Izanagi and Izanami

In the beginning, heaven and earth were not divided. Then, from the ocean of chaos, a reed arose, and that was the eternal land ruler, Kunitokotachi.

Then came the female god, Izanami, and the male, Izanagi. They stood on the floating bridge of heaven and stirred the ocean with a jeweled spear until it curdled, and so created the first island, Onokoro. They built a house on this island, with a central stone pillar that is the backbone of the world. Izanami walked one way around the pillar, and Izanagi walked the other. When they met face to face, they united in marriage.

Their first child was name Hiruko, but he did not thrive, so when he was three, they placed him in a reed boat and set him adrift; he became Ebisu, god of fishermen. Then Izanami gave birth to the eight islands of Japan. And finally Izanami began to give birth to the gods who would fashion and rule the world---gods of the sea and gods of the land, gods of the rain and wind. But when Izanami gave birth to the god of fire, she was so badly burned that she died.

Izanagi was furious with the fire god and cut him into three pieces. Then he set out to search for Izanami. He went right down into the Land of Gloom looking for her. He called her, saying, "Come back, my love. The lands we are making are not yet finished!" She came to him, saying, "You are too late. I have already eaten the food of this land. But I would like to return. Wait here for me, and I will ask permission from the spirits of the underworld. But do not try to look at me."

At length, Izanagi got tired of waiting, so he broke off a tooth from the comb he wore in his hair to use as a torch and followed her. When he found her, he saw that she was already rotting and maggots were swarming over her body. She was giving birth to the eight gods of thunder. Izanagi drew back, revolted. Izanami called after him, "Shame on you." She commanded the foul spirits of the Land of Gloom to slay him.

The spirits pursued Izanagi, but he managed to escape. He threw down his headdress and it turned into grapes, which the spirits stopped to eat. Then he threw down his comb, which turned into bamboo shoots, and once again the spirits stopped to eat. By the time Izanagi reached the pass between the land of the dead and the land of the living, Izanami herself had nearly caught up with him. But Izanagi saw her coming and quickly blocked the pass with a huge boulder that would take a thousand men to lift, so making a permanent barrier between life and death.

Standing on the other side of the boulder, Izanami shouted, "Every day I will kill a thousand people, and bring them to this land!" Izanagi replied, "Every day I will cause one thousand five hundred babies to be born."

Then Izanagi left Izanami to rule the Land of Gloom, and returned to the land of the living.

Izanagi came to a grove of orange trees on a plain covered with bush clover. There he bathed at the mouth of a clear stream, and, as he washed the filth of the underworld from his face, more gods were born. He wiped his left eye and created Amaterasu, goddess of the sun. He wiped his right eye and created Tsuki-yomi, god of the moon. He wiped his nose and created Susanowo, god of tempests.

Izanagi

天瓊を以て滄海を探るの図. Painting by Eitaku Kobayashi (Meiji period). Izanagi with spear Amenonuhoko to the right, Izanami to the left.

Izanagi (イザナギ, Izanagi^? recorded in the Kojiki as 伊弉諾, and in the Nihonshoki as 伊邪那岐; also written as 伊弉諾尊) is a deity born of the seven divine generations in Japanese mythology and Shintoism, and is also referred to in the roughly translated Kojiki as "male who invites", or Izanagi-no-mikoto.

He and his spouse Izanami bore many islands, deities, and forefathers of Japan. When Izanami died in childbirth, Izanagi tried (but failed) to retrieve her from Yomi (the underworld). In the cleansing rite after his return, he begot Amaterasu (the sun goddess) from his left eye, Tsukuyomi (the moon god) from his right eye, and Susano'o (tempest or storm god) from his nose. The story of Izanagi and Izanami has close parallels to the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, but it also has a major difference. When Izanagi looks prematurely at his wife, he beholds her monstrous and hellish state and she is shamed and enraged. She pursues him in order to kill him. She fails to do so, but promises to kill a thousand of his people every day. Izanagi retorts that a thousand and five hundred will be born every day.

In Japanese Shinto-mythology, the primordial sky, the god of all that is light and heavenly. Izanagi ("the male who invites") and his wife and sister Izanami ("the female who invites") were given the task of creating the world. Standing on Ama-no-ukihashi (the floating bridge of the heavens), they plunged a jewel crested spear into the ocean. When they pulled it free, the water that dripped from the spear coagulated and formed the first island of the Japanese archipelago. Here the first gods and humans were born.

When his wife died giving birth, Izanagi went to the underworld to retrieve her, but she refused to come back with him and they parted forever. When Iganami returned from the underworld, he started the first cleaning rites. He washed his left eye and thus created the sun goddess Amaterasu. When he washed his right eye, the moon goddess Tsuki-yomi came forth. From his nose he created Susanowa, the god of the seas and the storms.