Kojiki

“ Now that the Kojiki is in English and all may read it, we can clearly see who and what were the Japanese in the ages before letters and Chinese civilization; for these stories of the kami are but legendary and mythical accounts of men and women. One could scarcely recognize in the islanders of eleven or twelve hundred years ago, the polished, brilliant, and interesting people of to-day. Yet truth compels us to say that social morals in Dai Nippon, even with telegraphs and railways, are still more like those of ancient days than readers of rhapsodies by summer tourists might suppose. ”

“ Probably in no portion of the earth are the people and the land more like each other or apparently better acquainted with each other. Nowhere are thought and speech more reflective of the features of the landscape. Even after ten centuries, the Japanese are, in temperament, what the Kojiki reveals them to have been in their early simplicity. ”

“ Language comes at last with her revelations to furnish proofs of identity.
The mischievous Susanoō, so famous in the pre-historic legends, told in the Kojiki, half scamp, half benefactor, who planted all Japan with trees, brought the seeds from which they grew from Corea. His rescue of the maiden doomed to be devoured by the eight-headed dragon (emblem of water, and symbolical of the sea and rivers) reads like a gallant fellow saving one of the human beings who for centuries, until the now ruling dynasty abolished the custom, were sacrificed to the sea on the Corean coast fronting Japan. ”

“ In some respects the Kojiki may be regarded as one of the byproducts of the compilation, Hieta-no-Are being probably one of the assistants of the commission. The essential difference between the two chronicles is that the Kojiki was exclusively compiled from Japanese sources, written by Japanese as well as by naturalized Koreans, and retained much of the colloquial form of ancient Japanese narrated stories, while in the case of the Nihongi many Chinese historical works were consulted, and historical events were so arranged as to conform to what was stated in those Chinese records. ”

“ The Kojiki, however valuable it may be for research into the mythology, the manners, the language, and the legends of early Japan, is a very poor production, whether we consider it as literature or as a record of facts. As history it cannot compare with the Nihongi, a contemporary work in Chinese; while the language is a strange mixture of Chinese and Japanese, which there has been little attempt to endue with artistic quality. ”

“ So they made Onogoro-jima the pillar of the centre of the land."
The Kojiki says that Izanagi and Izanami were commanded by all the heavenly deities "to regulate and fully consolidate" the floating land beneath. But all the accounts, the Kojiki included, proceed to represent the islands of Japan as having been generated by them in the ordinary manner. We have therefore three distinct conceptions of creation in Japanese myth—first as generation in the most literal sense, second, as reducing to order, and third, as growth (Musubi) . ”

“ Of these two ancient and highly honored books, the "Kojiki" is slightly the elder—it was finished in A.D. 712—and is much the more Japanese. It devotes itself mainly to the gods, and tells of men only as they are god-men, related to the deities or inspired by them to compose poetry. For already the art of poetry, a peculiarly Japanese art quite unlike our Western ideas of poetry, was highly honored among the Mikado's followers. ”

“ That the compilation of the two great chronicles took place successively in the beginning of the eighth century is one of the symptoms showing the dawning of the national consciousness of the Japanese, to which I shall refer in the following chapters. In their characteristics, these two chronicles differ somewhat from each other. The materials of the Kojiki were first made legible and compiled by Hieta-no-Are, an intelligent courtier in the reign of the Emperor Temmu, and afterwards revised by the aforesaid Oh-no-Yasumaro. ”

“ Of course it is at the time one is best pleased that one does one’s real best in the artistic line.
By the way, since you like those Shintō prints,—and I might get you others,—what about a possible edition of your “Kojiki” illustrated by Japanese conceptions of this kind, colours and all? Such work can be so cheaply done in Japan! And an index! How often I wished for an index. I have made an imperfect one of my own. It is believed here that Hahaki is the ancient name of the modern Hōki. ”

“ Ten species of ophidia are known in the Japanese islands, but in the larger number of more or less imaginary varieties which figure in the ancient books we shall find plenty of material for fetich-worship. In perusing the "Kojiki" one scarcely knows, when he begins a story, whether the character which to all appearance is a man or woman is to end as a snake, or whether the mother after delivering her child will or will not glide into the marsh or slide away into the sea, leaving behind a trail of slime. ”

