Norito are the ritual prayers and liturgical addresses of Shinto, formal words spoken by a priest to the kami in the course of a ceremony. Composed and recited in an archaic, elevated Japanese, they are the verbal heart of Shinto ritual: through them the priest greets the kami, recounts the occasion of the rite, presents the offerings, voices the petitions of the worshippers, and invokes blessing. The recitation is delivered in a distinctive solemn cadence, and its language is deliberately beautiful and old, marking the words as set apart from ordinary speech and fit to be heard by the divine.
Underlying the practice is the ancient Japanese belief in kotodama, the spiritual power residing in words, the conviction that rightly spoken words carry a real efficacy, able to move the kami and to shape reality. The norito is therefore not merely a description of the rite but an active element of it, its careful, correct utterance essential to the ceremony's effect.