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The Chronicles say that he "believed in the law of Buddha and reverenced Shinto" which term now makes its first appearance on the page of Japanese history, the Kami alone having been spoken of hitherto. Anahobe did not suffer his discomfiture patiently.
Tsunayoshi had at that time a favourite attendant on whom he conferred the rank of Dewa no Kami with an estate at Kawagoe which yielded 100,000 koku annually. The friendship of the shogun for this most corrupt official had its origin in community of literary taste.
Nor, even though Germany be the land of learning, can the clear-headed scholar agree with some of her rationalists, who are often busy in the same field of industry, setting forth wild criticism as "science." The Kami and the Buddhas.
Izanami dies in giving birth to the Kami of fire, and her body is disintegrated into several beings, as the male and female Kami of metal mountains, the male and female Kami of viscid clay, the female Kami of abundant food, and the Kami of youth; while from the tears of Izanagi as he laments her decease is born the female Kami of lamentation.
Their powers, when united for any purpose, were resistless; and in time of national peril they were invoked en masse for aid against the foe .... Thus, to the eyes of faith, behind each family ghost there extended the measureless shadowy power of countless Kami; and the sense of duty to the ancestor was deepened by dim awe of the forces controlling the world, the whole invisible Vast.
This island they take as the basis of their future operations, and here they beget, by ordinary human processes which are described without any reservations first, "a great number of islands, and next, a great number of Kami."
Then Oishi Kuranosuké sent a messenger to the neighbouring houses, bearing the following message: "We, the Rônins who were formerly in the service of Asano Takumi no Kami, are this night about to break into the palace of Kôtsuké no Suké, to avenge our lord. As we are neither night robbers nor ruffians, no hurt will be done to the neighbouring houses. We pray you to set your minds at rest."
Now, however, five generations ensue, each consisting of two Kami, a male and a female, and thus the epithet "solitary" as applied to the first seven Kami becomes intelligible. All these generations are represented as gradually approximating to the exercise of creative functions, for the names* become more and more suggestive of earthly relations.
The bird flew down and lit on a cassia tree at the gate of the Heavenly Young Prince's dwelling, whereupon the prince, at the instigation of a female spy, taking a bow given to him originally by the Great-Producing Kami, shot a shaft which pierced the bird's bosom, and, reaching the Milky Way where sat the Sun goddess and the Great-Producing Kami, was recognized by the latter, who threw it back to earth, decreeing that it should strike the prince were he guilty of treason, and leave him unharmed if the blood on the arrow was that of the earthly Kami whom he had been sent to quell.
In common with most human beings the Japanese consider the serpent an object of mystery and awe, but most of them go further and pay the ophidian a reverence and awe which is worship. Their oldest literature shows how large a part the serpent played in the so-called divine age, how it acted as progenitress of the Mikado's ancestry, and how it afforded means of incarnation for the kami or gods.
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