Table of Contents
And now, a little bit about the many, many Shinto deities. I won't go into detail about all of them because of their sheer number: Traditionally, Shinto faith speaks of its Yaoyorozu-no-Kami (八百万の神 "Eight Million Gods"), of which I've encountered the shrines of around 200 or so during my stay in Japan.
However, out of this myriad, there's a number of principal deities that appear more often than others, so these are the ones I'll talk about here.
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Amatsukami
(天津神 "Heaven Harbor Gods"
= "Heavenly Deities")
The Amatsukami is the first group of great Shinto deities. There's four of them in total:
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Izanagi (伊邪那岐 "That One Wicked What Branch")
& Izanami (伊邪那美 "That One Wicked What Beauty")
These two are a couple and the primordial creator deities of Shinto that gave birth to all the others, with Izanagi being the male and Izanami the female. Among others, they also gave birth to the islands of Japan. Eventually, Izanami died after giving birth to the fire god Kagutsuchi (迦具土 "Tool Soil").
Izanagi then went to Yomi (陰府 "Shade Prefecture" = "Land of the Dead") to see her again, but was unable to bring her back because she had already eaten from the food of the dead. Despite his promise, Izanagi then lit a torch to look at his deceased wive, which revealed her appearance as an unsightly corpse. So infuriated was she about this that she sent a host of deities after him as he fled the land of the dead. On the way out, he sealed off the path to Yomi with a great boulder. Infuriated, Izanami vowed to kill a thousand people each day, to which Izanagi replied that then he would just give birth to a thousand and five hundred each day.
While cleansing himself from the taint of Yomi, further deities sprang into being, notably the remaining two Amatsukami - Amaterasu and Tsukiyomi - as well as Susanoo, who did not become an Amatsukami for reasons that I'll get to later.
A major shrine for Izanagi and Izanami is the Taga Taisha in Taga.
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Amaterasu (天照 "Heavenly Shine")
The goddess of the sun. The most famous story about here is about how when her brother Susanoo rampaged in her palace, Amaterasu hid herself in a cave known as the Ame-no-Iwayato (天岩屋戸 "Heavenly Rock-Cave Door"), plunging the world into darkness.
In an attempt to lure her out, the other gods threw a great festival outside the cave. Ame-no-Uzume-no-Mikoto (天宇受売命 "Heaven Eaves Accepting Sell Life") - goddess of dawn, mirth and meditation - did a lewd dance that caused the other gods to roar with laughter while Ame-no-Tajikarao (天手力男神 "Heaven Hand Strength Man God") waited hidden outside of the cave. When Amaterasu peeked out to see what was going on, two other deities distracted her with the Yata-no-Kagami (八咫鏡 "Eight Spans Mirror"), and Ame-no-Tajikarao pulled her out and sealed the cave behind her, thus restoring light to the world.
The main shrine of Amaterasu is Koutaijingu (皇大神宮 "Emperor's Great God's Hall"), which is also known as the Naiku (内宮 "Inner Shrine") of the Ise Jingu in Ise.
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Tsukiyomi (月読 "Moon Reader")
The god of the moon, and the one of the Amatsukami that is least frequently encountered. In fact, unlike Izanami, Izanagi and Amaterasu, I didn't even know this one existed until I started researching the principal deities of the Japanese pantheon.
There aren't many stories about him, except the one where he angered his wive Amaterasu by killing Ukemochi (保食 "Food Protector") - a deity of food - because he was disgusted that Ukemochi created food by spitting it out of his mouth. After Amaterasu learned that Tsukiyomi killed Ukemochi, she was so angry that she refused to ever look at Tsukiyomi again and moved to another part of the sky, which is the reason why day and night are never together.
Tsukiyomi doesn't even have a major shrine, but there is the Tsukiyomi-no-Miya in Ise.
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Kunitsukami
(国津神 "Country Harbor Gods"
= "Earthly Deities")
The Kunitsukami are the other group of great Shinto deities, and together with the Amatsukami they form the seven great deities of Shinto faith.
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Inari (稲荷 "Rice Bearer")
The goddess of rice, wealth and fertility, and quite frankly the reason why I know so much about Shinto. And the reason for that is that their messenger animals are foxes. Depicted sometimes as an old man carrying rice and sometimes as a comely woman riding on a white fox, their gender is kind of a spur-of-the-moment thing. Inari is also the most widespread deity of Japan, with roughly one in four shrines being an Inari-shrine.
The story of Inari and the foxes goes back to an old tale, where two foxes came to an Inari-shrine during a storm, seeking shelter. Inari offered them shelter, if in turn they would watch over her rice fields, keeping them free of vermin. And since rodents are high up the fox diet, that was a mutually beneficial agreement for both sides.
