The Tō-yū-ki, a work published in 1795, has the following:--
"In many places along the highway at Atsumi, in the province of Deha, where the cliffs stand up steeply on both sides, shime-naha are stretched across from one cliff to another. Below these shime-naha there are placed skilfully carved wooden phalli fronting the road. They are very large, being seven or eight feet in length and perhaps three or four feet in circumference. I thought this too shocking, and questioned the inhabitants why they did so. Their answer was that it was a very ancient custom. They were called Sai no kami,[164] and were made afresh every year on the 15th day of the 1st month. As they were local Gods, they were by no means neglectful of them, allowing them to remain even when high officials passed that way. They were not at all, I was told, put up for the amusement of the young folks. Moreover, seeing a number of slips of paper attached to the shime-naha, I inquired what they might be. It appeared that they were fastened there secretly by the women of the place as a prayer for handsome lovers. Truly this is one of those old customs which linger in remote parts. Phalli and ktenes of stone are worshipped by the country-folks in many places as the shintai of their ujigami."
The selection of a rocky pass for the erection of these objects, and the association with them of shime-naha,[165] show that their original function, namely, to prevent the passage of evil beings or influences, was not forgotten. The prayers of the women betray a misconception of the proper object of this cult.
Near the end of the Kogojiui there is a passage which makes mention of the phallus as a magical appliance. As it has some anthropological interest, I quote it at length:
"Of yore, in the age of the Gods, Oho-toko-nushi no Kami (great-earth-master-deity), on a day that he was cultivating a rice-field, gave his labourers the flesh of oxen to eat. At this time the child of Mi-toshi no Kami (august-harvest-god) went to that rice-field and spat upon the food, after which he returned and reported the matter to his father. Mi-toshi no Kami was wroth and let loose locusts on that field, so that the leaves of the young rice suddenly withered away and it became like dwarf bamboos. Upon this Oho-toko-nushi no Kami caused the diviners to ascertain by their art the reason of this. They replied that it was owing to a curse sent by Mi-toshi no Kami, and advised him to offer a white pig, a white horse, and a white cock in order to dispel his anger. When amends had been made to Mi-toshi no Kami in the manner directed, the latter replied, saying: 'Truly it was my doing. Take bare stalks of hemp, and make of them a reel with which to reel it, take the leaves and sweep it therewith, take "push-grass"[166] of Heaven and push it therewith. Take, moreover, crow-fan[167] and fan it, and if then the locusts do not depart, take ox-flesh and place it in the runnels, adding to it shapes of the male stem (phalli). Moreover, strew the banks of earth between the fields with water-lily seeds, ginger, walnut leaves and salt.' When these instructions were carried out the leaves of the young rice became thick again, and the harvest was a plentiful one. This is the reason why at the present day the Department of Religion worships Mi-toshi no Kami with offerings of a white pig, a white horse, and a white cock."
The facts quoted in the preceding pages show that there was some confusion between the use of the male and female emblems as non-religious magical appliances and their cult as deities. Primarily they were symbols, next objects of magic. Finally Religion intervened, and by her handmaids Personification and Myth raised them to the rank of deities, consecrating this step still further by devoting a formal ritual to their service. The kteis has received somewhat less attention than the phallus. It is no doubt identical with the Yachimata hime of the Michiahe norito, and in the Kojiki, its representative the peach is dubbed kami. But the Nihongi in the parallel passage merely speaks of its efficacy in repelling evil spirits, and refrains from deifying or even personifying it.
The circumstance that the Sahe no Kami were worshipped by the roadsides and at crossways[168] led to their being looked upon as guide-Gods and the special friends of travellers. Saruta-hiko, a phallic deity, represented as dwelling at the eight crossways of Heaven, is said to have acted as guide to Ninigi on his descent to earth. He is popularly called Dōsōjin, or Road-ancestor-deity, and is depicted as of gigantic stature, with a portentously long nose, which (the suggestion is not mine) may perhaps have a phallic morphological signification.
The worship of these deities was extremely popular in ancient Japan. They were much appealed to in divination,[169] and were prayed to by most travellers when starting on a journey. The phrase chi buri no Kami (Gods along the road) means the Sahe no Kami. The Sahe no Kami were the mitama par excellence. They were also called tamuke no Kami (Gods of offerings) because travellers were in the habit of carrying a nusa-bukuro (offering-bag) containing hemp leaves and rice, of which a little was offered to each of them when passing. All unforeseen disasters or illnesses on a journey were attributed to a neglect of the worship of these deities.
But a very little advance in enlightenment shows that the sexual instincts need restraint[170] rather than the stimulus which they must derive from such a cult. So early as a.d. 939 a deity of this kind which stood in a conspicuous position in Kiōto, and was worshipped by all travellers, was removed to a less prominent situation. Phallicism ultimately disappeared from official Shinto. But it lingered long in popular customs, and is not quite extinct even at the present day, especially in eastern Japan. I have myself witnessed a procession in which a phallus, several feet high and painted a bright red, was carried on a bier by a crowd of coolies in festal uniform, shouting, laughing, and zig-zagging tumultuously from one side of the street to another. In the lupanars they are honoured by having a lamp of simple construction kept burning before them, and are prayed to by the proprietor for numerous clients. The boys' festival of dondo, on the 15th of the 1st month, still retains traces of its phallic origin.[171]
Oni.--Oni, or demons, have no individual names. It is clear from the Kojiki and Nihongi mythical narratives that the oni exorcised by means of the peach[172] are the same as the "thunders" and the "armies of Yomi." In other words, they are primarily personified diseases.[173] They afterwards lost this specific character. Motoöri defines oni as ashiki kami, or "evil deity." He condemns their identification by the Wamiôshô with the spirits of the dead. There is a story of a tenth-century hero who cut off the arm of an oni and brought it home with him, but was tricked out of it by the owner, who came to his house in the disguise of an old woman.