Shinto: The Way of the Gods/Chapter 3

by W. G. Aston

CHAPTER III.

DEIFICATION OF MEN.

The importance of the deification of human beings in Shinto has been grossly exaggerated both by European scholars and by modern Japanese writers. Grant Allen, for example, says, in his 'Evolution of the Idea of God': "We know that some whole great national creeds, like the Shinto of Japan, recognize no deities at all, save living kings and dead ancestral spirits." He was probably misled by the old writer Kaempfer, whose ignorance of the subject is stupendous. The truth is that Shinto is derived in a much less degree from the second of the two great currents of religious thought than from the first. It has comparatively little worship of human beings. In the Kojiki, Nihongi, and Yengishiki we meet with hardly anything of this element. None of their great Gods are individual human beings, though at a later period a few deities of this class attained to considerable eminence and popularity. An analysis of a list of "Greater Shrines," prepared in the tenth century, yields the following results: Of the Gods comprised in it, seventeen are nature deities, one is a sword, which probably represented a nature deity, two are more or less legendary deceased Mikados, one is the deified type and supposed ancestor of a priestly corporation, one is the ancestor of an empress, and one a deceased statesman.

Deified Individual Men.—Like Nature-Gods, Man-Gods may be divided into three classes—namely, deified individual men, deified classes of men, and deified human qualities. The first of these classes comprises the Mikados, living or dead, and numerous heroes, of whom Yamato-dake, the legendary conqueror of the eastern part of Japan, and Sugahara (Tenjin), the god of learning, may be quoted as examples.

Phases of Conception.—They are variously conceived of, as follows:—

1. X, alive or dead, is a great man, worthy of our love, reverence, gratitude, or fear.
2. X, sometimes when alive, more frequently when dead, is possessed of superhuman powers, usually borrowed from those of nature, such as the control of the weather and the seasons, and of diseases.
3. X's powers reside not in his body but in a more or less spiritual emanation from it.

In the first of these three phases, man-worship is not religion. So long as a man is honoured for those qualities only which he really possesses or possessed, he cannot be called a God. But although rational man-worship is not in itself religion, it is a necessary factor in its development. Our sentiments of gratitude and awe towards the great nature-powers spring up in hearts already prepared by the feelings which we entertain towards our parents, superiors, and other fellow-men. Whether individually or collectively, a man loves his parents before he loves God. The outward signs of divine worship are almost exclusively in the first place acts of reverence towards men. A man bows his head or makes presents to his superiors before he worships or sacrifices to a deity.

There is a tendency to restrict the word worship to the adoration of deity. Thus, when we speak of ancestor-worship, we are apt to think of it as implying deification. But there is much worship of living and dead men which is perfectly rational, and implies no ascription to them of superhuman powers.

The second, or religious, phase of man-worship involves the assumption that some men are possessed of powers of a kind different from those of ordinary mortals. The mere exaggeration of the human faculties may produce an inferior sort of deity, but no really great man-God can be produced without borrowing some of the transcendent powers of Nature, or in some way identifying him with that increasing cosmic purpose, which from one point of view is tendency and evolution, and from another is a loving Providence. Until this is done a deified king, ancestor, or ghost (if there be such a thing) is a poor specimen of a God. To become a deity of any consequence, the man-God must make rain, avert floods, control the seasons, send and stay plagues, wield thunderbolts, ride upon the storm, or even act as Creator of the world.^[1] When the practice of deifying men was once established it was enough to entitle them Gods, the term itself implying the possession of those powers which we call supernatural, but which are only so when predicated of men.

Deification of Mikados.—The misunderstanding of metaphorical language is a fertile source of apotheosis. The deification of the Mikados is a case in point. The Mikado is called "the Heavenly Grandchild," his courtiers are "men above the clouds," rural districts are spoken of as "distant from Heaven," that is, from the Imperial Palace. The heir to the throne was styled hi no miko, or "august child of the Sun," and his residence hi no miya, "the august house of the Sun." The native names of many of the Mikados contain the element hiko, or "Sun-child." The appearance in Court of the Empress Suiko (A.D. 612) is compared to the sun issuing from the clouds. Tenshi, or "Son of Heaven," a Chinese term freely applied to the Mikado in later times, is a variant of the same idea, which, it need hardly be said, is known in other countries besides Japan. The Chinese Emperor is said to call the sun his elder brother, and the moon his sister. Images of the sun and moon were depicted on the banners which were borne before him on State occasions. The same practice had been adopted in Japan as early as A.D. 700, and there is a relic of it at the present day in the Japanese national flag, which is a red sun on a white ground.^[2] The ancient kings of Egypt called themselves earthly suns. Our own poet Waller, addressing James II., says:—

To your great merrit given,
A title to be called the sonne of Heaven.

Let us not pass by these metaphors with a disdainful smile, as mere unsubstantial poetic fancies. They are more or less rude attempts to give expression to the very important truth that the benefits which a nation derives from the rule of a wise and good sovereign are comparable to the blessings of the sun's warmth and light. As Browning, in 'Saul,' has well said:—

Each deed thou hast done
Dies, revives, goes to work in the world, and is as the sun
Looking down on the earth, though clouds spoil him, though tempests efface,
Can find nothing his own deed produced not, must everywhere trace
The results of his past summer prime—so each ray of thy will,
Every flash of thy passion and prowess long over, shall thrill
Thy whole people, the countless, with ardour till they too give forth
A like cheer to their sons, who in turn fill the south and the north
With the radiance thy deed was the germ of——.