“ The Kojiki shows that whatever the men may have been or done, the gods were abominably obscene, and both in word and deed were foul and revolting, utterly opposed in act to those reserves of modesty or standards of shame that exist even among the cultivated Japanese to-day.19 Even among the Ainos, whom the Japanese look upon as savages, there is still much of the obscenity of speech which belongs to all society20 in a state of barbarism ”

“ From that time forward the story in the Kojiki, though not well told, gives us some very curious pictures, and reads as if it were trustworthy. It is tolerably full for a few reigns, after which it again dwindles into more genealogies, ending with the death of the Empress Suiko in A.D. 628. ”

“ The above is the Kojiki version of the story. The Nihongi makes the Moon-God the culprit, and gives it as the reason of his alienation from the Sun-Goddess, who had sent him to visit the Food-Goddess. This is not the only attempt of myth-makers to account for the aloofness maintained by these two deities. ”

“ The Kojiki begins by relating the foundation of the heavens and earth, and the first volume is entirely occupied by the events of the mythological period. The second and third volumes contain the history of the mikados from Jimmu Tenno down to the empress Suiko Tenno, whose reign ended in 628. It is written with Chinese characters, some of which represent whole Japanese words (mana) , and others merely separate sounds of the syllabary (kana) , and in general conformity with Japanese idiom. ”

“ A most valuable commentary on it was compiled by the learned Motoöri Norinaga toward the end of the 18th century, under the title of Kojikiden. The next most ancient work of the kind is the Nihongi or Nihonshoki, which was also composed at the command of the reigning mikado, and completed in 720, by a commission presided over by the prince Toneri Shinno. It differs very much from the Kojiki in being composed in a purely Chinese idiom, and the poetry which occurs here and there is all that it contains of Japanese. ”

“ By the term “archaic” is to be understood the pure Japanese language of earliest times, and by the term “classical” the quasi-Chinese language which came into use for literary purposes when Japan appropriated the civilization of her great neighbours. The Kojiki is written in the archaic form: that is to say, the language is the language of old Japan, the script, although ideographic, is used phonetically only, and the case-indicators are represented by Chinese characters having the same sounds. ”

“ Ohonamochi.—One of Susa no wo’s children was an Earth-god named Ohonamochi (great-name-possessor) , who is at this day a very important deity. The Kojiki relates his adventures at great length. He was badly treated by his eighty elder brothers, but assisted by a hare to whom he had rendered service. He went down to the land of Yomi, where he married the daughter of Susa no wo. Susa no wo imposed tasks upon him which by his wife’s assistance he performed successfully, and ultimately made his escape, taking her with him. ”

“ It is impossible to translate this rigmarole; but as it contains the words "earth," "sun," "moon," and "mist," a nature-deity is evidently intended. Both the Kojiki and Kiujiki first Gods disappear at once from the mythical record. There is little trace of their worship in later times, and they must be pronounced mere abortive attempts at deity-making. Two other first deities are mentioned in the various myths quoted in the Nihongi, namely, Umashi-ashi-kabi-hiko-ji (sweet-reed-shoot-prince-father) and Ama-toko-tachi (Heaven-eternal-stand) . ”

“ To go farther back in point of time than the "Kojiki," we find that even before the development of art in very ancient Japan, the male gods were represented by a symbol which thus became an image of the deity himself. ”

“ The loyal Japanese believed that their Emperor was descended from the gods, and in the "Kojiki," which is regarded with the same reverence by them as the Bible by Europeans, many actions implying divine power are said to have been performed by such beings as the Heavenly-August-Sky-Luxuriant-Dragonfly-Youth, by the Great-Refulgent-Mountain-Dwelling Grandee, and by other kami, or superior ones ("them that are above us," Mrs. Dolly Winthrop would have said) , to whom it was impossible to refuse the rank of deity. ”

“ How comes it that profound erudition so often lacks the salt of humour and the guidance of common sense?
Be this as it may, criticism is not at all a "Japanesey" thing; and as Japanese art and literature contain frequent allusions to the early history (so-called) of the country, the chief outlines of this history, as preserved in the works entitled Kojiki and Nihongi, both dating from the eighth century after Christ, may here be given. We include the mythology under the same heading, for the reason that it is absolutely impossible to separate the two. ”

