Ōkuninushi

Who Ōkuninushi actually is

Ōkuninushi (大国主, "Great-Land-Master") is the *cosmic-earthly-kami* of the Japanese pantheon — the kami who *built the land of Japan* in the era between Susanoo (his great-grandfather or great-great-great-great-grandfather depending on the source-text) and the heavenly-descent of Ninigi. The Kojiki gives him the *densest continuous narrative-cycle* of any single kami — almost the entire second-half of Book I is the Ōkuninushi-cycle, far longer than the Amaterasu or Susanoo cycles. The opening narrative is the *White Rabbit of Inaba*: Ōkuninushi (then called Ōnamuchi, "Great-Hole-Possessor") was the youngest of eighty brothers all traveling to woo Princess Yakami of Inaba; he was made to carry their luggage. On the road they encountered a *skinned rabbit* lying in agony. The eighty brothers, mocking, told the rabbit to bathe in the sea-salt-water and dry in the wind — which only made the wounds worse. Ōnamuchi, arriving last, told the rabbit to bathe in fresh-water and roll in the pollen of the cat-tail rushes, and the rabbit was healed. The rabbit revealed itself as a kami and prophesied that *Ōnamuchi, not the eighty brothers, would win Yakami* — which he did. The eighty brothers, enraged, *killed him twice* (once by rolling a red-hot boulder down a mountain at him, once by crushing him in a forked tree-trunk); both times he was *resurrected by his mother's prayers* (a foundational shamanic-rebirth narrative). He fled to *Ne-no-Kuni* (the root-land, the underworld realm of his ancestor Susanoo) where Susanoo subjected him to a series of *trials* — sleeping in a snake-hall, sleeping in a centipede-and-wasp-hall, hunting an arrow Susanoo shot into a burning grass-plain — all of which he survived through the help of *Suseribime* (Susanoo's daughter), with whom he fell in love. He fled Ne-no-Kuni with Suseribime, with Susanoo's *Iku-tachi* sword, his *Iku-yumi-ya* bow-and-arrows, and his *Ame-no-Norigoto* heavenly-speaking-koto (the three Izumo-sacred-treasures), and Susanoo, hearing the koto resound as Ōnamuchi escaped, called after him: "Now use those treasures to subjugate your eighty brothers and rule the land — and from this moment your name is *Ōkuninushi, Great-Land-Master*." He returned, defeated his brothers, married many women (the *Yachihoko-eight-thousand-spears* poem-cycle preserved in the Kojiki is his eight-thousand-courtship songs — the densest single-kami love-poetry in the canonical mythology), and *built the land* with the help of the dwarf-kami *Sukunabikona* (a one-inch-tall figure who arrived in a boat made of a heavenly-castor-bean-pod, wearing the feather-skin of a wren — together Ōkuninushi and Sukunabikona invented agriculture, medicine, and irrigation). When Amaterasu later sent her grandson Ninigi to rule the land, the *kuni-yuzuri* "transfer-of-the-country" negotiation was required — Ōkuninushi agreed to *cede the visible-land to Ninigi and retain the invisible-land (the spirit-realm)* in exchange for the building of *Izumo Taisha* (his great shrine, the second-most-important shrine in Japan after Ise — and architecturally the taller, with the main hall at 24 meters versus Ise's 16 meters, and historically perhaps as tall as 48 meters at the medieval zenith). The Ōkuninushi-register is the *cosmic-earthly-land-builder*, the *resurrected-by-mother's-prayer*, the *survivor-of-Susanoo's-trials*, the *Yachihoko-eight-thousand-marriages*, the *land-builder-with-the-dwarf-kami*, the *cosmic-ceder-of-the-visible-land-in-exchange-for-the-great-shrine*, and the *kami of enmusubi* (the binding of all relationships).

