entrance hall, a sanctuary, a sanctuary of enlightenment, and a sanctuary of the Most Holy Place, all arranged vertically. The roof is of hipped construction with gables projecting on both sides, and a high octagonal pyramid roof hangs in the center with a ball cap and a cross at the top.
Looking inside, the handle brackets on the shoji and the front door of the sanctuary are marked "CORBIN US," indicating that they were made in the U.S.A. The chandelier is of Russian origin. The chandelier is Russian, and was in the cathedral in the Matsuyama POW camp at the time of the Russian-Japanese War.
The 18 icons in the chapel are the works of Irina Yamashita Rin, Japan's first female oil painter (icon painter), and are valuable in the history of art. These works, along with one other icon, are designated as cultural assets of Odate City.
The church is a valuable wooden Byzantine-style structure, with wooden arches extending from all sides and a dome over the sanctuary. Overall, the building has cultural and historical value as a Meiji-era pseudo-Western-style building, and at the same time, it is of local significance as the remains of a congregation of the Orthodox Church in the Tohoku region, which was distributed throughout the rural areas of this region.
From "Cultural Properties of Odate City
The church underwent the most extensive restoration and conservation in this century and was consecrated in the fall of 2018.
On Christmas Day 2019, the six icons of the Royal Gate were restored and restored to their golden splendor.
Dear Brothers and Sisters.
To ensure the preservation of Hokuroku Haristist Church,
a valuable cultural asset in terms of history, art, and architecture,
for future generations,
We are always happy to receive your donations
from all people inside and outside the country.
Donations are used to repair the church and restore icons.
