Incense
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Incense is a preparation of aromatic plant matter, often with the addition of essential oils extracted from plant or animal sources, intended to release fragrant smoke for religious, therapeutic, or aesthetic purposes as it smolders. In the past, Chinese and Japanese society used incense as a time keeping device in the form of incense clocks.
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Forms and use of incense
Incense is available in numerous forms and degree of processing. However incense can generally be separated into direct burning and indirect burning depending on how they are used.
In general, large and coarse incense tends to burn longer than finer incense; as well, direct burning incense requires less preparation prior to its use. Beyond these facts, preference in the form of incense used depends largely on culture, tradition, or personal tastes. Stick incense is the most common and preferred form of incense used in Chinese and Japanese culture, as such, most of the incense produce by these culture are in stick form.
Direct burning
Also called combustible incense. When lit by a flame and then fanned out, the glowing ember on the incense will continue to smolder and burn away the rest of the incense without the continued input of heat. This class of incense is typcically made of finely ground fragrant incense materials that has been bound together by a combustible binder.
- Coil: Shaped into a coil, the incense is able to burn for an extended period; from hours to days.
- Cone: Incense of this form burns relatively fast.
- Cored stick: This form of stick incense has a supporting center core of bamboo. Higher quality varieties of this incense form have fragrant sandalwood cores. The core is coated by a thick layer of incense material that burns away with the core. This type of incense is commonly produced by the Indians and the Chinese.
- Solid stick: This stick incense has no supporting core and is completely made of incense material. Easily broken into pieces, it allows one to determine the specific amount of incense they wish to burn. This is the most commonly produced form of incense in Japan.
To use direct buring incense, one sets the incense on fire and then extinguishes the flame so that the incense continues to glow and smoke.
Indirect Burning
Also called non-combustible incense. The use of this class of incense requires a separate heat source since it does not produce an ember that burns itself. The heat is traditionally provided by charcoal or hot ash, though electrical censers are now available. The incense is burned by placing them directly on top of the hot coals or on a hot metal plate in the censer or thurible.
This is the most common form of incense traditionally used in the middle east and the western world. The best known incense of this type are the raw resins of frankincense and myrrh, likely due to their numerous mentions in the christian bible. In fact, the word for "frankincense" in many European languages also alludes to any form of incense. Similar forms of, indirect burning incense are used by the Japanese in kodo (香道).
- Whole: The incense material is burned directly in its raw unprocessed form on top of coal embers.
- Powdered or granulated: The incense material is broken down into finer bits. This incense burns quickly and provides a short period of intense smells.
- Paste: The powdered or granulated incense material, is mixed together with a sticky and incombustible binder such as dried fruit, honey, or a soft resin and then formed to balls or small cakes. This is seen in many incense using cultures. Many Arabian incense, also called Bakhoor, are of this type.
Manufacturing
Incense manufacturing applies mainly to direct burning incense since it must be carefully blended and manufactured such that it has ability to slowly and evenly burn itself in entirety.
While indirect burning incense contians mainly fragrant materials, recipes and mixes for all direct burning incense consist of two things: fragrant materials and a combustible base.
Fragrant Materials
The fragrant materials provides the aroma and the fragrant smoke when the incense is burned. Many types of fragrant woods, resins, herbs,and essential oils are used as incense or to make incense. These fragrant materials are also commonly used in perfume formulations.
Plant materials
The following fragrance materials are often burned whole (copal, frankencense, etc.) or pulverized (cedar, sandalwood, etc.) before burning or further processing. These are commonly used in religious ceremonies since many of them are considered quite valuable. Essential oils of these materials may be used to make incense, but the resulting incense are usually considered inferior in quality.
- Agarwood
- Gum benzoin
- Clove
- Camphor
- Cedar
- Copal
- Cypress
- Frankincense
- Juniper
- Labdanum or ladanum
- Myrrh
- Nutmeg
- Patchouli
- Sage
- Sandalwood
- Star Anise
- Storax
Essential Oil Fragrances
The following frangrances are usually mixed into a carrier, such as wood powder or other solid fragrance material, before being formed into incense. Incense made primarily from essential oils are mainly used for pleasure and burned for their fragrances alone. Essential oil based incense is usually cheaper then original material incense.
- Patchouli
- Cedarwood
- Sandalwood
- Ferula or galbanum
- Jasmine
- Rose
- Ylang-ylang
Perfumed incense sticks
This is cheapest type of incense. Artificial fragrances and perfumes are usually add, after incense being formed from charcoal powder. Typical that essential oils from this plants not available and it is sign of perfumered incense.
