The Concept of Musubi: An Approach from Cognitive Anthropology

Abstract

The question of the concept of musubi 結 in the philosophy of modern Shinto is posed as an alternative or complementary position to the theology of Amaterasu, the imperial deity. This theology has been systematically supported and disseminated by pro-imperial factions since the Meiji Restoration (1868), it has been made official in the propaganda apparatus of Imperial Japan until World War II, and in the postwar period it continues to count on important supports in the academic and extra-academic world to this day. The very tradition of texts associated with classical mythology already reveals a struggle between the musubi deities and the imperial deity for hegemonically representing the symbolic peak of divine power. Both traditions point to fundamental conceptions in the history of Shinto philosophy and theology. While the deities of the musubi have represented the generational model, a conception of great importance in the construction of a Shinto as a religion centered on the present, the imperial deity Amaterasu represents the importance of the imperial figure within the myth of the descent from the celestial plane to the terrestrial, a myth with claims to enter history, and clearly theocratic. In this way, the problem of how to harmonize these two great sources of divine power is generated historically, a problem that is solved in some passages of classical mythology itself by representing the cooperation of the force of both deities that we find in certain places. However, the intellectual struggle of two different conceptions of the origin of power in the history of Shinto philosophy remains latent, a struggle that reaches contemporary times.