It may be objected that it is contrary to the general law of human development to make the higher metaphorical conception precede the lower physical one. It is no doubt true that the physical idea of fatherhood must come before the metaphorical use of this relationship. But it does not follow that when once the metaphor is arrived at, it may not relapse into its original physical acceptation. The forces which produce religious progress act by waves, with intervals of stagnation or retrogression. Even when the general religious condition of a country is advancing it will be found that the lower popular stratum of thought consists less of undeveloped germs of future progress than of a breccia of the debased or imperfectly assimilated ideas of the wise men of preceding generations. In this retrograde movement a large part is played by the invincible tendency of the vulgar to give metaphors their literal signification. This, I take it, is the source of the numerous actual children or descendants of the Sun and other deities who are found all over the world, in Greece, Peru, Japan, and elsewhere. The sequence of ideas may be thus represented:—

1. The King or sage is like the Sun.
2. He is (rhetorically) a Sun, or the Sun's brother or offspring.
3. He is actually descended from the Sun in the nth generation, the intermediate links of the genealogy being a, b, c, d, &c., and he is therefore himself a divinity.

Herbert Spencer, in his 'Sociology,' says:—

"There are proofs that like confusion of metaphor with fact leads to Sun-worship. Complimentary naming after the sun occurs everywhere, and where it is associated with power, becomes inherited. The chiefs of the Hurons bore the name of the Sun; and Humboldt remarks that 'the "Sun-Kings" among the Natches recall to mind the Heliades of the first eastern colony of Rhodes.' Out of numerous illustrations from Egypt may be quoted an inscription from Silsilis—'Hail to thee! King of Egypt! Sun of the foreign peoples...... Life, salvation, health to him! he is a shining Sun.' In such cases, then, worship of the ancestor readily becomes worship of the Sun...... Personalization of the wind had an origin of this kind."

"Nature-worship, then, is but an aberrant form of ghost-worship."

Surely this is an inversion of the true order of things. Why do kings bear the name of Sun, or child of the Sun? Is it not because the Sun is already looked upon as a glorious being (a God?) with whom it is an honour to be associated? Herbert Spencer himself speaks of "complimentary naming after the Sun." The Chinese call deification hai-ten, or "matching with Heaven," showing that with them at least it is the man who acquires his divinity by being placed on a level with Heaven, not vice versâ. Worship of the Sun must be anterior to the very existence of Mikados, and there are certainly more substantial reasons for it than the transfer to him, suggested by metaphorical language, of the reverence paid to human sovereigns or ancestors.

The deification of living Mikados was titular rather than real. I am not aware that any specific so-called miraculous powers^[3] were authoritatively claimed for them. In 645 a Japanese minister, addressing some envoys from Korea, described his sovereign as "the Emperor of Japan, who rules the world as a manifest deity." The same official recognized the Korean princes as "Sons of the Gods." The Mikado Keikō, admiring the strength and courage of his son Yamatodake, says to him: "Whereas in outward form thou art our child, in reality thou art a God." The Mikados called themselves, in notifications and elsewhere, Akitsu Kami, that is, manifest or incarnate deities, and claimed a general authority over the Gods of Japan. Yūriaku conversed on equal terms with the God Hito-koto-nushi. He expected obedience from the Thunder-God, but speedily had cause to repent his audacity.^[4]

The honours paid to deceased Mikados stand on a somewhat different footing. There is little, however, in the earlier period of Shinto to distinguish the respect shown to deceased Mikados from the customary observances towards the undeified dead. The Kojiki and Nihongi have hardly a trace of any practical recognition of their divinity. We are told in the Nihongi (A.D. 679) that the Mikado Temmu did reverence to the tomb of his mother who had died eighteen years before. In 681 worship was paid (no doubt by the Mikado) to the august spirit of the Mikado's grandfather (or ancestor). There is nothing in these notices to show that divine worship is intended. An oath made by Yemishi or Ainus, when tendering their submission in 581, is more to the point. They pray that "if we break this oath, may all the Gods of Heaven and Earth, and also the spirits of the Mikados destroy our race." Still it must be remembered that the author of the Nihongi was a profound Chinese scholar, and that his work is deeply tinctured with Chinese ideas. I should not be surprised to find that the above oath was simply copied from some Chinese book.

In the time of the Yengishiki (tenth century) the honours paid to deceased Mikados had become regularized, and offerings similar to those made to nature-deities were tendered to them periodically. It is, however, a significant circumstance that of the twenty-seven norito contained in that work not one relates to their worship, and that the care of their tombs did not belong to the Department of Shinto. Hirata protests vigorously against a modern practice of using a Chinese word meaning Imperial Mausoleum for the shrines of Ise and Kamo.

As early as the ninth century there are several cases of prayers addressed to deceased Mikados for rain, to stay a curse sent by them for disrespect to their tombs, for the restoration of the Mikado's health, for preservation from calamity, &c. In more recent times shrines were erected to them, and prayers put up for blessings which it is far beyond the power of man to grant. Under the name of Hachiman, the Mikado Ojin, visibly owing to Chinese and Buddhist influences, became an important deity in later Shinto. The same may be said of the Empress Jingo. The Kojiki and Nihongi treat both as mere mortals.

The honours paid to deceased Mikados were much neglected before the Restoration of 1868. At present they consist in four solemn mourning services held in the Palace, one on the anniversary of the death of the late Emperor, the second on that of the death of Jimmu Tennō, the third and fourth in spring and autumn, in memory of all the Imperial ancestors.^[5] Embassies are also despatched to the Imperial tombs (misasagi) which now have toriwi (the distinctive Shinto honorary gateway) erected in front of them. Two of the Mikados, namely, Ojin and Kwammu, have special State shrines dedicated to them. Concurrent with the enhancement of the political prestige of the Crown there has been a strong tendency in the present reign to increase the respect paid to the Imperial House, so that it now amounts to something like religious worship. The ceremony of the naishi dokoro,^[6] which in ancient times was in honour of the sacred sun-mirror, now includes the tablets of the deceased Mikados.