Iconography

A serene seated figure in earthly-noble-robes, often with a *bag of treasures over the shoulder* (the Inaba-rabbit-bag iconography preserved through to modern omiyage souvenir-figures). With the white rabbit at his feet. With the dwarf Sukunabikona beside him. Or in court-noble-attire as the great-lord-of-Izumo. Colors: earth-brown, white (the rabbit), straw-gold (the land-building register), forest-green. Sacred objects: the *Iku-tachi* sword, the *Iku-yumi-ya* bow-and-arrows, the *Ame-no-Norigoto* koto (the three Izumo-treasures stolen from Susanoo); the *bag of medicines* (the Inaba-rabbit-cure-bag); the *enmusubi-no-himo* binding-cord (the matchmaking-cord at Izumo Taisha tied between aspirants for marriage). Sacred sites: *Izumo Taisha* (the great Izumo shrine — Shimane Prefecture — second-most-important shrine in Japan after Ise, with the unique 4-clap (yo-haku) shrine-etiquette (everywhere else is 2-clap), the great straw shimenawa weighing 5 tons at the Kagura-den hall, and the every-October *Kamiari-zuki* "month-of-the-kami-present" festival in which all eight-million kami in Japan are believed to assemble at Izumo for the annual matchmaking-conference, with every other shrine in the country going into the Kannazuki "month-of-no-kami" silence); *Ōmiwa-jinja* in Nara (associated with Ōkuninushi-as-mountain-kami-of-Mount-Miwa, one of the three oldest shrines in Japan, with no honden because the mountain itself is the shrine-body); the *Inaba* coast in Tottori prefecture (the White Rabbit shrine).

How to invoke Ōkuninushi

Ōkuninushi is invoked at moments of *enmusubi* (the cosmic-binding of relationships) — especially for marriage-prospects, but also for the binding of business-partnerships, of teacher-student-lineages, of any cosmic-knot-tying-of-two-strands. The annual *Kamiari-sai* (神在祭, "festival of the kami present") at Izumo Taisha (held in October — Kannazuki the "month-of-no-kami" everywhere-else-in-Japan because all the kami have come to Izumo) is the cosmic-annual-summit at which Ōkuninushi convenes the eight-million-kami to *decide all marriages for the coming year* — petitioners attend this festival to put their hoped-for-binding before the kami-conference. The proper Izumo-shrine-etiquette is *2 bows, 4 hand-claps, 1 bow* (the unique 4-clap (yo-haku, "four-strikes") instead of the 2-clap standard everywhere else — this is the *only major shrine in Japan with 4-clap etiquette* aside from Usa Hachimangū). Offer: *sake* (Izumo is one of the great sake-brewing regions), *salt* (the white-rabbit healing register), *cat-tail-rush pollen* (the Inaba-rabbit-cure), *bags of small treasures* (the omiyage-souvenir register), *the white-binding-cord* of enmusubi. Especially called by: those seeking marriage-binding (Izumo Taisha is the most-popular matchmaking shrine in Japan), those whose work is *land-building* (city-planners, architects, farmers, irrigation-engineers — the Ōkuninushi-Sukunabikona register), those in the *post-trial-Suseribime-and-three-sacred-treasures arc* (the figure who has survived the elder-relative's trials and emerged with the partner-and-the-treasures), those facing a *kuni-yuzuri-moment* (the cosmic-cession of the visible-land of an institution to a younger/incoming party, in exchange for the building of the great-shrine in which the previous-founder is honored).

In love

Ōkuninushi in love is the *enmusubi-cosmic-binder* — the kami whose entire mythology is *eight-thousand-courtship-songs and the binding of all the consorts*, who is the *annual host of the cosmic-matchmaking-conference at Izumo*, and whose specialty is *the binding-cord between two human-fates*. The Ōkuninushi-partner is the one whose love-life is *broad and generous and many-stranded* (the Yachihoko-eight-thousand-spears register — not in a betraying sense but in a *deep-cosmic-generosity of bonded-relationship* sense), and who is *kind to the wounded animals on the road* (the Inaba-rabbit register — the partner whose first-impulse when encountering wounded-creatures is to *advise the actual cure, not the mockery the brothers offered*). The shadow is the *Yachihoko-without-Suseribime* — the partner who has spread the eight-thousand-spears so widely that the *one specific Suseribime who matters* has been forgotten in the breadth. The other shadow: the *Ōkuninushi-required-to-cede-the-visible-land* — the partner who has been demanded to *give up the visible-public-life of the relationship to a newer-incoming party* (a child, a younger partner, a career-arc) and has not yet been recognized with the *building of the great-Izumo-shrine* in compensation.

