In Shinto myth, the divine pair Izanagi, “He Who Invites,” and Izanami, “She Who Invites,” are entrusted by the heavenly kami with giving shape to the formless world. Standing upon the Floating Bridge of Heaven, they lower the jeweled spear into the primordial sea and stir its briny chaos. When the spear is raised, droplets fall and congeal into the first island, Onogoro, which becomes the sacred stage on which creation unfolds. Descending to this island, they build a palace and erect a central pillar, around which they perform a marriage rite that will bind heaven, earth, and the yet-unborn land of the kami.

The first performance of this rite is flawed: as they circle the pillar in opposite directions and meet, Izanami speaks first. This reversal of proper order results in malformed offspring, including the leech-child Hiruko, who cannot be counted among the true lands of Japan. Seeking guidance, they consult the elder deities and are instructed that Izanagi, as male, must speak first. Repeating the ritual with the corrected form, they unite again and now bring forth the principal islands of Japan—Awaji, Shikoku, Oki, Kyushu, Iki, Tsushima, Sado, and Honshu—followed by many other kami associated with sea, wind, mountains, trees, and the myriad forms of nature. The myth thus presents cosmic order as something that depends upon right relationship and proper ritual speech.

Creation, however, is shadowed by loss. In giving birth to the fire kami Kagutsuchi, Izanami is fatally burned, and from her suffering and death further deities arise. Overcome with grief, Izanagi slays Kagutsuchi, from whose blood more kami are born, and then descends to Yomi, the land of the dead, in a desperate attempt to reclaim his partner. There, in the darkness, Izanami warns him not to look upon her; when he breaks this taboo and beholds her decayed form, horror and shame erupt into pursuit and flight. Izanagi escapes and seals the entrance to Yomi with a great boulder, marking an irrevocable boundary between the realms of the living and the dead and giving mythic shape to the reality of mortality.

Returning from that realm of defilement, Izanagi undergoes ritual purification in flowing water, a misogi that becomes itself a creative act. As garments and impurities are cast off and his body is washed, new kami emerge from the process of cleansing. From his left eye appears Amaterasu, the radiant sun goddess; from his right eye, Tsukuyomi, the moon deity; and from his nose, Susanoo, the storm or sea god. These three, born from purification after contact with death, stand at the center of Shinto cosmology and suggest that from the very act of cleansing and reordering, new light, rhythm, and power enter the world.