Other Deifications.—Even in the case of the deification of living and dead Mikados there is much room for suspicion of foreign influence. Of the deification of other men I find no clear evidence in the older records. It is probable, however, that some of the numerous obscure deities mentioned in the Kojiki and Nihongi are deified men. A number of the legendary and historical personages named in these works were deified at a subsequent period. Others have been added from time to time. The case of the God of Suha has a special interest. Here the God's living descendant, real or supposed, is regarded as a God, and a cave (probably a tomb) occupies the place of the shrine. A fuller account of this cult is given below.^[7]

The high-priest of the Great Shrine of Idzumo is called an iki-gami, or living deity. Not only good but bad men might be deified or canonized, as in the case of the arch-rebel Masakado, the robber Kumasaka Chohan, and in our own day, Nishitaro Buntarō, the murderer of Mori, the Minister for Education.

Lafcadio Hearn, in his 'Gleanings in Buddha Fields,' tells a typical story of the deification of a living man. A certain Hamaguchi Gohei, head man of his village, saved the lives of his fellow villagers from destruction by a tidal wave, at the sacrifice of his crop of rice, which he set fire to in order to attract them away from the sea-shore to the higher ground. "So they declared him a God, and thereafter called him Hamaguchi Daimyōjin, and when they rebuilt their village, they built a temple to the spirit of him, and fixed above the front of it a tablet bearing his name in Chinese text of gold; and they worshipped him there, with prayer and with offerings...... He continued to live in his old thatched home upon the hill, while his soul was being worshipped in the shrine below. A hundred years and more he has been dead; but his temple, they tell me, still stands, and the people still pray to the ghost of the good old farmer to help them in time of fear or trouble."

Ancestor-Worship.—If we restrict this term to the religious cult of one's own ancestors, as in China, this form of religion has hardly any place in Shinto. The only case of it, except in modern times and under foreign influences, is that of the Mikados, and even then there is no evidence of its existence before the sixth century. The term ancestor-worship is often used more generally of the worship of dead men of former generations. There is no good reason, however, for distinguishing between the cult of dead and that of living men. If the former is the more common, it is because absence and lapse of time are usually necessary to allow their obviously human character to be forgotten and to raise the popular imagination to the height of attributing to them superhuman powers. Deification is the result of an exaggerated appreciation of what the man was during life, though there is often associated with this primary reason the ascription of imaginary powers to his corpse or ghost.

It is often assumed by English writers that Shinto is substantially, or at least is based on, ancestor-worship. The modern Japanese, imbued with Chinese ideas, throw them back into the old Shinto, and have persuaded themselves that it contains a far more important element of this kind than is actually the case. A recent Japanese writer says: "Ancestor-worship was the basis of Shinto. The divinities, whether celestial or terrestrial, were the progenitors of the nation, from the sovereign and the princes surrounding the throne to the nobles who discharged the services of the State and the soldiers who fought its battles." Hirata, notwithstanding his anti-Chinese prejudices, was unable to resist the influence of Chinese ideas as regards ancestor-worship. He devotes vol. x. of his 'Tamadasuki' to the inculcation of an ancestor-worship which is plainly nothing but the well-known Chinese cult. His tama-ya (spirit-house, or domestic ancestral shrine) is a Chinese institution under a Japanese name, and the tama-shiro, or spirit-token, is the Chinese ihai (ancestral tablet). He would have his followers address their prayers, as in China, to their ancestors of every generation, from the parents of the worshipper up to the "Great Ancestor," the founder of the family. Their spirits (mitama) are to be adjured to avert evil from their descendants, to keep watch over them by night and day, and to grant them prosperity and long life. This is genuine ancestor-worship, but it is not Shinto. It was to meet the case of a failure of direct heirs to continue such ancestor-worship that the practice of adoption, unknown in ancient Japan, was introduced from China. The truth is that only a very small part of the Japanese nation knew, or pretended to know, anything about their ancestors. Even of those who had genealogies, many traced their descent from mere undeified mortals, some being Koreans or Chinese. There remain in the Shōjiroku and elsewhere a good number of genealogies in which the descent of noble families from Shinto deities is recorded. To what class do these deities belong? It is impossible to assert that some may not be genuine deified ancestors, though I cannot point to any undoubted case of this kind. Many are nature-deities. The descent of the imperial family from the Sun-Goddess is a typical example. The God of Growth, Kuni-toko-tachi, the Yatagarasu or Sun-Crow, the sword Futsunushi, and many other nature-deities appear among the ancestors of the Shōjiroku. In the 'Ideals of the East,' a work recently published in English by Mr. Takakura Okasu, the author speaks of the "immaculate ancestrism of Ise and Idzumo." The so-called ancestral Gods worshipped at these places are the Sun-Goddess, the Food-Goddess, Ohonamochi (an Earth-God) and Susa no wo (the Rainstorm). Dr. E. Caird's observation that "in the majority of cases it is not that the being worshipped is conceived of by his worshipper as a God because he is an ancestor, but rather that he is conceived as an ancestor because he is believed to be their God,"^[8] obviously applies to this feature of Shinto.

Other nobles traced their lineage from, and paid a special worship to, personages who never existed as individual human beings. Such is Koyane, the reputed ancestor, but really only a personified type of the Nakatomi priestly corporation.

If we have any regard for correct terminology we must call this recognition of nature-deities and class-types as ancestors not ancestor-worship, but pseudo-ancestor-worship. When Britain's sons declare, as they do with sufficient emphasis, that "Britannia rules the waves," is this ancestor-worship? Or supposing that Macaulay's New Zealander found a remnant of the English people worshipping John Bull as their reputed ancestor, would he be right to conclude that ancestor-worship was an English institution?

Uji-Gami.—These pseudo-ancestors are called in Japanese uji-gami, or surname gods. The uji were originally official designations, whether of Court officials or of local officials or chieftains, which, as these offices became hereditary, took the character of hereditary titles, and eventually became mere surnames. They may be compared with such titles as Duke of Wellington or with surnames like Chamberlain, Constable, or Baillie. In ancient times the common people had no surnames, and therefore no ancestor-worship, pseudo or real.

