Our chief sources of information regarding these ancient Japanese myths are the Shinto works, the Ko-ji-ki and the Nihon-gi.[9] Of these works, the Ko-ji-ki (“Records of Ancient Matters”) is the oldest; it was completed in Japanese in A.D. 712; the Nihon-gi (“Chronicles of Japan”) was completed in A.D. 720 in the Chinese language.
Although the myths, formerly handed down orally by generations of priests, were not collected and systematized until about 200 years after Buddhism was introduced into Japan, they were not greatly influenced by Indian ideas. Dragon-lore, however, became so complex that it is difficult to sift the local from the imported elements.
In the preface to the Ko-ji-ki, Yasumaro, the compiler, in his summary, writes:
“Now when chaos had begun to condense, but force and form were not yet manifest, and there was nought named, nought done, who could know its shape? Nevertheless Heaven and Earth first parted, and the Three Deities performed the commencement of Creation; the Passive and Active Essences then developed, and the Two Spirits became the Ancestors of all things.”
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The myth of the separation of Heaven and Earth dates back to remote antiquity in Egypt. Shu, the atmosphere-god, separated the sky-goddess Nut from the earth-god Seb. In Polynesian mythology Rangi (Heaven), and Papa (Earth), from whom “all things originated”, were “rent apart” by Tane-mahuta, “the god and father of forests, of birds, of insects”. But in this case the earth is the mother and the sky the father.[10]
About the “Three Deities” referred to by Yasumaro, we do not learn much. The idea of the trinity may have been of Indian origin. The Passive and Active Essences recall the male Yang and its female Yin principles of China. These are represented in the Ko-ji-ki by Izanagi (“Male who Invites”) and Izanami (“Female who Invites”).
Dr. Aston translates the opening passage of the Nihon-gi as follows:
“Of old, Heaven and Earth were not yet separated, and the In and the Yo not yet divided. They formed a chaotic mass like an egg, which was of obscurely defined limits, and contained germs. The purer and clearer part was thinly diffused and formed Heaven, while the heavier and grosser element settled down and became Earth. The finer element easily became a united body, but the consolidation of the heavy and gross element was accomplished with difficulty. Heaven was therefore formed first, and Earth established subsequently. Thereafter divine beings were produced between them.”
Here we meet with the cosmic egg, from which emerged the Chinese Pʼan Ku, the Indian Brahma, the Egyptian Ra or Horus, and one of the Polynesian creators. It might be held that China is the source of the Japanese myth, because the In and the Yo are [[349]]here, quite evidently the Yang and the Yin, representing not Izanagi and Izanami as in the Ko-ji-ki, but the deities of heaven and earth. But the Ko-ji-ki form of the myth may be the oldest, and we may have in the Nihon-gi evidence of Chinese ideas having been superimposed on those already obtaining in Japan, into which they were imported from other areas.