I believe I have an answer for you from a Shinto perspective, and since we are speaking in environmental design terms which is focused on the relationship between the user of the space and the space itself it may be of some small but useful consideration.

In terms of the Shinto system of belief, it’s very tradition oriented, and echos back to prehistory. The user of the space in this Shinto concept is the kami enshrined in the space.

I’ve noticed that Western religions tend to shift and sway in their architectural considerations, often at the behest of the financial backer of the structure being built. There is nothing wrong with this, even if seem a self aggrandizement. In Shinto terms while an individual may be associated with the founding of a shrine, it’s a rare event and the focus of the shrine and it’s structure is more related to the kami being enshrined. Shrines tend to evolve with the kami more than with the congregants.

In the sense of the kami, that is, in it’s spiritual sense, even if the physical components of the structure are only days old, the structure itself is as old as the first shrine to built at the shrine’s location. It’s this kami quality that Shinto people consider. In this sense it remains the same object.

There is an advantage to the practice of rebuilding every twenty years, in exactly the same fashion each time, in that the techniques are preserved and remain in living memory. This is important in a geologically volatile nation like Japan where the structures can be damaged in an earthquake. So, there is a historic practicality.

I hope this serves to offer a perspective.