Animal-based Materials
Combustible incense base
The combustible base not only binds the fragrant material together but also allows the produced incense to burn with a self-sustained ember, which propagates slowly and evenly through an entire piece of incense. The base also should not burn with a perceivable smell. Commercially, two types of incense base exists:
- Gum and oxidizer mixtures: Charcoal or wood powder forms the base of the mixture. Gums such as Gum Arabic or Gum Tragacanth are used to bind the mixture together while an oxidizer such as Sodium nitrate or Potassium nitrate sustains the burning of the incense. Fragrant materials are combined into the base as a powder prior to incense forming or after forming as essential oils. The formula for the charcoal based incense base is quite similar to black powder.
- Natural plant-based binders: Mucilaginous plant material such as Makko powder, which is made from the bark of the tabu-no-ki tree (Machilus thunbergii)(jap. 椨の木; たぶのき), is mixed with the fragrant materials and water. The mucilage from the wet binding powder hold the frangrant material together while the cellulose in the powder combusts to form a stable ember when the mixture dries. The dry binding powder usually consists of about 10% dry weight in the finished incense. Many other plants are suitable for use as this type of binder.
Mixture Properties
In order to burn evenly and properly, attention has to be paid to certain properties of the incense mixture:
- Oil content: Resinous materials such as Myrrh and Frankincense must not exceed the amount of dry materials in the mixture or else the incense will not smolder and burn. The higher the oil content, the more the dry materials needed in the mixture.
- Oxidizer quantity: The amount of "chemical" oxidizer in gum binded incense must be well proportioned. Too little, and the incense will not ignite, too much, and the incense will burn too quickly and not produce fragrant smoke.
- Mixture density: Incense mixture made with natural binders should not combined with too much water in mixing, or over compressed while being formed. This either results in uneven air distributions or undesirable densities in the mixture, which causes the incense to burns unevenly, too slowly or too quickly.
Forming Incense
After the fragrance mixture is determined, the materials must be combined with the incense based and formed into desired shapes. Incense is either extruded, pressed into forms, or coated onto a supporting material.
- Extruded and pressed: Small quantities of water is combined with the frangrace and incense base mixture and kneaded into a hard dough. The incense dough is then pressed into shaped forms to create cone and smaller coiled incense, or forced through a hydraulic press for solid stick incense. The formed incense is then trimmed and slowly dried. Incense produced in these fashions has a tendency to warp or mishapen when improperly dried and as such, must be placed in climate controlled rooms and rotated several times through the drying process.
- Coated: This method used mainly to produce cored incense of either larger coil (up to 1 meter in diameter) or cored stick forms. The supporting material, made of either of thin bamboo or wood is soaked in water or a thin water/glue mixture for a short time. The sticks are evenly separated then dipped into a tray of damp incense powder, consisting of frangrance materials and a plant based binder, usually makko. 3 to 4 layers of damp powder are coated onto the sticks, forming a 2 mm thick layer of incense material on the stick. The coated incense is then allowed to dry in open air. Additional coatings of incense mixture can be applyed after each period of successive drying. Incense that are burned in temples of Chinese traditional religion produced in this fashion can have a thickness between 1 to 2 cm.
Incense base can also be formed into incense shapes without any fragrance material. These are purchased by hobbists who immerse the preformed incense base in their own blends of essential oil mixtures to create specialized incense.
Religious and Ethnic use of Incense
Biblical Use
A compound of aromatic gums and balsams that will burn slowly, giving off a fragrant aroma. The Hebrew words qeto'reth and qetoh·rah' are from the root qa·tar', meaning "make sacrificial smoke." The equivalent in the Christian Greek Scriptures is thy·mi'a·ma.
The sacred incense prescribed for use in the wilderness tabernacle was made of costly materials that the congregation contributed. (Ex 25:1, 2, 6; 35:4, 5, 8, 27-29) In giving the divine formula for this fourfold mixture, God said to Moses: "Take to yourself perfumes: stacte drops and onycha and perfumed galbanum and pure frankincense. There should be the same portion of each. And you must make it into an incense, a spice mixture, the work of an ointment maker, salted, pure, something holy. And you must pound some of it into fine powder and put some of it before the Testimony in the tent of meeting, where I shall present myself to you. It should be most holy to you people." Then, to impress upon them the exclusiveness and holiness of the incense, God added: "Whoever makes any like it to enjoy its smell must be cut off from his people."-Ex 30:34-38; 37:29.
At the end of the Holy compartment of the tabernacle, next to the curtain dividing it off from the Most Holy, was located "the altar of incense." (Ex 30:1; 37:25; 40:5, 26, 27) There was also a similar incense altar in Solomon's temple. (1Ch 28:18; 2Ch 2:4) Upon these altars, every morning and evening the sacred incense was burned. (Ex 30:7, 8; 2Ch 13:11) Once a year on the Day of Atonement coals from the altar were taken in a censer, or fire holder, together with two handfuls of incense, into the Most Holy, where the incense was made to smoke before the mercy seat of the ark of the testimony.-Le 16:12, 13.
