A butsudan is a cabinet with double doors, and what it holds is arranged like a small temple. At the center stands the honzon, the main object of reverence, whose identity depends on the family's sect: Amida Buddha for Pure Land households, a calligraphic mandala for Nichiren lineages, Shakyamuni for Zen. Around it stand the ihai, lacquered memorial tablets bearing the posthumous names of the family dead, together with a bell, candle holders, an incense burner and small vessels for rice, water and tea. The altar is used in an everyday register as much as a liturgical one. Offerings of rice from the meal, a cup of tea, seasonal fruit or a deceased parent's favorite sweets are placed there in the morning; incense is lit, the bell struck, and a short recitation or a simple greeting offered.
Families report news at the butsudan, weddings and births and examinations passed, because the ancestors enshrined there remain interested parties in the household. The cabinet itself ranges from austere plain wood in some Zen households to the gilded splendor of Pure Land styles, and regional workshops built reputations on particular finishes. During Obon in midsummer, when the dead are welcomed back, the butsudan becomes the center of the household observance, cleaned and provisioned for the visit. Scholars of Japanese religion treat it, with the Shinto kamidana, as one of the two anchors of domestic practice in Japan.