The word uji is also used collectively of the noble house of persons bearing the same surname. It does not seem a very ancient institution, and must date from a time when an organized Government had already been established. Of the cult of the Uji-gami as such we know very little. The Kojiki mentions the fact of various deities being worshipped by certain noble families. A modern authority says: "All descendants of deities had uji. Every uji consisted of members called ukara. The chief of the uji was termed the uji no kami (the superior of the uji). It was his duty, on festival occasions, to convene the ukara for the worship of the ancestral God." In later times the Uji-gami became simply the tutelary deity of one's birth-place, and was also called ubusuna (birth-sand). Infants born in his jurisdiction are presented to him soon after birth, and parturient women pray to him for relief. They also procure earth from the site of his shrine, in the belief that it has a magical power to assist their delivery. The same earth is credited with the property of relaxing the rigidity of a corpse The modern Uji-gami are taken indiscriminately from all classes of deities, perhaps including even a few genuine ancestors. One or two Indian deities have been made Uji-gami. The Nakatomi had three Uji-gami—namely, Take-mika-dzuchi, Futsunushi, and Koyane. Noble families have been known to change their Uji-gami.

The Uji-gami correspond in some respects to the Greek ἀρχηγός.

Biso.—Analogous to the Uji-gami are the trades-deities of modern times. They are called biso (author or inventor), and may be either nature-deities, deceased men, or merely the deified type of the particular trade or profession. Wrestlers worship Nomi no Sukune, who was probably a real person, and Chinese doctors the legendary Chinese Emperor Shinnung. Confucian pundits worship Confucius, poets honour Hitomaro, and Haikwai poets Bashô. Professors of the art of tea-drinking show reverence to the founder of that particular branch of it which they practise. Soothsayers, miko, football players, flower-arrangers, and actors worship the so-called ancestral gods of their several professions. There is a Kaji-so-sha, or blacksmith-ancestor-shrine. Carpenters, for some reason, have adopted Shōtoku Daishi, an Imperial Prince who lived in the seventh century, as their patron. Merchants worship Yebisu. They also pay some sort of respect to Fukusuke,^[9] a dwarfish figure with a large head, attired in the ceremonial kami-shimo, and seated in a squatting position, which may often be seen in the larger shops. A figure of a cat with uplifted paw, called the maneki-neko, or "beckoning cat," and a recumbent cow covered with rugs are also objects of respect with them. It is in many cases a question whether the honour shown amounts really to divine worship.

Spirits.—The older Shinto scriptures afford but scanty evidence of the spiritualization of deified human beings. In the Nihongi there is one reference to the worship of a Mikado's mitama (spirit). In another case the mitama of the Mikados are called upon to punish oath-breakers. Yamato-dake's mitama is in one place said to have been changed into a white bird. Of the mitama of ordinary undeified human beings there is no mention in the Kojiki or Nihongi; but, of course, this may be owing to the imperfection of the record. Tamashiï a derivative of tama, is the ordinary word for soul at the present day, and is undoubtedly of considerable antiquity. Still there are cases where we should expect to find mitama spoken of, but where a more material conception—namely, that of metamorphosis—takes its place. Among several instances of this kind may be quoted that of Yamato-dake. He died, and was buried, upon which he took the form of a white bird, which flew away leaving the tomb empty. The modern name for ghost testifies to the prevalence of this conception in Japan. It is bake-mono, or "transformation," and is applied to foxes which change into human form as well as to the ghosts of the dead and to hobgoblins of uncertain origin. Bake-mono are not worshipped in Japan, any more than ghosts are with ourselves, but there is a beginning of reverence to them in the honorific particle o which is frequently prefixed to the word, especially by women. There are no proper ghosts in the Kojiki or Nihongi, although the writers of these works were fond of recording strange and miraculous occurrences. The metamorphosed appearances mentioned in them are never phantoms with a resemblance to the human form, and possess no spiritual qualities. Even now the bakemono, though differing little from our ghost, is quite distinct from the human mitama or tamashiï (soul).

Tama, as we have seen above,^[10] may mean either a jewel, a round object, or the effluence of a deity or a spirit. Here literal-minded Dullness, with whom the Gods themselves contend in vain, leaps to the conclusion that the physical globular tama is not merely a symbol of the soul, but the soul itself. By the ignorant in modern times it is conceived of as a small round black object, which has the power of leaving the body during sleep. The popular name for the will-of-the-wisp, namely, hito-dama (man-ball-soul) enshrines a like superstition.^[11] It is asserted that the souls of the newly dead have been seen to float away over the eaves and roof as a transparent globe of impalpable essence.

We may compare with these Japanese notions the following cases, which I quote from Herbert Spencer's 'Sociology': "According to Ximenes, when a lord died in Vera Cruz, the first thing they did after his death was to put a precious stone in his mouth. The object of it was that the stone should receive his soul. The Mexicans along with a man's remains put a gem of more or less value, which they said would serve him in place of a heart in the other world." Such material conceptions of the soul are to be found everywhere. Mr. Hartland, in his 'Legend of Perseus,' observes: "To the savage, as to our own forefathers, and to the folk of all civilized countries still, the idea of an incorporeal soul is incomprehensible. It is everywhere in the lower culture conceived of as material, though capable of changing its form and appearance without losing its identity."^[12] Hirata, after pointing out correctly that the mitama (jewel or spirit) is so called because there is nothing in the body so precious as the soul, immediately relapses into a more material conception when he proceeds to explain that, although we cannot discern its shape, seen from the Gods it must have the shape of a jewel (that is, spherical).^[13]

The history of the mitama suggests that the material, or partially material, conceptions of the soul are a comparatively recent development. Though religion is on the whole progressive, it by no means follows that all movements of religious thought are in a forward direction. The spiritual edifice which poets and seers build up is being constantly reduced to ruin by the inept handling of the material-minded vulgar, to be reared anew by others more splendid than before. But let us not mistake the ruin for the first courses of a new building, the dead husk for the living germ. Ghosts and ball-souls are aberrant conceptions which belong to the former category. The dullards to whom such notions are due are quite incapable of originating the pregnant, though artificial, conception of body and soul as two distinct entities.

