Old-World Japan: Legends of the Land of the Gods. Frank Rinder
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Frank Rinder
Old-World Japan: Legends of the Land of the Gods
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4057664649737
Table of Contents
Rai-Taro, the Son of the Thunder-God
The Great Fir Tree of Takasago
The Love of the Snow-White Fox
Preface
HISTORY and mythology, fact and fable, are closely interwoven in the texture of Japanese life and thought; indeed, it is within relatively recent years only that exact comparative criticism has been able, with some degree of accuracy, to divide the one from the other. The accounts of the God-period contained in the Kojiki and the Nihongi—“Records of Ancient Matters” compiled in the eighth century of the Christian era—profess to outline the events of the vast cycles of years from the time of Ame-no-mi-naka-nushi-no-kami’s birth in the Plain of High Heaven, “when the earth, young and like unto floating oil, drifted about medusa-like,” to the death of the Empress Suiko, A.D. 628.
The first six tales in this little volume are founded on some of the most significant and picturesque incidents of this God-period. The opening legend gives a brief relation of the birth of several of the great Shinto deities, of the creation of Japan and of the world, of the Orpheus-like descent of Izanagi to Hades, and of his subsequent fight with the demons.
That Chinese civilisation has exercised a profound influence on that of Japan, cannot be doubted. A scholar of repute has indicated that evidence of this is to be found even in writings so early as the Kojiki and the Nihongi. To give a single instance only: the curved jewels, of which the remarkable necklace of Ama-terasu was made, have never been found in Japan, whereas the stones are not uncommon in China.
This is not the place critically to consider the wealth of myth, legend, fable, and folk-tale to be found scattered throughout Japanese literature, and represented in Japanese art: suffice it to say, that to the student and the lover of primitive romance, there are here vast fields practically unexplored.
The tales contained in this volume have been selected with a view rather to their beauty and charm of incident and colour, than with the aim to represent adequately the many-sided subject of Japanese lore. Moreover, those only have been chosen which are not familiar to the English-reading public. Several of the classic names of Japan have been interpolated in the text. It remains to say that, in order not to weary the reader, it has been found necessary to abbreviate the many-syllabled Japanese names.
The sources from which I have drawn are too numerous to particularise. To Professor Basil Hall Chamberlain, whose intimate and scholarly knowledge of all matters Japanese is well known, my thanks are especially due, as also the expression of my indebtedness to other writers in English, from Mr. A. B. Mitford to Mr. Lafcadio Hearn, whose volumes on “Unfamiliar Japan” appeared last year. The careful text of Dr. David Brauns, and the studies of F. A. Junker von Langegg, have also been of great service. The works of numerous French writers on Japanese art have likewise been consulted with advantage.
FRANK RINDER.
The Birth-Time of the Gods
BEFORE time was, and while yet the world was uncreated, chaos reigned. The earth and the waters, the light and the darkness, the stars and the firmament, were intermingled in a vapoury liquid. All things were formless and confused. No creature existed; phantom shapes moved as clouds on the ruffled surface of a sea. It was the birth-time of the gods. The first deity sprang from an immense bulrush-bud, which rose, spear-like, in the midst of the boundless disorder. Other gods were born, but three generations passed before the actual separation of the atmosphere from the more solid earth. Finally, where the tip of the bulrush points upward, the Heavenly Spirits appeared.
From this time their kingdom was divided from the lower world where chaos still prevailed. To the fourth pair of gods it was given to create the earth. These two beings were the powerful God of the Air, Izanagi, and the fair Goddess of the Clouds, Izanami. From them sprang all life.
Now Izanagi and Izanami wandered on the Floating Bridge of Heaven. This bridge spanned the gulf between heaven and the unformed world; it was upheld in the air, and it stood secure. The God of the Air spoke to the Goddess of the Clouds: “There must needs be a kingdom beneath us, let us visit it.” When he had so said, he plunged his jewelled spear into the seething mass below. The drops that fell from the point of the spear congealed and became the island of Onogoro. Thereupon