Inari

Who Inari actually is

Inari (稲荷, "rice-bearer" — the literal etymology is *ina* "rice-plant" + *ri* a reading of the kanji 荷 "to carry/bear") is the *cosmic-rice-and-prosperity-kami* of the Japanese pantheon — and the *most-numerous single kami in the entire archipelago*, with approximately 32,000 of Japan's ~80,000 Shinto shrines being Inari-shrines (and tens of thousands of additional household and corporate Inari-altars). The founding-narrative is the *Yamashiro Fudoki* account of 711 CE: *Hata-no-Iroku*, a wealthy man of the Hata immigrant-clan, used a rice-cake (*mochi*) as an archery-target; the rice-cake transformed into a white-bird and flew to the summit of Mount Inariyama (in the southern suburbs of present-day Kyoto), where rice spontaneously grew where it landed; Hata-no-Iroku, recognizing this as a kami-omen, founded the shrine at the summit (the founding-date 711 CE is the second day of the second month — *hatsu-uma* "the first horse-day" — which has been the major annual Inari festival ever since). The shrine became the *Fushimi Inari Taisha*, the head shrine of all subsequent Inari shrines worldwide. Inari has *three or five primary kami-aspects* (the number varies by source) collectively-known as *Inari Ōkami*: *Ukanomitama-no-Kami* (the spirit-of-the-rice-granary, the primary aspect), *Sa-Daihikō-no-Kami* (the great-rice-kami of the left), *Ō-Miyanome-no-Kami* (the great-shrine-woman-of-the-shrine), *Tanaka-Ō-Kami* (the rice-paddy-kami), and *Shi-no-Ōkami* (the four-great-kami). The *kitsune* (foxes) are *not Inari themselves* but are the *messengers and servants of Inari* (the medieval folk-tradition elaborated this with detailed kitsune-hierarchies of white-foxes-and-fields-foxes-and-air-foxes, the celestial kitsune like Tamamo-no-Mae the legendary nine-tailed fox of Heian-court intrigue, the Buddhist Dakini-ten chariot-foxes, and the household-protective folk-kitsune of Edo-period popular religion). The medieval Buddhist *Dakini-ten* (荼枳尼天, the Buddhist deity ultimately derived from the Indian *ḍākinī* of esoteric Vajrayana lineages, mediated through Chinese-Buddhist intermediate tradition) was identified with Inari in the Shingon and Tendai schools — the fox-vehicle is the Buddhist contribution to the iconography, and the medieval Inari-Dakini-ten syncretism produced an elaborate *honji-suijaku* theology in which the Indian Buddhist deity was understood as the *original-essence (honji)* and Inari was the *Japanese-trace (suijaku)* of the same cosmic-figure. The 1868 Shinbutsu-bunri *forcibly-separated Inari from Dakini-ten*, an administrative-violence that produced the contemporary somewhat-anomalous situation in which the Buddhist Dakini-ten cult continues at temples (notably Toyokawa Inari in Aichi, which is technically a Sōtō-Zen Buddhist temple, not a Shinto shrine, despite being commonly-called an "Inari" — most Japanese visitors do not know this distinction), while the Shinto Inari cult continues at shrines (Fushimi, Kasama, Yutoku, the three great Inari shrines of contemporary Japan). The Inari-register is the *cosmic-rice-and-prosperity*, the *fox-messenger and fox-themselves-as-the-tricksters-not-the-kami*, the *patron of business and sake-brewing and household-prosperity*, the *most-numerous-single-kami of Japan*, and the *gender-ambiguous-cosmic-figure*.

