Onmyoji and the Deconstruction of Shikigami
# The Kurando-no-Tō Spirit-Judging Scroll
## Chapter 2, Part 3: The Shikigami Compilation - A Genealogy of Negation -- The Era of Birth and the Unsharpened Blade
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Kurando-no-Tō, you have meticulously traced the history and theoretical gaps of the acts of curses and purification. What remains is the shikigami—that power said to have been commanded by Lord Seimei."
Kurando-no-Tō: "This is, in truth, the most fragile pillar of the three. Let us lay out their dates of establishment once more."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Curses were incorporated into the legal system of the early 8th century, specifically the 'Code of Thieves and Robbers' of the Ritsuryo system."
Kurando-no-Tō: "Indeed. Enmi (sorcery) and curses were codified as actual criminal categories from the start. They were born not as stories, but as institutions."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Purification, you say, has its origins in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki myths—the misogi-harae of Izanagi, established in the 8th century."
Kurando-no-Tō: "This is even older. Moreover, it is rooted in the layer of myth, where questioning historical accuracy is fundamentally beside the point."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Then what of the shikigami?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "The 'Konjaku Monogatarishu,' from the early 12th century, is the first appearance. It has been over a hundred years since Lord Seimei's death. In contemporary primary sources—the 'Mido Kanpakuki' and 'Shoyuki'—there is absolutely no mention of commanding shikigami."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Curses are 8th-century institutions, purification is 8th-century myth, and shikigami are 12th-century tales—when laid out like this..."
Kurando-no-Tō: "It stands out that the shikigami is remarkably new, and as a later creation, its origins are easily identifiable through literature. Curses, as acts, cannot be denied because they were institutional, with only the mechanism being later. Purification, being myth, makes the validity of questioning its birth date shaky from the start. Only the shikigami has a clear moment of birth."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "I heard that even after that birth, the stories continued to expand."
Kurando-no-Tō: "The 'Uji Shui Monogatari' in the early 13th century marks about two hundred years. The 'Hokisho' in the Muromachi period marks about four hundred. The 'Abe no Seimei Monogatari' in the early Edo period marks about six hundred. And the completed form of the Kuzunoha legend, 'Ashiya Doman Ouchi Kagami,' in the 19th year of Kyoho, is a full 730 years after his death."
Library Bureau Scribe: "As time passes, it becomes more detailed."
Kurando-no-Tō: "This is a well-known pattern in philology as the theory of narrative accumulation. Exaggeration and attribution progress during the oral tradition stage, and the later the era, the greater the mystery. Shikigami can be called a cultural sediment, formed by the memory of Lord Seimei, a real technical bureaucrat, with layers of later narrative desire attached to it."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Then, could such a method of negation—the act of exposing the later nature of stories—have been possible for the people of that time?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "Let us advance time for a moment. I would like to introduce you to a figure from a later age."
Library Bureau Scribe: "A figure from a later age, you say?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "Yamagata Banto, an Edo-period merchant scholar. Standing on the rationalism of Confucianism, in his book 'Yume no Shiro,' he deconstructed the history of the age of the gods itself as fiction by strictly distinguishing between myth and history."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Did he deny the gods outright?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "In the 'Mukiron' (On the Non-existence of Ghosts) chapter, explicitly. He argued that sages were also human, and when they die, they lose their vitality and heart. Without thought, how could there be miracles? In his death poem, he wrote, 'In this world, there are no gods, Buddhas, or monsters.'"
Library Bureau Scribe: "Is this not the same logic we just discussed in our study of ghosts?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "Indeed. If the substrate that generates the self is lost, the miracle is also lost—Japanese people two hundred years ago had already reached this logic."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Then, were there no people like Banto in the Heian world?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "This is a blank space that I also find regrettable. As far as I can investigate, I have not found any."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Why is that?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "The theoretical tools to support skepticism were not at the center of knowledge at that time. Banto's theory of non-existence relied on a study that already had a theoretical foothold for denying the soul, namely Xunzi-style rationalism. The center of Heian learning was the study of history and Buddhism. While the practitioners of history were officials whose duties differed from Onmyodo, they did not systematically possess the motivation or tools to overturn its theoretical premises."