Historically, this is actually highly accurate, since foxes really have been the protectors of rice fields ever since the Japanese started cultivating it, and there's one important reason for that: The absence of cats. The Japanese stated growing rice as early as 14,000BC, with rice farming really taking off during the Yayoi period between 300BC and AD300. However, cats only arrived in Japan around AD600. So up until then, it was entirely up to the local foxes to keep vermin in check, and having a fox around your farm was a "divine" blessing.
The main shrine of Inari is the Inari Taisha in Kyoto.
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Toyouke (豊受 "Bounty Taker")
The goddess of agriculture, industry and clothing. Despite her being one of the principal deities, there aren't any great legends surrounding her, apart from her being enshrined at the grand shrine of Ise (the Ise Jingu) and many of its branch shrines around the country.
The main shrine of Toyouke is the Toyouke Daijingu, which is also known as the Geku (外宮 "Outer Shrine") of the Ise Jingu.
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Ookuninushi (大国主 "Great Country Lord")
The god of nation-building, medicine and protective magic. He is the head of the Kunitsukami, and the original ruler of the terrestrial world. However, the Amatsukami forced him to relinquish his rule and left him to rule over Kakuriyo (幽世 "Hidden World") instead. Amaterasu's grandson Ninigi (瓊瓊杵 "Beautiful Jewel Beautiful Jewel Wooden Pestle") eventually came down to earth and founded the imperial lineage of Japan, which is why the emperors of Japan trace their lineage back to Amaterasu, and not Ookuninushi.
The main shrine of Ookuninushi is the Izumo Taisha in Izumo.
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Shichifukijin (七福神 "Seven Lucky Gods")
These are only borderline Shinto, but I'll include them here anyway since I've seen enough Shinto shrines worshiping one or more of them. They are the seven lucky gods of Buddhism, but as I just said, they can also occasionally be encountered in Shinto shrines as the two faiths interweave quite seamlessly at times.
While there are occasional shrines dedicated to individual Shichifukujin, all seven of them can also be found in some temples, such as Iou-Ji (医王寺 "Doctor King Temple") in Kawasaki.
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Ebisu (恵比寿 "Favor Ratio Longevity")
The god of fishing and ocean's bounty. Originally born without bones, he was cast into the sea in a boat of reeds by his parents Izanami and Izanagi before his third birthday, and was pulled out by an Ainu fisherman. He eventually overcame his weakness and became the god he is today, still slightly crippled and deaf, but mirthful and auspicious nonetheless. Interestingly, Ebisu is also the only "original" Japanese Shichifukujin, that is, the only one that does not originally stem from a Hindu or Taoist deity.
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Daikokuten (大黒天 "Great Black Heaven")
The god of crafting, wealth and gold. He is usually depicted carrying around a hammer and a large sack while sitting on two rolls of goods. He is also sometimes used interchangeably with Ookuninushi. Like most of the Shichifukujin, his origins can be found in Hindu mythology, where he stems from Mahākāla, one of the epithets of the Hindu god Shiva.
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Bishamonten (毘沙門天 "Helping Sand Gate Heaven")
The god of warfare and protection, and punisher of evildoers. He is also sometimes used interchangeably with Hachiman, to whom I'll get later, and stems from the Hindu deity Vaiśravaṇa.
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Benzaiten (弁財天 "Speech Wealth Heaven")
The goddess of music, water, knowledge, and all that flows. Also, my personal favorite of the Shichifukujin. She stems from the Hindu goddess of Saraswati, and in Shinto faith is known as one of the daughters of Amaterasu.
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Juroujin (寿老人 "Longevity Old Person")
The god of longevity. For a change, this one does not stem from Hindu mythology, but rather the Chinese Taoist god Nánjí Lǎorén (南極老人 "Old Man of the South Pole").
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Hotei (布袋 "Cloth Sack")
The god of Yolo. Depicted as smiling man in simple clothes with a belly so thick that it spills out of his robes, this god is the definition of happy-go-lucky. His history can be traced to Budai (Chinese 布袋 "Cloth Sack"), which in turn is the nickname of the Chinese Buddhist monk Qici (契此 "This Vow").
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Fukurokuju (福禄寿 "Luck Allowance Longevity")
The god of wisdom, who is the embodiment of the Chinese Three Star Gods Fu, Lu and Shou (福祿壽 chin. "Luck Allowance Longevity") into one deity. His most striking feature is his extremely tall head, and before becoming a deity he was said to be a Sennin (仙人 "Hermit Person"), a mountain hermit who could survive without food.
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Other Notable Deities
Apart from the principle deities and the Shichifukujin, there's a couple of other notable names in Shinto mythology, or names that you'll come across regularly if you visit shrines, so this section is for all those.