Iconography

The *vermillion torii* (the bright cinnabar-red gate-arch) is the most-iconic Inari iconographic-element — Fushimi Inari Taisha has more than 10,000 such torii ascending Mount Inariyama in continuous tunnels donated by businesses (the back of each torii is inscribed with the donor business-name, the date of donation, and the prayer for prosperity). The *kitsune-statue* (the fox-statue) flanks every Inari shrine in pairs — typically one holding a *jewel* (the wish-fulfilling mani-jewel of cosmic-prosperity), one holding a *key* (the key to the rice-granary), one holding a *scroll* (the sutra or shrine-document), or one holding a *sheaf of rice* (the foundational-substance). The fox-statues are always *white-stone or bronze* (the *byakko* white-fox being the most-sacred). The *inari-zushi* (rice stuffed in fried tofu-pouches) is the foundational fox-offering and is named for the kami. Anthropomorphic depictions are rarer and vary widely: a white-bearded elder seated on a sack of rice (the Ukanomitama register), a young woman with rice-sheaves and a kitsune-companion (the Ō-Miyanome register), a Buddhist Dakini-ten in golden robes riding a white-fox (the syncretic register, mostly seen at Buddhist temples). Colors: vermillion-red (the torii), white (the foxes), gold (the rice). Sacred sites: *Fushimi Inari Taisha* (Kyoto, the head shrine — the second-most-photographed shrine-image in Japan after Itsukushima's floating torii, with ~10 million annual visitors); *Kasama Inari Jinja* (Ibaraki, one of the three great Inari shrines); *Yūtoku Inari Jinja* (Saga, the third great Inari shrine, with its elevated cliff-mounted main hall); *Toyokawa Inari* (Aichi — the great Buddhist-Dakini-ten Inari temple, technically a Sōtō Zen temple, not a Shinto shrine, the largest Buddhist-Inari center).

How to invoke Inari

Inari is invoked at moments of *business-prosperity, harvest-thanksgiving, sake-brewing-blessing, and household-protection*. The annual *Hatsuuma* "first horse-day" of February (the founding-day of Fushimi Inari Taisha in 711 CE) is the major annual Inari festival, observed at every Inari shrine — small-business-owners and family-businesses across Japan visit their local Inari shrine that day to *renew the cosmic-prosperity-binding* for the year ahead. The proper offering is *inari-zushi* (the fried-tofu-rice-pouch named for the kami — the fox-folk-belief is that foxes love fried-tofu), *sake*, *rice-cakes (mochi)*, *uncooked rice*, *azuki-rice* (for the Hatsuuma-festival), and at the larger shrines the *donation of a new torii* (the standard small-business offering at Fushimi: a *one-shaku torii* costs ~¥175,000, a five-meter torii ~¥1.6 million — the line of vermillion torii at Fushimi is the *crowdfunded ledger of every business that has petitioned Inari over centuries*). Especially called by: business-owners (especially small-business and family-business owners — Inari is the *cosmic-patron of the small-business of Japan*, of which there are roughly 3.4 million), sake-brewers and rice-farmers, those facing *the cosmic-test of whether the rice-cake will fly off into a white-bird-omen at the shrine-summit* (the founder-moment, the first-customer-moment, the cosmic-confirmation that the venture has been blessed), those whose work has *kitsune-messenger* in it (the messenger-functions, the trickster-functions, the shape-shifting communicative-functions), and those navigating *the cosmic-gender-ambiguity* (Inari is the patron-kami for those whose cosmic-register cannot be cleanly-categorized as male-or-female).

In love

Inari in love is the *cosmic-prosperity-binding* — the partner whose register is the *household-business-and-rice-prosperity*, whose cosmic-function is the *binding of the relationship to the soil and the harvest and the annual-yield*. The Inari-partner is the *family-business-spouse* in the broadest sense — the partner with whom the cosmic-economy of the household is *one cosmic-substance* with the cosmic-economy of the love. The shadow is the *Inari-flattened-into-fox-tourist* — the partner who has been treated as if *they are the kitsune-messenger* (the cute-photogenic-tourist-attraction) rather than the *cosmic-kami-of-the-rice-and-prosperity* behind the messenger. The other shadow: the *gender-ambiguity-erased* — the partner whose cosmic-Inari-register has been forcibly-categorized into male-or-female when the cosmic-pattern is *Inari-is-gender-ambiguous by design* and the cosmic-substance is the *prosperity-binding, not the gender*.

