Susanoo

Susanoo and the water dragon.

Susanoo (須佐之男, Susanowo^?), in Shinto, is the god of the sea, storms and battles. He is the brother of Amaterasu, the goddess of the Sun, and Tsukuyomi, the god of the Moon. This god is sometimes described as brutal and sometimes as considerate. The Kojiki and the Nihonshoki have written their legendary suppression of a serpent monster called Yamata-no-Orochi, in the country of Izumo. Both books describe him as an ancestor of the imperial lineage. In contrast, some folklore regards him as a native god or head of an Izumo people.

History

Mythology tells that this is one of the three Japanese gods, who was born from the nose of his father, Izanagi, when he took a bath to purify himself after going to the land of the dead, called Yomi, where he tried to rescue his beloved Izanami. From a very young age he showed a cold and aggressive attitude, but with great potential. His father, when dividing up his kingdom, granted him the sea, the land and the lightning, but he wanted more.

Knowing that his father's anger could turn into great danger, he waited for Izanagi to enter his divine sleep. After this, he had a battle with his sister Amaterasu, which resulted in dire consequences, causing the council of eight hundred gods to expel him from heaven directly to the Izumo region.

The battle with Amaterasu

When Susanoo wanted to face his sister Amaterasu, to avoid unnecessary injuries, he decided to do a creative power contest with her: it consisted of creating the more minor divinities the better. In the first round, Amaterasu took her brother's sword, and after breaking it into three fragments and chewing it, three beautiful goddesses appeared. Susanoo, in order to overcome her, took her sister's fertility beads and, with them, created five very aggressive gods. Susanoo was declared the winner, although her sister, since the beads Susanoo had created her lesser gods with belonged to her, said that she was the winner. Susanoo refused to accept it and destroyed the sacred spinning mill, home of Amaterasu, and in addition to that she dismembered and distributed the body of the "celestial" horse through the spinning mill. Amaterasu was so scared when she saw the dead sacred animal that she fled to the Yamato Iwato cave, where she locked herself in, causing eternal darkness.

Susanoo was quickly put on trial by the council of eight hundred gods, blamed for murdering the “heavenly” horse, frightening his sister (thus causing eternal darkness), and taking the life of one of the maidens. of Amaterasu (goddess helpers in the sacred spinning), who died from splinters from the loom when it broke from the impact with the heavenly horse.

Battle with the Yamata-no-Orochi

After being judged, the god was banished and sent to the Izumo region where he met a man whose seven daughters had been killed by the "Yamata-no-Orochi", a hideous eight-legged snake. heads and eight tails; and only the eighth daughter, Kushinada-hime, had survived. The man told the god that the beast would come soon to take the last daughter; Susanoo decided to help the man and came up with a plan. Soon, the god transformed the daughter into a comb which he placed in her hair. On the day the beast attacked, the god had already built eight colossal gates, and behind them he had placed vast quantities of an alcoholic beverage (sake); the snake fell into the trap and drank the neutralizing drink; already fallen on the ground, Susanoo, took his totsuka sword and cut each of the tails and heads of the snake, in the fourth tail he found a sword of beautiful appearance, Kusanagi. Taking possession of her as a present for his sister, the god managed to return to the divine mansions.