Since his has not burnt down yet, he should live on. The death spirit tells the man that it is not his time to die, because lives are measured as candles that burn down. A man who is about to commit suicide comes face to face with a Shinigami who reveals itself. We know this fact about these death spirits from an old traditional tale.
Death spirits are therefore no scarier than garbage collectors or other public servants in a way.Īccording to legend, death spirits work in pairs and appear when it is a person’s pre-ordained time to die, at which point they invite him or her over the threshold between life and death. When exactly did this idea of death spirits come about? Well, no one is really sure, but it seems like it may have been as recently as the 18th or 19th century.īefore the idea of death kami came to Japan, traditional beliefs did not necessarily see death as a bad thing, but as a normal part of the cycle of existence. It may very well be that the Western folk tales of a Grim Reaper served as the original inspiration for these Japanese death spirits. It was not until Japan came into contact with the West that the idea of a death god or spirit such as the Shinigami really entered the collective imagination. Origin and HistoryĪlthough Shinigami are kami like any other in Shinto religious lore, they are actually a relatively modern invention. However, for reasons that will be explained below, they are never mentioned in the original creation tales and so we are left with nothing more than educated guesses. Specifically, they must originate from Izanami and Izanagi. Presumably they must share the same mother and father as all kami. Very little is known about the parentage of the death spirits. This means you won’t necessarily recognize one if you should see it.
On top of this, it seems that even when Shinigami are seen, they never have the same look or shape. What do the Shinigami look like? That’s a surprisingly difficult question to answer, since death spirits are invisible to everyone except a rare few who have some sort of connection to death or who are close to dying themselves.
0 kommentar(er)
