Amaterasu
Amaterasu-ōmikami
Japanese Living tradition
Shinto is a living religion; Amaterasu is enshrined at Ise, its most sacred shrine.
The Shinto goddess of the sun, enshrined at the Grand Shrine of Ise.
Hurt by her storm-god brother Susanoo, Amaterasu hid in the cave Ama-no-Iwato, and the world fell into darkness. The gods gathered outside, crowing roosters and hanging a mirror, while the goddess Ame-no-Uzume danced so wildly that they roared with laughter. Curious, Amaterasu peeked out, saw her radiance in the mirror, and light returned.
Symbols
Sun Sacred mirror (Yata no Kagami) Roosters
In the ancient sources
The Kojiki (712 CE)
- Amaterasu-ōmikami
- “great august deity who shines in heaven” Kojiki X
- Kojiki X She is born when Izanagi washes his left eye after returning from the land of the dead; the moon god comes from his right eye and Susanoo from his nose.
- Kojiki XV Susanoo wrecks her rice fields, defiles her hall and drops a backwards-flayed horse through the roof of her weaving hall; her weaving maidens die of fright.
- Kojiki XVI She shuts herself in the Rock-Cave of Heaven; the gods set roosters crowing, make a mirror, and laugh at Ame-no-Uzume's dance. When she peeks out, they hold up the mirror, and a strong god takes her hand and draws her out.
- Kojiki XXXIII Sending her grandson to rule the earth, the gods give him the mirror and tell him to revere it as her spirit; it is worshipped at Isuzu, the Inner Shrine of Ise.
The Nihon Shoki (720) tells the same story with variants; in one, Amaterasu herself is hurt by her weaving shuttle.
Cross-checked against these texts and records, in public-domain or freely available versions where they exist. Line, section and chapter numbers follow the standard editions, so a particular translation may differ slightly.
Correspondences Explore all
These come from the tradition itself, and practice differs between regions, lineages and houses. To go deeper, learn from the people and communities who keep this tradition.