“ This corresponds nearly with the Kojiki myth. ↑ The Chinese character is 人, which the interlinear Kana coolly renders by Kami, deity. ↑ Heaven-of-eternal-stand. ↑ The names of these two Deities are of doubtful meaning. According to the Chinese characters Uhiji should mean mud-earth, and Suhiji sand-earth. Ni or ne is a honorific particle. Vide Chamberlain's "Kojiki," p. 17. ↑ These names are somewhat obscure. Oho-to means great door or house; nochi, after, and mahe, before. He, is place; toma, a coarse kind of mat; tomu, wealthy ”

“ The "Kojiki" mentions eight objects, not at all the same, however, and calls them the Eight Great Deities of Idzushi. Vide Ch. K., p. 261. Possibly the Idzushi short sword and the Idzushi spear were stone weapons. This passage is one of several evidences that Japan owes to Corea one element of the Shintō religion. The "Yengi-shiki" mentions several Corean Gods as being worshipped in Japan. The "Kojiki" mixes up this legend with that of Arashito given above. Indeed both are probably founded on the same occurrence. ↑ I can't find any king of this name in Silla History. ”

“ Professing to go back to the origin of all things, it proves to be atheistical, for the first material substance wants a creator. The details of the cosmogony it treats of are puerile and unphilosophical. The Kojiki contains no system of morals, discusses no ethical questions, prescribes no ritual, or points to any god or gods as objects of worship. All the essentials of a religion are wanting in Shintôism, and it is difficult to see how it could have ever been denominated a religion at all. ”

“ Apparently she was prone to being possessed, and ended by being quite intimate with deity. Her chronicle is a curious patchwork, pieced out, however, fairly complete between the Kojiki and the Nihonshoki. The Nihonshoki, after some Almanack de Gotha work introducing a few rather dry domesticities, simply kills her husband, without offering us any excuse for the deed except the apparent unimportance of his life. ”

“ For example, consider the equipment of the Buddhist priests of the ninth century in the matter of art alone. Shintō knows next to nothing of art,6 and indeed one might almost say that it knows little of civilization. It is like ultra-Puritanic Protestantism and Iconoclasm. Buddhism, on the contrary, is the mother of art, and art is her ever-busy child and handmaid. The temples of the Kami were bald and bare. The Kojiki told nothing of life hereafter, and kept silence on a hundred points at which human curiosity is sure to be active, and at which the Yoga system was voluble. ”

“ And lest this should be supposed to be a modern faith, the confession further declares that "This is the religion which the true prophet Zurthust, or Zoroaster, brought from God."
The Shintoists of Japan, according to their sacred book, the "Kojiki," believe in one self-existent and supreme God, from whom others emanated. From two of these, male and female, sprang the Goddess of the Sun, and from her the royal line of the Mikados. There was no creation, but the two active emanations stirred up the eternally existing chaos, till from it came forth the teeming world of animal and vegetable life. ”

“ Over all arches a sky of colour faint as a dream.
There seems to be a sense of divine magic in the very atmosphere, through all the luminous day, brooding over the vapoury land, over the ghostly blue of the flood—a sense of Shinto. With my fancy full of the legends of the Kojiki, the rhythmic chant of the engines comes to my ears as the rhythm of a Shinto ritual mingled with the names of gods:
Koto-shiro-nushi-no-Kami, Oho-kuni-nushi-no-Kami.
Sec. 2
The great range on the right grows loftier as we steam on ”

“ Ch. "Kojiki," p. 19. Identified with a small island near Ahaji. ↑ The "Kiujiki" mentions a tradition according to which the two gods made the jewel-spear the central pillar of their house. ↑ The words for male and female are in the original Yō and In. It greatly excites the indignation of the Motowori and Hirata school to have these Chinese philosophical terms applied to Japanese deities. I cannot help thinking that some early marriage ceremony is adumbrated by this circumambulation. We have the ceremony of divorce further on. The erection of a house is not merely for practical reasons. ”