Labor Thanksgiving Day

Today, and November 23rd annually is Labor Thanksgiving Day. It is one of the national holidays of Japan. When a national holiday falls on a Sunday in Japan, as in the case in 2025, the following day is given as a day off in lieu. Therefore tomorrow, November 24th 2025, will be a day off work and school nationally.

"Labor Thanksgiving Day" was promulgated and enacted as a public holiday in 1948. The purpose is to "celebrate hard work, celebrate production, and thank each other for the people." Japan, an agricultural country, has long had a custom of celebrating the harvest of grains to the gods. This day was the day of one of the court festivals before the war, the "Niiname-sai". The "Niiname-sai" is a ceremony in which the emperor eats newly harvested new grain and gives thanks for the harvest of the year. This was changed to be separated from the emperor's events and state affairs by the occupation policy after World War II, and became "Labor Thanksgiving Day".

The date of November 23 itself has no deep meaning. In pre-modern Japan, the date of the Niiname-sai was moveable, taking place on the last Day of the Rabbit of the eleventh month of the old Japanese lunar calendar. In the year that they changed to the solar calendar November 23rd was close to when the Niiname-sai would have been and presumably that is why they chose the date. Have you any plans for this Labor Thanksgiving Day and / or the public holiday November 24th (in 2025)?