Let me add a few more etymological facts which bear on the question of spirituality.

Mi-kage, or "august shadow," is an ancient synonym for mi-tama. It is unnecessary to suppose that anything but a metaphorical meaning was originally intended. There is, however, a modern superstition that when a man is near his death his shadow becomes thinner.

The ordinary Japanese word for "to die" is shinuru, that is to say, "breath-depart." Death is also called concealment, long concealment, body-concealment, rock-concealment (in allusion to the practice of burial in dolmens), change, and ending. In the case of the Gods, death is called divine departure or divine ascent.

Iki, "breath," one of the vital functions, is put by metonymy for their sum, that is, life. It has not, like our word "spirit" and the Greek "psyche," taken the further step of coming to mean the human soul, except we identify it with the ke of hotoke, which has been plausibly derived from hito, "man," and ke, "spirit." It is now the common Buddhist term for Buddha and his saints, and also for the spirits of the sainted dead. The material-minded man, as usual, drags it down to his own level. To him the corpse at a funeral is the hotoke. It is not certain, however, that the element ke of this word is not of Chinese origin. China, always far in advance of Japan in spirituality, has exercised a profound influence on the development of Japanese ideas regarding spiritual matters.

Another material conception of the life or soul is contained in a poem of the Manyōshiu, in which a fisherman named Urashima is related to have found his way to the Toko yo no kuni, or "Eternal Land." When about to return to earth he received from his wife a casket, with the injunction that he must not open it. He does open it, upon which his life or soul comes out and flies away like a white cloud to the "Eternal Land." He dies soon after. But this is a poetic fancy, open to strong suspicions of Chinese inspiration.

There is a ceremony called iki-mitama (living soul), which consists in paying respect to an absent parent, &c., as if he were present. Another similar practice is that of kage-zen (shadow-food), in which a meal is set out for an absent member of the family, especially when it is not known whether he is dead or alive. The term iki-su-dama (living spirit) is applied to the angry spirit (double?) of a living person, which is supposed to work a curse, sometimes unknown even to himself. Su-dama are defined as the essences of woods or mountains, which assume a metamorphosed form—elves, as we should say. All these are comparatively modern ideas.

The Shinto Dō-itsu, a modern Shinto manual, frankly adopts the Chinese views of the soul. A manual of this sect has the following: "The kom-paku are in China the animal and rational souls. When a man dies, his kon goes up to Heaven and his haku returns to Earth. Man at birth derives his breath (or life) from Heaven and Earth. Therefore when he dies it returns to Heaven and Earth. The kon is the yang or male, positive spirit; the haku is the yin or female, negative spirit (tama). In everything there is the yin and the yang heart. All men have ki (breath), kei (form), and sei (life). The kon rules the ki and the sei. The haku rules the form and the body. Ki means literally breath, on which man's life depends. From the Buddhist point of view there are two functions of the material body, namely, life and death, each of which has its soul. The saki-dama (spirit of luck) is the kon; the kushi-dama (wondrous spirit) is the haku.^[14] Again the five viscera have each a God in shape like a man."

State of the Dead.—Like the Old Testament, the ancient Japanese records afford but few and uncertain glimpses of the condition of the dead. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul is nowhere taught explicitly. There are no prayers for the dead or for happiness in a future life. There is a land of yomi (darkness) which corresponds to the Greek Hades and the Hebrew Sheöl. It is also termed Ne no kuni (root-land), Soko no kuni (bottom-land), Shita-tsu-kuni (lower-land), or the Yaso-kumade, that is to say, the eighty road-windings, a euphemistic phrase resembling our "going on a long journey." Yomi, however, does not seem to be peopled by human beings or ghosts. Nor do we find any actual cases of their descending thither at death, although the conception was no doubt originally a metaphor for the grave. In the Nihongi myth we find that where one version speaks of Izanami in Yomi, another uses the expression "temporary burying-place." The same work mentions an opinion that the "Even Pass of Yomi" is not any place in particular, but means only the space of time when the breath fails on the approach of death. The Kojiki, after relating the death and burial of Izanami on Mount Hiba, at the boundary of the Land of Idzumo, goes on to speak of her descent to Yomi as if it were the same thing. From this it would appear that to many persons, even in these early times, Yomi was a tolerably transparent metaphor for the state of the dead. How difficult it is for even learned and intelligent men to rise above the literal interpretation of metaphor is illustrated by the fact that Motoöri treats this suggestion with great scorn, pointing out that there is an actual entrance to Yomi in the province of Idzumo.

Izanami went to Yomi when she died. She is called the Great Deity of Yomi. It is also spoken of as the abode of Susa no wo, who, according to one myth, was appointed to rule this region. We also hear of the deities of Yomi, the armies of Yomi, the ugly females of Yomi, and the Road-Wardens of Yomi. Thunder-Gods are said to have been generated there from the dead body of Izanami. All these are probably various personifications of death and disease.

In modern times Yomi has been identified with Jigoku, the inferno of the Buddhists, which is a place of torture for the wicked. Our own word hell has undergone a similar change of application.

In the Manyōshiu heaven is mentioned as the destination of a deceased Mikado, while in the very same poem a prince is spoken of as dwelling in his tomb in silence and solitude. The Toko-yo no kuni, or Eternal Land, is another home of the dead. The God Sukunabikona went thither when he died. So did a brother of the first Mikado, Jimmu. The Toko-yo no kuni is identified by some with Hōrai-san, the Chinese island paradise of the Eastern Sea, and by others with China itself. The orange is said to have been introduced from the Toko-yo no kuni. In the Manyōshiu poem of Urashima, the Toko-yo no kuni is the same as the submarine palace of the Sea-Gods, where death and old age are unknown. Toko-yo tachi (ye immortal ones!) is a complimentary exclamation in a poem of the Nihongi.