Christianity
Incense is employed by the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox churches, and some churches of the Anglican Communion. At any Mass, a priest may choose to use incense. Eastern Rite Catholic Churches, Traditional Catholic Churches, and the Eastern Orthodox use incense more often at Mass. This incense is usually blessed before it is burned.
A thurible is used to contain incense as it is burned. The censer is swung at the object to be incensed; the swing is generally either single or double, depending on the reverence for the object being incensed; for particularly important objects (such as the Blessed Sacrament during its elevation) multiple swings may be performed.
Aside from being burnt, grains of blessed incense are placed in the Easter candle and in the sepulchre of consecrated altars. Many formulations of incense are currently used, often with frankincense, myrrh, styrax, copal or other aromatics.
The smoke of burning incense are viewed by many of the Roman Catholic faith as a sign of a good Christian's prayer. [1]
Buddhism, Shinto and Japan
In the year 538 c.e. Buddhism was first introduced into Japan. Along with it across the ocean came statues of Buddha, ancient Sutras, as well as incense. From that moment on, incense has been an inseparable part of Japanese history. Incense holds an invaluable role in Buddhist ceremonies and rites as well as in those of the Shinto shrines. It is reputed to be a method of purifying the surroundings, bringing forth the Buddhist Alamkaraka (Realm of Adornment). Use of incense is spread through the country by touting its purifying and medicinal properties.
During the Asuka, Nara, and Heian eras of Japan, the frequency of foreign exchange missions traveling between T'ang China and Japan became increasingly frequent. Bringing with them Buddhism, Medicine, Art, and of course, Incense. Among the most prominent of them was the Chinese Buddhist Master Ganjin who established Toshodai-ji Temple in Nara during the year 759.
Incense has developed a deeply profound link bound closely to everyday Japanese life, and is comparable to the great popularity it held in ancient Chang-an (China), where the secular uses of incense came into great favor with the royal class. The mixing of various ingredients together and then kneading them together with plum meat or honey came to be widely used in rooms, placed in the sleeves of a garment, and even used to imbue clothes with. The development of such a love for incense in Japan is vividly detailed in the Tale of Genji.
From these simple beginnings it underwent a transformation into a mutual competition between each other's mixtures, referred to as "Takimono-awase" (Fragrance Mixing). Before long, it developed into the burning of natural raw incense ingredients, which was called "Ko-awase" (Incense Mixing). These elegant games later became the source of the Kodo ceremony (Way of Incense).
During the Feudal period (Sengoku jidai, 1490 - 1573) of Japan there arose a necessity for a simple as well as practical form of incense. Chinese of the Ming Dynasty transmitted the techniques of creating incense sticks. It was simple form of powdered incense rolled into a stick that was easy to carry and more affordable for the common people. This was the epoch of incense popularity. It flourished in acceptance with all classes, rich and poor. In the center of this limelight, was the city of Sakai. This popularity was mainly due to establishment of Sakai as a major port for foreign trade from China, Spain, and Portugal.
Baieido dates back to the Muromachi period (1338-1573) in Japanese history. During this period, the founder of Baieido, Kakuuemon Yamatoya, became a wholesaler of medicinal herbs in Sakai city. Sakai was a well-known trading port in ancient Japan in which incense trading was in high demand. In 1657, the founder named himself "Jinkoya Sakubei" and specialized in selling incense ingredients and incense sticks. "Jinkoya" (Aloes wood trader) was a name peculiar to Sakai, only medicinal wholesalers who specialized in incense were authorized to use this name. In the time-honored traditions of Jinkoya Sakubei, Baieido has dedicated itself to making incense for over 300 years. The method and recipes have been handed down from generation to generation in an unbroken secret oral tradition.
Criticism of incense
Health risk
Some studies have shown that people who burn incense often, (exposed to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons or PAHs) may be at increased risk for lung and bladder cancer as well as occupational skin and scrotal cancers. The risk of cancer from burning incense will depend on the levels of PAHs given off from the smoke and the length of time of exposure. However, the increased risk is usually associated with the chemical base or dipping of some incense sticks, and there are increasing numbers of chemical-free varieties available.
Strong smell
Some claim the use of incense aggravates allergies, causing many churches to stop using it. Others do not like scents near meals, and still others associate the smell with the drug subculture.
Flammability
Some insurance carriers and risk managers for churches have complained that since incense burns, there are insurance issues.
External links
- Health Central.com - Incense and cancer
- BBC News | Health | Incense link to cancer
- The History of Baieido
- Japanese incense and Kodo
- Catholic Encyclopedia (1917) on Incense
- EWTN Catholic Questions: Why is incense used during Mass?
References
- Silvio A. Bedini. (1994). "The Trail of Time : Time Measurement with Incense in East Asia". Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521374820