In work

Inari in work is the *cosmic-business-prosperity-kami*. The Inari-figure is the *small-business-founder* (the cosmic-pattern of all 3.4 million small-businesses of Japan), the *family-business-second-or-third-generation-continuator*, the *commercial-prosperity-keeper* whose presence in the institution is the *cosmic-rice-cake-on-the-shrine-summit*. The Inari-register also includes the *kitsune-messenger* employees (the communicators, the messengers, the shape-shifting-PR-figures who are the *fox-servants of the rice-kami*) and the *vermillion-torii-donor pattern* (the institution that *donates the next torii to the ascending tunnel at Fushimi* with its name inscribed on the back — the public-business-prayer-ledger). The shadow is the institution that has *treated the kitsune-messengers as the kami themselves* (giving credit to the visible-fox-servants instead of the invisible-rice-kami-behind-them — the pattern of mistaking the *spokesperson for the substance*). The other shadow: the *Inari-Dakini-Buddhist-syncretic-figure forcibly-separated by the institutional 1868-Shinbutsu-bunri* — the figure in the institution whose cosmic-substance is *both Shinto-Inari and Buddhist-Dakini-ten* (both rice-prosperity and esoteric-tantric-wisdom-substance), who has been administratively-separated into one or the other by an institutional-violence that resembles the Meiji-edict.

The gift

Inari gives the *cosmic-rice-prosperity*. The gift is the *Hatsuuma-annual-binding-with-the-rice-kami* — the recognition that *the cosmic-business-prosperity of the small-family-business is one-substance with the rice-harvest-and-the-fox-messenger-and-the-vermillion-torii-tunnel*, and that the annual February-first-horse-day-festival is the *cosmic-renewal of the binding for the coming year*. The gift is the *kitsune-messenger-recognition* — the recognition that *the fox-messengers are not the kami themselves but the servants*, and that *honoring the messengers without confusing them with the cosmic-source is the proper cosmic-etiquette*. The gift is the *gender-ambiguity-as-cosmic-feature* — the recognition that *the cosmic-rice-prosperity kami is gender-ambiguous by design*, that the cosmic-substance is the *prosperity-and-binding, not the gender*. The gift is the *vermillion-torii-ascending-tunnel as the public-prayer-ledger* — the recognition that *every donated torii at Fushimi is one business's public-cosmic-prayer for prosperity*, and that the cumulative-ledger of all those-prayers ascending Mount Inariyama is *the most-photographed shrine-image in Japan*.

The shadow

Inari has been *commodified by Japanese-tourism* perhaps more than any other kami. The 10,000+ vermillion torii at Fushimi Inari Taisha have become the *single-most-photographed Instagram-image of Japanese tourism*, and the cosmic-context of *each torii being one business's public-cosmic-prayer for prosperity* has been substantially-eroded for the tens of millions of annual foreign-tourist-visitors (the post-2015 *gaikoku-jin no Fushimi-Inari rush* has transformed the shrine-experience for Japanese petitioners, with the cosmic-prayer-ascent now jostling with the *Instagram-photo-tour pause-at-every-torii*). The *kitsune-messenger* tradition has been *flattened into "Japanese spirit foxes"* in Western popular culture (post-Studio-Ghibli, post-Pokémon, post-anime-globalization) detached from the specifically Inari-rice-economy religious context, with *kitsune-cosplay and kitsune-merchandise* now globally available divorced from the Inari-cosmic-substance. The 1868 Shinbutsu-bunri *forcibly-separated Inari from the Buddhist Dakini-ten cult* in an administrative-violence that left the *folk-Inari-Dakini synthesis* in an unresolved gray-zone still-debated today (Toyokawa Inari is the surviving institutional case — technically a Sōtō Zen Buddhist temple in Shinbutsu-bunri terms, popularly an "Inari" in folk-religious terms, with the cosmic-substance unresolved). The further shadow: the *post-2010 SNS-era* (the social-media age) has produced a new generation of *fox-cosplay-non-petitioners* who visit Inari shrines without participating in the cosmic-binding-with-the-rice-kami, a development that the older shrine-officials describe as the *cosmic-emptying of the torii-tunnel from the inside* (the photogenic-surface preserved, the cosmic-substance evacuated). The deepest shadow: the *gender-ambiguity of Inari* (depicted across shrine-traditions as male elder, female woman, androgynous youth, fox-form) has been *progressively-stabilized into a default-female reading* in 20th-and-21st-century popular-religious imagination, with the cosmic-gender-ambiguity that was a feature of the source-tradition being *categorically-resolved away* into a more conventional female-deity reading.

Pair with