Library Bureau Scribe: "But you mentioned before that the tools themselves existed."
Kurando-no-Tō: "'Inmyo,' the logic of fallacies taught by the Hosso sect. Wang Chong's 'Lunheng,' a book of skepticism based on experience. Both should have already been transmitted to Japan at that time."
Library Bureau Scribe: "The tools were there, but no one picked them up."
Kurando-no-Tō: "This is the most profound form of internal criticism. It is not about throwing stones from the outside. The era itself, while possessing the ability to verify itself, did not exercise it—this void speaks eloquently."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Then, Kurando-no-Tō, how should we evaluate those who call themselves Onmyoji now, based on this void?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "Curses are institutions, purification is myth, shikigami are tales—while their origins differ, they share only one thing. They are all products of a unique history, having origins in real technical bureaucrats, actually punished criminals, or mythological sources."
Library Bureau Scribe: "And the current claimants lack that history."
Kurando-no-Tō: "What they are borrowing is only the name. They have taken on the image of Lord Seimei—an image that has continued to expand through stories for one hundred, two hundred, seven hundred years—in its entirety without questioning its origin. If they truly wish to be descendants of the priest-Onmyoji, they must demonstrate the technique of operating the divinity of a proper name through established procedures. If they wish to be of the lineage of Esoteric Buddhism, they must prove their unification with Mahavairocana according to the stages imposed by the doctrine. If they wish to be of the lineage of Shugendo, they must undergo the verifiable processes of mountain entry and trials of power."
Library Bureau Scribe: "Whichever path they choose, they cannot escape the required substantiation."
Kurando-no-Tō: "And without any of that substantiation being shown, only the name is circulating. This is the place we have reached through these two chapters."
---
Library Bureau Scribe: "Finally, I would like to ask one thing. Inmyo, Wang Chong, and Banto were all sharpeners of the blade of negation. However, that blade is still not being sharpened today. Why is that?"
Kurando-no-Tō: "I think this is not a lack of knowledge, but a structure of demand. Techniques faithful to ancient methods end in tedious calculation and lack the charm of a story. What people seek is not an accurate technician, but a storyteller. It may be that in every age, those who are feared and chosen are not the ones who sharpen the blade, but the ones who spin the story."
Library Bureau Scribe: "And for that reason, the blade has remained unsharpened for a thousand years."
Kurando-no-Tō: "However, sharpening it is something that can be done in any age. Just as we did tonight."
---
## Commentary
As a summary of Chapter 2, this section juxtaposes the philological establishment dates of curses (8th century, the Ritsuryo system), purification (8th century, the Kojiki/Nihon Shoki myths), and shikigami (12th century, the 'Konjaku Monogatarishu'), showing that shikigami is the newest and most easily identifiable later creation. The story of the shikigami has been accumulated in stages through the 'Uji Shui Monogatari' (13th century), 'Hokisho' (Muromachi), 'Abe no Seimei Monogatari' (early Edo), and 'Ashiya Doman Ouchi Kagami' (1734, 730 years after his death), forming a typical example of the theory of narrative accumulation.
In the latter half, the 'Mukiron' (On the Non-existence of Ghosts) from 'Yume no Shiro' by the Edo-period merchant scholar Yamagata Banto (1748-1821) is presented as an example of the denial of ghosts through Confucian rationalism. It points out the void that, although theoretical tools such as Inmyo (the logic of fallacies of the Hosso sect, the thirty-three errors) and Wang Chong's 'Lunheng' (empirical skepticism) existed in the Heian period, there is no record of them being connected to the criticism of Onmyodo or curses. This void, where 'the tools existed but were not used,' is positioned not as external criticism, but as a self-verification ability that the era itself possessed but did not exercise.
In the conclusion, it summarizes that regardless of which lineage they claim, modern 'Onmyoji' do not demonstrate any of the verifiable substantiations required by each tradition (techniques for operating the divinity of a proper name, the staged training of Esoteric Buddhism, or the mountain entry and trials of power of Shugendo). The chapter closes by seeking one of the causes of this void in the structural factor where the strict maintenance of technology is inversely proportional to market demand (the point shown in Chapter 2, Part 1).