The most definite statement regarding the continued existence of men after death occurs in the Nihongi under the legendary date A.D. 367:— "The Yemishi rebelled. Tamichi was sent to attack them. He was worsted by the Yemishi, and slain at the harbour of Ishimi. Now one of his followers obtained Tamichi's armlet and gave it to his wife, who embraced the armlet and strangled herself. When the men of that time heard of this they shed tears. After this the Yemishi again made an incursion and dug up Tamichi's tomb, upon which a great serpent started up with glaring eyes and came out of the tomb. It bit the Yemishi, who were every one affected by the serpent's poison, so that many of them died, and only one or two escaped. Therefore the men of that time said: 'Although dead Tamichi at last had his revenge. How can it be said that the dead have no knowledge?'"

Evidently at this time there were two opinions on the subject. Motoöri says that this is a subject which transcends human comprehension. He leans to the view of the old books, that men when they die go to the Land of Yomi, in preference to the sceptical ratiocinations of the Chinese sophists. Hirata takes a more decided attitude. He points to the story just quoted as an example of dead men executing vengeance upon those who were their enemies during life.

Funeral Customs.—Let us now inquire whether anything is to be learned regarding the views of the ancient Japanese as to the condition of the dead from their funeral customs. The bodies of nobles, princes, and sovereigns were deposited in megalithic vaults which were covered by huge mounds of earth.^[15] Pending the construction of these, the body was placed temporarily in a building called a moya, or mourning house. It was enclosed in a wooden coffin and in some cases in a sarcophagus of stone or earthenware. These sarcophagi have been found to contain traces of cinnabar.^[16] In all the more modern megalithic tombs the entrance faces the south. This arrangement is connected with the idea, common to the Japanese with the Chinese and other far-eastern races, that the north is the most honourable quarter. The Mikado, on state occasions, stands on the north side of the Hall of Audience. His palace fronts the south. Immediately after death corpses are laid with the head to the north, a position scrupulously avoided by many Japanese for sleep. They say they are unworthy of so great honour.

With the more eminent dead there were buried food, weapons, ornaments, vessels of pottery, and other valuables. Eulogies were pronounced over them, and music was performed at the funeral. Posthumous honours—a Chinese institution—were conferred on those who had merited them by distinguished services. In the more ancient times human sacrifices were made at the tombs of deceased Mikados and princes. The Nihongi, under the legendary date B.C. 2, states:—

"10th month, 5th day. Yamato-hiko, the Mikado's younger brother by the mother's side, died.

"11th month, 2nd day. Yamato-hiko was buried at Tsuki-zaka in Musa. Thereupon his personal attendants were assembled, and were all buried alive upright in the precinct of the tomb. For several days they died not, but wept and wailed day and night. At last they died and rotted. Dogs and crows gathered and ate them.

"The Emperor, hearing the sound of their weeping and wailing, was grieved at heart, and commanded his high officers, saying 'It is a very painful thing to force those whom one has loved in life to follow him in death. Though it be an ancient custom, why follow it if it is bad? From this time forward, take counsel so as to put a stop to the following of the dead.'

"A.D. 3, 7th month, 6th day. The Empress Hibasu-hime no Mikoto died. Some time before the burial, the Emperor commanded his Ministers, saying: 'We have already recognized that the practice of following the dead is not good. What should now be done in performing this burial?' Thereupon Nomi no Sukune came forward and said: 'It is not good to bury living men upright at the tumulus of a prince. How can such a practice be handed down to posterity? I beg leave to propose an expedient which I will submit to Your Majesty.' So he sent messengers to summon up from the Land of Idzumo a hundred men of the clay-workers' Be. He himself directed the men of the clay-workers' Be to take clay and form therewith shapes of men, horses, and various objects, which he presented to the Emperor, saying: 'Henceforward let it be the law for future ages to substitute things of clay for living men, and to set them up at tumuli.' Then the Emperor was greatly rejoiced, and commanded Nomi no Sukune, saying: 'Thy expedient hath greatly pleased Our heart.' So the things of clay were first set up at the tomb of Hibasu-hime no Mikoto. And a name was given to these clay objects.^[17] They were called haniwa, or clay rings.

"Then a decree was issued, saying: 'Henceforth these clay figures must be set up at tumuli: let not men be harmed.' The Emperor bountifully rewarded Nomi no Sukune for this service, and also bestowed on him a kneading-place, and appointed him to the official charge of the clay-workers' Be. His original title was therefore changed, and he was called Hashi no Omi. This was how it came to pass that the Hashi no Muraji superintend the burials of the Emperors."

This narrative is too much in accordance with what we know of other races in the barbaric stage of culture to allow us to doubt that we have here a genuine bit of history, though perhaps the details may be inaccurate, and the chronology is certainly wrong. In an ancient Chinese notice of Japan we read that "at this time (A.D. 247) Queen Himeko died. A great mound was raised over her, and more than a hundred of her male and female attendants followed her in death."

Funeral human sacrifice is well known to have existed among the Manchu Tartars and other races of North-Eastern Asia until modern times. The Jesuit missionary Du Halde relates that the Emperor Shunchi, of the T'sing dynasty (died 1662), inconsolable for the loss of his wife and infant child, "signified by his will that thirty men should kill themselves to appease her manes, which ceremony the Chinese look upon with horror, and was abolished by the care of his successor"—the famous Kanghi.

Another missionary, Alvarez Semedo, in his history of the Tartar invasion, says: "It is the custome of the Tartars, when any man of quality dieth, to cast into that fire which consumes the dead corpse as many Servants, Women, and Horses with Bows and Arrows as may be fit to atend and serve them in the next life."

