Page:Shinto, the Way of the Gods - Aston - 1905.djvu/97

Rh The Nihongi tells us that—

"Izanagi and Izanami stood on the floating bridge of Heaven, and held counsel together, saying 'Is there not a country beneath?' Thereupon they thrust down the Jewel-Spear of Heaven' (Ame no tama-boko) and groping about with it, found the ocean. The brine which dripped from the point of the spear coagulated and formed an island which received the name of Onogoro-jima or the 'Self-Coagulating Island.' The two deities thereupon descended and dwelt there. Accordingly they wished to be united as husband and wife, and to produce countries. So they made Onogoro-jima the pillar of the centre of the land."

The Kojiki says that Izanagi and Izanami were commanded by all the heavenly deities "to regulate and fully consolidate" the floating land beneath. But all the accounts, the Kojiki included, proceed to represent the islands of Japan as having been generated by them in the ordinary manner. We have therefore three distinct conceptions of creation in Japanese myth—first as generation in the most literal sense, second, as reducing to order, and third, as growth (Musubi).

The "floating bridge of Heaven" is no doubt the rainbow. It is represented on earth by the Sori-bashi or Taiko-bashi (drum-bridge) a semi-circular bridge over a pond before some Shinto shrines. It has too steep a slope for ordinary use, and is reserved for the Deity and for the priest on solemn occasions, the custom having been in this instance probably suggested by the myth.

The Ame no tama-boko or Jewel-Spear of Heaven has been the subject of much dissertation. Hirata, whose view is endorsed by several eminent scholars, native and foreign, thinks that it is a phallus. Its use in creating, which in Japanese myth is the same thing as begetting, the first