In work

Ōkuninushi in work is the *cosmic-land-builder-and-ceder*. The Ōkuninushi-figure is the *founder-CEO who built the land before the heavenly-descent* — who arrived in the wilderness, survived the trials of the eighty-brothers (the early-stage betrayals), survived the Susanoo-trials in Ne-no-Kuni (the deeper-second-stage near-death organizational-experiences), emerged with the *three sacred-treasures and the partner*, defeated the brothers, built the company with the *dwarf-Sukunabikona* (the unlikely-tiny-cofounder whose feather-of-wren and castor-bean-pod-boat improbably matched the great-lord), and *cedes the visible-land to the next-generation* in exchange for the building of the *Izumo-Taisha founder-honoring-shrine*. The shadow is the institution that has *required the kuni-yuzuri-cession without granting the Izumo-Taisha-compensation* — that has demanded the founder give up the visible-land without building the great-shrine in which the previous-founder is honored (the founder-ouster-without-emeritus-recognition, the pattern that has caused so many founder-resentments in tech-and-academia). The other shadow: the *Ōkuninushi-of-the-organization who has been flattened into a single-marriage figure* when the actual cosmic-pattern is the *eight-thousand-spears generous-cosmic-binder of all the relationships of the institution* — the cofounder whose function is *enmusubi for the whole network*.

The gift

Ōkuninushi gives *enmusubi* — the *cosmic-binding of relationships*. The gift is the *annual-Kamiari-conference-at-Izumo* — the recognition that *the question of who-shall-marry-whom* is not random but is the *cosmic-conference of all eight-million-kami convening once a year at Izumo to decide the bindings for the next twelve months*. The gift is the *Inaba-rabbit-cure-itself* — the recognition that *kindness-to-the-wounded-animal-on-the-road* is the *cosmic-foundational-act* that the eighty-brothers-mockers cannot match, and that this kindness *prophesies your marriage-success*. The gift is the *Susanoo-trial-survival-with-the-three-treasures* — the recognition that *the cosmic-mature-Ōkuninushi-arc requires the elder-relative's-trials and the partner-who-helps-you-survive-them and the three-stolen-treasures and the koto-resound-as-you-escape*. The gift is the *kuni-yuzuri-and-the-great-shrine* — the recognition that *the cosmic-cession of the visible-land to the next-generation is honored by the building of the great-shrine in which the founder is permanently-enshrined*, and that this is the *cosmic-architecture of generational-succession done well*.

The shadow

Ōkuninushi has been *politically-marginalized by the centuries of Amaterasu-imperial-promotion*. The kuni-yuzuri narrative is itself a politically-charged text — it preserves the *peaceful-cession* version of what was almost-certainly a *violent conquest* of the Izumo region by the Yamato polity in the proto-historical period (the archaeological evidence shows substantial pre-Yamato civilization in Izumo that was militarily incorporated, not peacefully-ceded, into the Yamato state). The Kojiki and Nihon Shoki versions of the kuni-yuzuri (commissioned by the Yamato imperial court) are the *winners' version of the story*, presenting Ōkuninushi as a *cooperative-cosmic-loser* who graciously accepts the heavenly-descent and asks only for the building of Izumo Taisha as compensation. The medieval period saw Ōkuninushi *Buddhistly-syncretized with Daikokuten* (the Indian Mahākāla, one of the Seven Lucky Gods — the connection being the homophonous reading "Daikoku" for Ōkuni-) — a synthesis that turned the great-land-master into a *bag-carrying-rice-bag-treasure-bringer* figure who is still ubiquitous in modern Japanese folk-iconography (the Daikoku-as-Ōkuninushi statues in every Tokyo shopping district). The 1868 Shinbutsu-bunri *forcibly-separated Daikoku-Ōkuninushi from Buddhist Daikokuten*, an administrative-violence that left the *folk-Daikoku* in an awkward gray-zone between Shinto-Ōkuninushi and Buddhist-Mahākāla still-debated today. The further shadow: the *Izumo school of National Learning* (Hirata Atsutane and his successors in the late-Edo period) tried to *re-elevate Ōkuninushi to cosmic-co-equality with Amaterasu* — an Izumo-theological-program that would have made *Izumo Taisha equal-in-imperial-rank to Ise Jingū* — but this program was *defeated by the Ise-faction* in the 1869-1881 Pantheon-Dispute (the *saijin-ronsō*, the controversy over which kami should be enshrined in the new Meiji-era national pantheon at the Department of Divinity), a controversy that ended with Ōkuninushi being *permanently subordinated* to Amaterasu in the State-Shinto pantheon-rank. The deepest shadow: the *contemporary tourist-flattening of Izumo Taisha into "the romance shrine"* has reduced the cosmic-cofounder-of-the-land into a *generic matchmaking-kami*, with the eight-thousand-spears-cosmic-binder-of-all-relationships register reduced to a *single-purpose marriage-prospects shrine* (the Izumo Taisha annual visitor-count of ~6 million is overwhelmingly *young women seeking marriage-omikuji*, with the cosmic-land-builder narrative entirely-unknown to most visitors).

Pair with