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Susanoo (須佐之男 "Man who Ought to Help")
The god of storms and the sea, and no-good younger brother of Amaterasu and Tsukiyomi. He is wild, impetuous, and generally short-tempered. Originally, he was on equal standing with his siblings, but he was ousted by Izanagi after crying for his mother so much that the mountains started to wither and the seas began to dry up.
We've already been about the story of Susanoo wreaking havoc on Amaterasu's palace, so let's continue with what happened thereafter. As a punishment, Susanoo was cast into exile. However, he was eventually able to redeem himself by slaying the Yamata-no-Orochi (八岐大蛇 "Eight-Branching Great Snake"), a vile eight-headed serpent that was terrorizing the people. He then cut off the serpent's tail and forged it into the legendary sword Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi (草薙剣 "Grass-Cutting Sword"), which he presented to his sister Amaterasu as a reconciliatory gift.
One major Susanoo shrine is the Susa Shrine in Izumo.
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Hachiman (八幡 "Eight Banners")
The god of archery and war. Originally a the mortal emperor Oojin (応神 "Accepted God"), he was later properly deified and became known as the god of eight banners, referring to the eight heavenly banners that signaled the birth of the divine and deified emperor.
Naturally, he was very popular for worship among the samurai, but fishers and farmers also worshiped him, which is why his shrines are the second-most-commonly found shrines in Japan: Roughly 1 in 34 Shrines that I came across was a Hachiman shrine. And yes, that's nothing to Inari's "1 in 4", but with how diverse most shrines are, it's still a clear second place.
Just like Inari, Hachiman also has a specific messenger animal associated with him: The dove, which symbolizes both bow and arrow. Unlike Inari's foxes, the dove is not present in all Hachiman shrines, but it can be found in some of them if you look for it.
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Konpira (金毘羅 "Gold Help Arrange")
The god of merchants and sailors, the shrines of whom are known as Kotohira (金刀比羅 "Gold Sword Compare Silk") shrines, and are the third-most-commonly found shrines in Japan, with roughly 1 in 67 shrines being Kotohira shrines.
He allegedly came into existence when a priest attempted to summon the Ganges deity Kumbhīra. As such, he is naturally connected to the gods of water, as well a Susanoo. Said shrine is naturally also the main shrine of Konpira worship, and is located in the eponymous town of Kotohira on Shikoku.
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Sugawara no Michizane (菅原道真 "Sedge Meadow Road Truth")
A scholar, poet and politician of 9th century of Japan who was later deified and today is revered as the Shinto god of learning. His shrines are known as Tenmangu (天満宮 "Heavenly Full Hall"), and are naturally quite popular with students who come there to pray for success in exams, and buy good luck charms to help with learning. These shrines come at a close forth place after the Kotohira shrines, with roughly 1 in 77 shrines being Tenmangu.
The story behind his deification is interesting too: Near the end of his life, he was a successful politician, but was ousted and exiled by a political rival. After he died in exile, plague and drought spread across the land, the emperor's sons died one after another, and lightning repeatedly struck the palace. The imperial court thought this to be the work of the vengeful spirit of Sugawara and built a shrine to appease him, also posthumously restoring his title and office.
His main shrine is the Dazaifu Tenmangu near Fukuoka on Kyushu.
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Some Statistics
Finally, here's some statistics about how often I encountered shrines dedicated to specific deities:
Inari shrines clearly make out the largest batch, over a quarter of all shrines. The next-biggest segment is the unidentified segment, which refers to those shrines that did not have a name or anything else based on which I could associate them to a deity (mostly small and tiny shrines). Then, anything suffixed with "Gods" is not a single god, but shrines dedicated for example to a specific mountain, island, tree or field.
Finally, you will notice the segments getting narrower and narrower up until Ebisu, the shrines of whom make out barely more than 1% of all shrines that I visited. That is why after that I made a cut and grouped all remaining shrines into groups based on how many shrines were dedicated to each deity. Broken down, the grey areas refer to:
- 10 deities with 16-25 shrines each
- 15 deities with 11-15 shrines each
- 20 deities with 6-10 shrines each
- 22 deities with 4-5 shrines each
- 14 deities with 3 shrines each
- 28 deities with 2 shrines each
- 89 unique shrines
Finally, take this statistic with a grain of salt: While I did record all shrines that I came across, I also made a point of seeking out Inari shrines for the possibility of there being foxes. Even, so, there was still a lot of Inari shrines that I also found by pure chance, so even if the total ratio of Inari shrines is a bit lower, it is still definitely in the right order of magnitude.
And with that, I'll resume my enumeration of fox shrines as already scheduled.
