are vengeful

Japanese ghosts Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

from the aristocratic classes, especially those who have been

martyred A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external ...

Description

The name consists of two

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are still used, along with the subsequ ...

, 御 (go) meaning honorable and 霊 (ryō) meaning soul or spirit. Arising mainly in the

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means "peace" in Japane ...

, the belief was that "the spirits of powerful lords who had been wronged were capable of catastrophic vengeance, including destruction of crops and the summoning of a

typhoon A typhoon is a mature tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere. This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, and is the most active tropical cyclone basin on Earth, accounting for a ...

or an

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fro ...

". According to tradition, the only way to "quell the wrath of a goryō" was with the help of a

yamabushi are Japanese mountain ascetic hermits. They are generally part of the syncretic religion, which includes Tantric Buddhist, Shinto, and Japanese Taoist elements. Their origins can be traced back to the solitary Yama-bito and some (saints o ...

, who could "perform the necessary rites that would tame the spirit". An example of a goryō is the

Shinto kami Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintoist ...

known as Tenjin:

Government official
Sugawara no Michizane was a scholar, poet, and politician of the Heian Period of Japan. He is regarded as an excellent poet, particularly in Kanshi poetry, and is today revered in Shinto as the god of learning, . In the poem anthology ''Hyakunin Isshu'', he is known ...
was killed in a plot by a rival member of the
Fujiwara clan was a powerful family of imperial regents in Japan, descending from the Nakatomi clan and, as legend held, through them their ancestral god Ame-no-Koyane. The Fujiwara prospered since the ancient times and dominated the imperial court until ...
. In the years after his death, the capital city was struck by heavy rain and lightning, and his chief Fujiwara adversary and
Emperor Daigo was the 60th emperor of Japan,Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 醍醐天皇 (60)/ref> according to the traditional order of succession. Daigo's reign spanned the years from 897 through 930. He is named after his place of burial. Gen ...
's crown prince died, while fires caused by lightning and floods destroyed many residences. The court drew the conclusion that the disturbances were caused by Michizane's angry spirit. In order to placate him, the emperor restored all his offices, burned the official order of exile, and he was promoted to Senior Second Rank. Even this wasn't enough, and 70 years later he was elevated to the post of
Daijō-daijin The was the head of the '' Daijō-kan'' (Great Council of State) during and after the Nara period and briefly under the Meiji Constitution. Equivalent to the Chinese ( Grand Preceptor). History Emperor Tenji's favorite son, Prince Ōtomo, ...
, and he was deified as Tenjin-sama, which means "heavenly deity". He became the patron god of calligraphy, of poetry and of those who suffer injustice. A shrine was established at Kitano. With the support of the government, it was immediately raised to the first rank of official shrines.Morris, 54.

Notes

References

* Iwasaka, Michiko and

Toelken, Barre John Barre Toelken (June 15, 1935 – November 9, 2018) was an award-winning American folklorist, noted for his study of Native American material and oral traditions. Early life and education Barre Toelken was born in Enfield, Massachusetts, t ...

. ''Ghosts and the Japanese: Cultural Experiences in Japanese Death Legends'', Utah State University Press, 1994.

External links

The image of the Goryō for Japanese families

Goryo Shinko - The Religion of Ghosts
- An article about the Heian period Goryo religion at hyakumonogatari.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Goryo Japanese ghosts Japanese folk religion Shinto Onmyōdō * Goryō faith

Description

See also

Notes

References

External links