EA 116 Week 1b Outline
I. Shamanism
A. What is shamanism? Who or what is a shaman?
1. Originated in Siberia 10,000 B.C.E.
a. spread to Americas
b. spread to South Asia
c. spread to China, Korea, Japan
1) oracle shells
2) mirrors, (also see here), magatama jewels, swords, etc.
Link to article on three sacred regalia (mirror, sword, jewel) of Japanese imperial family
2. Importance of shamanism in the study of religion: why is it underestimated?
a.
b.
3. Belief in two worlds:
a. material world
b. spiritual world
B. What can Shamans do?
1.
2. How do they do this? Achieve a trance state and then:
a.
b.
C. Two Main Functions of Premodern Shamanism
1. Make prophecies/fortune telling
2. Pacification/exorcism of:
a. angry deities (kami/ujigami)
b. angry or obsessed spirits (goryô/onryô or muenbotoke)
c. modern shamans often simply connect family to deceased loved ones
II. Two main categories of Shamans
A. passive vehicles or mediums (MIKO or ITAKO)
1. When did they develop?
2. How do they gain their power?
a.
b.
c.
3. What gender mainly?
4. What kind of trance?
5. What can they do?
B. Active ascetics
1. When did they develop?
2. How do they gain their power?
3. What gender are they mainly?
4. What is their trance like?
5. What can they do?
III. How did male ascetics take over the role of exorcism from female miko? (see also Ellwood, Japanese Religion, pp. 28-30)
A. Early shamanic women very powerful
1. image of female shaman (Uneme)
2. 4th century e.g. of Himiko from Chinese historical chronicles (Catalpa Bow, p. 28)
a. prehistoric (Yayoi-Yamato) female shamans
B. Development of Male Exorcism Specialists (8th-10th c.)
1. Ubasoku or hijiri (8th-9th c.): figures who combined Buddhist and Shamanic practice
a. often outside established religious and political institutions (associated with common people)
b. eg. En no Gyôja, seen as the founder of Shugendô (mountain asceticism), described in "The Wizard of the Mountain" and "The Master"
Example of charismatic ascetic wanderer who performed ascetic disciplines (chanting and fasting) that gave him supernatural power to:
1) heal people
2) perform divination through dream trances
3) communicate and control demons (as attendants) and deities such as Zao Gongen (image) and Katsuragi Hitokotonushi (the kami of Mt. Katsuragi).
Not in "Wizard of the Mountain," but known for organizing and raising money for big public work projects, such as bridges and irrigation, so worked for the poor.
Because not part of government controlled religion, and because he preached to commoners, which was illegal at the time, he was seen as subversive voice of popular discontent (in "The Wizard of the Mountains" the Emperor keeps trying to exile or execute En no Gy?ja because he is supposedy going to rebel)
2. Yamabushi mountain ascetics (9th c. onwards)
a. Group associated with hijiri like En no Gyôja, develops into yamabushi who practice Shugendô (combination of esoteric Buddhism and Shamanism):
b. practice centered on mountains
c. practice ascetic discipline (described pp. 85-93 Catalpa Bow) that is believe do give them supernatural power
d. images of modern-day yamabushi practice
C. Split of male and female roles after development of Buddhist shamanic specialists
1. female role:
"She can enter a state of trance in which the spiritual apparition may possess her, penetrate inside her body and use her voice to name itself and to make its utterance. She is therefore primarily a transmitter, a vessel through whom the spiritual beings can make their communications to us in a comprehensible way." (Catalpa Bow, p. 22)
2. male role:
3. exceptions:
IV. Native Japanese (Shinto) Deities
NOTE: Shinto ("Way of the Kami") is a relatively late term (c. 15th century), but we're going to use it to talk about kami, kami worship, and kami rituals.
A. What are kami (native deities)?
Two main forms (sometimes overlapping): earthly nature deities (chigi) and heavenly personified deities (tenjin)
1. Earthly deities: began as any numinous manifestation of the sacred (hierophanies), mainly in natural phenomena.
a. Therefore can take on a wide variety of forms and characteristics (Catalpa Bow, p. 35)
Shinto priests with sakaki branches
d. originally not personified (i.e. originally did not appear in human form)
B. When do they take on human-like form?
1. The introduction of Buddhism and Buddhist images (8th-9th centuries)
QUOTE: "The belief that the kami have any permanent or true form which they can manifest to human senses is late, and derivative from Buddhist iconography." (Catalpa Bow, p. 38)
2. Examples of personified nature deities:
C. A second kind of kami, the ujigami (clan deity) develops out of ancestor worship
To understand how those develop, we need to understand the concept of tama
VI. Tama or tamashii ("soul")
A. "An entity which resides in some host, to which it imparts life and vitality..." (Catalpa Bow, p. 43)
B. Tama can leave the body temporarily (ikiryô) or permanently (shiryô)
1. Ikiryô (living spirit)
a. unconscious process:
Poem by 10th c. poet Izumi Shikibu mourning her dead love, Prince Atsumichi:
mono omoeba
sawa no hotaru mo
wa ga mi yori
akugare izure
tama ka to zo miru
Thinking of him:
could the firefly of the marsh
be my soul
departing from my very flesh
wandering off in anguish?
(adapted from Brower and Miner, Japanese Court Poetry)
1) tama means jewel and even in this early period, tama was visualized as a flaming ball/jewel. See also this much later Edo period image of hitodama (person-tama).
b. conscious process:
1) by an ascetic in a dream vision
2) by someone practicing black magic to attack someone they have a grudge against
2. When tama leaves the body for good it is called shiryô (dead spirit)
B. What happens to tama after they leave the body permanently?
C. How can tama become personified kami? Two main ways.
1. Tama of powerful clan ancestors is considered deity for that clan: ujigami.
a. If the clan is politically powerful, the ujigami is also powerful, and eventually could become a deity for people outside the clan.
1) . e.g. Amaterasu Omikami as ujigami of the Yamato clan (imperial family) becomes the founding deity for all of Japan
2. Tama of onryô/goryô( literally, "honored spirits" but really angry spirits of the dead) who can cause possession illness etc. for individuals.
a. If the person was extremely powerful in life, as a goryô could become an ekijin (disease deity) or raijin (thunder deity) and cause problems for country as a whole.
b. Over many years, because of various pacification interventions, ekijin and raijin could transform into a different, less angry kind of kami.
1) eg. Sugawara no Michizane (845-903), starts out as goryô identified with thunder deity (raijin), eventually deified as Tenman Tenjin, patron deity of school children trying to pass tests.
2) eg. Taira no Masakado (d. 940), starts out as goryô, eventually becomes somewhat demonic patron deity of Edo/Tokyo (sometimes evil, sometimes good, depends on the story).
D. What all forms of kami share:
1.
2. Why do they appear in this world?
a. they bring disasters
b. they bring benefits
E. What do kami usually require from the living?
1. correct worship
2. ritual purity
F. Can they be called good or evil? No. Kami are extremely powerful, but cannot be thought of as good or evil in and of themselves. Unlike monotheistic idea of god as ominpotent, ominiscient, and completely good. The nature kami especially are beyond good and evil (the way that an earthquake is beyond good and evil). All kami have "good" peaceful sides and "bad" raging sides. Whether a kami does "good" things or "bad" things is all in the eye of the beholder.
1. Eg. Disease Kami (ekijin) may cause you to catch an epidemic flu, or may spare you.
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