Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
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Female

This page groups deities by the gender attributed to them in myth, since most pantheons assign their gods a specific gender the way they assign one to people. Wikipedia notes that "in polytheistic religions, gods often have genders which would enable them to sexually interact with each other, and even with humans." Browsing this way lets a visitor compare, for instance, every goddess in the atlas against every god, regardless of which tradition either comes from.

Facts
Overview
What Defines This Grouping
The kami of Shinto together with the buddhas and bodhisattvas long worshipped alongside them. Kami are not a fixed pantheon: the word covers sacred powers in nature, places, ancestors and exceptional people, held to be innumerable, and the named great kami of the eighth-century chronicles are a small and deliberately organised part of what is venerated at shrines. 2
Attestation
Era of Attestation
The named kami first appear as an ordered corpus in the Kojiki of 712 and the Nihon Shoki of 720, compiled to serve the claims of the imperial court. Shrine worship continues today. 2
Veneration Today
Venerated today at shrines throughout Japan and in the Japanese diaspora. 2
Directory
Category
Deities 1
Origins
Origin of the Name
Kami is the tradition's own word and is not a translation of god. It names a quality of awe-commanding power that may belong to a deity, a place, a natural force, an ancestor or a living person, and it takes no plural. 2
Learn More
The kami of Japan

This group holds the deities of Shinto, the indigenous tradition of Japan, together with figures shared with Japanese Buddhism. The Shinto divine is the kami (sacred powers present in nature, ancestors, places and exceptional beings), understood as innumerable rather than as a fixed pantheon.

The browser will find the great kami of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki: the sun-goddess Amaterasu, from whom the imperial line is traced; her brother the storm-god Susanoo; the moon-god Tsukuyomi; the creator pair Izanagi and Izanami; and popular figures such as Inari and the Seven Lucky Gods. The entries note the long entanglement of Shinto and Buddhist worship in Japanese history.

Female
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Sources
1. Divinity Atlas Directory Taxonomy, First Edition Category Tree
2. Shinto: A History
Helen Hardacre, Oxford University Press, 2017ch. 1View the Source
Divinity Atlas Directory Prose, First Edition Category Descriptions
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