This custom was also practised in China in the most ancient times, though long condemned as barbarous. An ode in the 'Sheking' laments the death of three brothers who were sacrificed at the funeral of Duke Muh, B.C. 621. When the Emperor She Hwang-ti died, B.C. 209, his son Urh said, "My father's palace-ladies who have no children must not leave the tomb," and compelled them all to follow him in death. Their number was very great.

A King of Kokuryö in Corea died A.D. 248. He was beloved for his virtues, and many of his household wished to die with him. His successor forbade them to do so, saying that it was not a proper custom. Many of them, however, committed suicide at the tomb. ('Tongkam,' iii. 20.)

In A.D. 502, Silla prohibited the custom of burying people alive at the funerals of the sovereigns. Before this time five men and five women were put to death at the King's tomb. ('Tongkam,' v. 5.)

Cases of suicide at the tomb of a beloved lord or sovereign have not been uncommon in Japan even in modern times. There was one in 1868.

The Japanese, like the Chinese, make no distinction between voluntary deaths and human sacrifices. Both are called jun-shi, a term which means "following in death." Indeed, as we may see by the Indian suttee, it is often hard to draw the line between these two forms of what is really the same custom.

In the case of common people, of course, no such costly form of burial could have been practised. It was called no-okuri (sending to a moor or waste place), by which simple interment, or perhaps exposure at a distance from human habitations, was probably meant. The offerings consisted of a little rice and water.

It is often assumed as too obvious to require proof that such funeral customs as these imply a belief in the continued sentient existence of the dead. It is taken for granted that it is for their personal comfort and gratification that wives and attendants are put to death and offerings of food deposited at the tomb.^[18] If we reflect, however, on the reasons for our own funeral observances, which are less different in principle from those of barbarous nations than we are willing to admit, we shall see cause to doubt whether this is really the ruling motive. Most of us have laid flowers on the coffin of some dear one, or erected a tombstone to his memory, or subscribed for a monument to a statesman who in life has deserved well of his country. Were these things done for the physical gratification of the dead? We cannot divide them in principle from more barbarous rites. We do not suppose that the dead see or smell the wreaths laid upon the coffin. Why should it be thought that in a more barbarous state of society it is believed that they enjoy the society of the wife who is sacrificed at the tomb?

The ruling motives for such rites are to be sought elsewhere. In addition to the practical considerations which, as Sir Alfred Lyall has shown, are potent in the case of the Indian suttee, it is to be remembered that the memory of the great dead is a national asset of the highest value (as the memory of our parents is in the domestic circle), and that it is worth while going to great expense in order to perpetuate it. In an age before writing or epic poems existed, cruel sacrifices, pyramids, great tumuli, and other rude monuments were more necessary for this purpose than they are in our day. And if barbarians sacrificed human beings, do not we spend the financial equivalent of many human lives in statues, memorials, and otherwise useless funeral pageantry? The difference between them and us lies not so much in the motive as in the lower value placed by them on human life.

The truth is that offerings to the dead, from a flower or a few grains of rice to a human victim, are partly a symbolical language addressed to the deceased, and partly constitute an appeal for sympathy by the mourners and a response by their friends. They symbolize the union of hearts among those who have suffered by a common bereavement. We must also allow something for the despair which counts nothing that is left of any value, and prompts the survivors to beating of breasts, tearing of garments, cutting the flesh, sitting in sackcloth and ashes, lavish expenditure, and even suicide. Yet it must be admitted that there is a broad, though secondary and lower, current of opinion, which holds that the dead benefit in some more or less obscure physical sense by the offerings at their tombs. Hirata believed that food offered to the dead loses its savour more rapidly than other food. The ghosts summoned up by Ulysses from Erebus eagerly lapped up the blood offered them. This, although poetry, no doubt represents a real belief.

Mr. Andrew Lang mentions the case of an Irish peasant woman, who, when her husband died, killed his horse, and, to some one who reproached her for her folly, replied, "Would you have my man go about on foot in the next world?" But may we not suspect that the real motive of my countrywoman's action was to express dumbly to the world the love she bore her husband by sacrificing something which she valued highly, and that the answer quoted was nothing more than a consciously frivolous reason, invented for the benefit of an unsympathetic, dull-minded intruder?

Whether or not the dead, apart from any physical benefit from funeral offerings, are grateful for the affectionate remembrance which they symbolize, it may be doubted whether the recognition of such a feeling on their part enters very largely into our motives. Was it for the gratification of Nelson's spirit that the column was erected in Trafalgar Square? Or do those who annually deposit primroses before the statue of Lord Beaconsfield think that his spirit is sensible of this observance?

Funeral ceremonies were not recognized as having anything to do with the older Shinto. It avoided everything connected with death, which was regarded as a source of pollution. Not until the revolution of 1868 was there instituted an authorized form of Shinto burial.^[19]

Deified Classes of Men.—In the older Shinto this category of deities had more importance than it has at present. Several of the pseudo-ancestors are in reality deified types, analogous to such conceptions as Tommy Atkins or Mrs. Grundy. As a general rule they have two aspects, one as man-Gods, and another as satellites of the Sun-Goddess, a nature deity. They are more particularly described in a later chapter.

Deities of Human Qualities.—As might be expected, Shinto has comparatively few deities of this class. It is represented by the Gods of Pestilence, of Good and Ill Luck, the phallic deities, and the oni, or demons of disease. Such deified abstractions as the Fates, the Furies, Old Age, Time, Themis, Fear, Love, &c., are conspicuously absent.

It will be observed that both of the two great currents of religion-making thought are concerned in the evolution of the last two categories of man-deities. They involve not only the exaltation of human types and qualities to the rank of divinity, but the personification of these general and abstract conceptions. This complication indicates that they belong to a secondary stage of development. Ta-jikara no wo (hand-strength-male), for example, is not a primary deity of the Japanese Pantheon. He is little more than an ornamental adjunct to the myth of the Sun-Goddess. It may be gathered from the myths of the Kojiki and Nihongi that the phallic deities—personifications of lusty animal vigour—were at first mere magical appliances, which were afterwards personified and raised to divine rank. It was a personified human abstraction—namely, Psyche, who was described by Keats as

The latest born and loveliest by far
Of all Olympus' faded hierarchy.

