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Paper short abstract

This paper explores the mythological origins of the cult of Mount Yudono, beginning with two engi from the Genroku era and analyzing the transmission of the cult of the Three Mountains from the Kumano in Kii Peninsula to Dewa in the Tōhoku region from the medieval to the early modern period.

Paper long abstract

This paper examines the two extant oldest origin stories (engi)—Kontai ryōbu Dainichi godenki and Yudonosan Dainichi Nyorai gohonji—dating back to the beginning of the Genroku era (1688–1704) and concerning the genesis of Mount Yudono in present-day Yamagata Prefecture. I concentrate on the first two sections of the texts, which describe Kongō Dōji’s mythical journey on the back of his Golden Lion from the kingdom of Magadha in India to the Tōhoku region. Arriving in front of Gohōzen, the volcanic rock covered with hot spring water embodying the god of Yudono, Kongō Dōji met his sister Kontainyo, who regained her human form after having transformed herself into a butterfly to show both her brother and the lion the way to the Three Mountains of Dewa. These opening scenes do not merely allude to the esoteric interpretation of Gohōzen as the rocky body of the kami of Yudono (Yudono Daigongen), whose original ground (honjibutsu) corresponds to the Two Worlds Dainichi Nyorai (Kontai Ryōbu Dainichi Nyorai), whose halves are embodied by Kongō Dōji as the Diamond World (Kongōkai) and Kontainyo as the Womb World (Taizōkai). The sequence of the approach of the Indian deities with their mythical animals evoked, especially in the Tōhoku devotees of Dewa Sanzan, the lion dance (shishi mai) executed since the thirteenth century by the Kumano guides (Kumano sendatsu) as a ritual performance (kagura) to transfer the cult of the Three Mountains of Kumano (Kumano Sanzan) from the Kii Peninsula to northern Honshū. Furthermore, the subsequent sections of these engi already reflect the hegemonic conflict between Yudono and Mount Haguro for control of Dewa Sanzan, weaving a political dimension into the mythological one. Elaborating on Jacques Derrida’s notion of trace as an entity that continually exceeds the truth it seeks to convey and is therefore inevitably condemned to reveal itself by fading away, I analyze the initial dis-placement and subsequent re-placement of the cult of the Three Mountains from Kumano to Dewa during the medieval period, while also considering the later cult transformations and institutional conflicts of the early modern period.