Mnemosyne, Styx, and all the numerous deified abstractions of humanity in Greek mythology are obviously of later origin than Gaia and Ouranos, or even Zeus and Here.

It is on the narrow basis of these two secondary classes of conceptions that Comte strove to establish his Religion of Humanity. But it is difficult to conceive how on Positivist principles Humanity, whether we regard it as a class or as a quality, could have a sentient existence or transcendent power, without a combination of which there can be no deity and no religion, properly so called. His worship of deceased individual men is open to the same objection. Comte's recognition of nature-deities is brief and contemptuous. He allows a certain reverence to the Sun and Earth as "fetishes."^[20]

Animals in Shinto.—Animals may be worshipped for their own sakes, as wonderful, terrible, or uncanny beings. The tiger, the serpent, and the wolf are for this reason called Kami. But there are no shrines in their honour, and they have no regular cult. A more common reason for honouring animals is their association with some deity as his servants or messengers. Thus the deer is sacred to Take-mika-tsuchi at Kasuga, the monkey is sacred at Hiyoshi, the pigeon to the God Hachiman, the white egret at the shrine of Kebi no Miya, the tortoise at Matsunoö, and the crow at Kumano. The wani, or sea-monster, belongs to the sea-God, and the dragon belongs to (or is) Taka okami (the rain-God). There is also mention of a thunder-beast. In later times the rat is sacred to Daikokusama. The pheasant is the messenger of the Gods generally. The best-known case of the worship of an associated animal is that of Inari, the rice-God, whose attendant foxes are mistaken by the ignorant for the God himself, and whose effigies have offerings of food made to them. The mythical Yatagarasu, or Sun-Crow, had formerly a shrine in its honour. The stone Koma-inu (Korean dogs), seen in front of many Shinto shrines, are meant not as Gods, but as guardians, like the Buddhist Niō. They are a later introduction.

The Gods are sometimes represented as assuming animal form. Kushiyatama no Kami changes into a cormorant, Koto-shiro-nushi into a wani (sea-monster or dragon) eight fathoms long. The God of Ohoyama takes the form of a white deer. The most usual form assumed by deities is that of a snake, serpent, or dragon. Ohonamochi, in his amours with a mortal princess, showed himself to her as a small snake. In the Yamato-dake legend, there is a mountain-deity who takes the shape of a great serpent. At the command of the Mikado Yūriaku, the God of Mimuro was brought to him by one of his courtiers. It was a serpent. Water-Gods are usually serpents or dragons.

Totemism.—I find no distinct traces of totemism in ancient Japan. Tattooing, which some have associated with this form of belief, existed as a means of distinguishing rank and occupation. The most probable derivation of the tribal name Kumaso is from kuma, bear, and oso, otter. A very few surnames are taken from names of animals. Dances, in which the performers represented various animals, were common.

The piecemeal immigration of the Japanese race from the continent of Asia must have done much to break up their original tribal system and to destroy any institutions associated with it.

The law of exogamy, with which totemism is connected, was very narrow in its operation in ancient Japan.^[21]

 

1. "Laotze finit par n'être plus que le principe vital universel existant avant le ciel et la terre et qui s'est plu à chaque époque a se montrer sous les traits d'un personnage quelconque souvent des plus obscurs."—'Religion de la Chine,' De Harlez.
2. See a paper on the Hi no maru (sun-circle) in the T. A. S. J., Nov. 8th, 1893.
3. Such as touching for scrofula or the assurance of fine weather.
4. The statements of Kaempfer, in his 'History of Japan,' regarding the sacred character of the Mikado's person cannot be depended on. His account of Shinto generally is grossly erroneous, or rather imaginary.
5. 'Japan,' edited by Capt. Brinkley.
6. See Index, sub voce.
7. See Index—'Suha.'
8. 'Evolution of Religion,' p. 239.
9. Fuku means good fortune.
10. See p. 27.
11. In Teutonic mythology the will-of-the-wisps are souls which have not attained heavenly peace.
12. See also Mr. Frazer's 'Golden Bough,' ii. 297.
13. The Stoics held that the world was not only animated and immortal, but likewise happy and round, because Plato says that that is the most perfect form.
14. Hirata denies this.
15. For full details of the construction of the Japanese dolmen, the reader may consult two admirable papers by Mr. W. Gowland, in the Japan Society's Transactions, 1897-8, and the Journal of the Society of Antiquaries, 1897.
16. "Blood, which is the life, is the food frequently offered to the dead...... By a substitution of similars, it is considered sufficient to colour the corpse, or some part thereof, with some red substance taking the place thereof." —Jevons, 'Introduction to the History of Religion,' p. 52. But see Index—'Red.'
17. Some of these figures are still in existence, and one may be seen in the British Museum, where it constitutes the chief treasure of the Gowland Collection. The Uyeno Museum, in Tokio, also possesses specimens, both of men and horses.
18. "Rites, performed at graves, becoming afterwards religious rites performed at altars in temples, were at first acts done for the benefit of the ghost." —Herbert Spencer's 'Sociology,' ii. 8.
19. See an article by Mr. W. H. Lay in T. A. S. J., 1891.
20. "Comte ramenait toutes les religions à l'adoration de l'homme par l'homme. Comte, il est vrai, ne faisait pas de l'homme individuel l'objet du culte normal : il proposait à nos adorations l'homme en tant qu' espèce en tant qu' humanité et parvenait à deployer une véritable mysticité sur cette étroite base,"—Reville, 'Prolegomena,' p. 26.
21. See Index—'Incest.'