Angry spirits were feared in Heian times, and an emperor’s posthumous wrath was seen as especially dangerous. The threat was that such a spirit would “take” one or more people. Eiga monogatari reports that when Emperor Kazan (968–1008, r. 984–986) was gravely ill, he kept repeating, “If I die, I shall take all the Princesses with me before the end of the forty-nine days.” Then he died. All four of his daughters died within that time. He had indeed taken them with him (mote-tori-yuku), and that is what the spirit meant to do with Ukifune. The Eiga narrator remarks, “Everyone agreed that the strength of a high-born person’s will is a fearsome thing.”[49]
Kikki, the diary of Yoshida Tsunefusa (1142–1200) recorded an imperial curse under the date Juei 2/7/16 (1183). Retired Emperor Sutoku (1119–64, r. 1123–41), in exile in Sanuki, copied the gobu daijō (“five-part Mahāyana”)[50] in his own blood and wrote at the end, “This is so that in an unjust reign my merit for the life to come should destroy the realm” (hiri no yo, goshō no ryō, tenka wo horobosubeki no omomuki). The sutras he had copied were to be sunk in the sea. However, the court obtained them and instead dedicated them at a temple “in order to bring his angry spirit to enlightenment.” Tsunefusa wrote at the end, “Terrifying, terrifying!”[51]
Retired Emperor Gotoba (1180–1239, r. 1183–98) even left first-person testimony on the subject of angry spirits. On Katei 3 8/25 (1237), in exile on Oki, he wrote a testament in which he recorded what Emperor Goshirakawa (1127–92, r. 1155–58) had once told him: that Goshirakawa hoped to escape the cycle of reincarnation but was also afraid of becoming a demonic spirit (maen). If that should happen, Goshirakawa told Gotoba, and something takes (toru koto araba) any descendant of mine, understand that none other than my own power will have done it. He continued,
If I turn all my good works and merit to evil and do anything of that kind, all that good will vanish, and I will enter deeper and deeper into evil. If any descendant of mine is then ruling the realm, he must perform no rite for the gods or buddhas but to pray for my enlightenment.
Then he went on,
Alas, I acted foolishly, paid little heed to what he had said, prayed for this and that, went on pilgrimage here and there, and now it has come to this [kakaru koto ni nariniki]. If hereafter any descendant of mine rules the realm and performs any such rites that are not for my enlightenment, my curse will be upon him [ikko ni on-mi no tatari to narubeki koto nari].[52]
Katō Gitai concluded from these examples that the greater the person’s power or prestige in life, the more powerful that person’s spirit will be after death, and that “When an emperor who has accumulated great Buddhist merit applies the power of that merit negatively and becomes an onryō, the result is a very powerful onryō indeed.”[53]
Goshirakawa, Sutoku, and Gotoba were all bitter about what they had suffered at the hands of others. Goshirakawa had been forced to abdicate, while Sutoku and Gotoba had been exiled.[54] No emperor faced exile in the time of The Tale of Genji, but forced abdication occurred (Kazan is an example), and succession issues, too, could cause acute resentment. One of these arose at the death of Emperor Ichijō (980–1011, r. 986–1011). In conformity with custom, Ichijō was to designate before he died his heir apparent’s (Sanjō, 976–1017, r. 1011–16) successor. According to Eiga monogatari he wanted to appoint his eldest son, a grandson of Fujiwara no Korechika (974–1010), but was obliged instead to appoint a grandson of Fujiwara no Michinaga.[55] Eiga also records that Michinaga disposed of Ichijō’s property after Ichijō’s death.[56] He was therefore in a good position to find, as Gukanshō reports him doing,
something that looked like an Imperial Mandate written in the deceased Emperor’s hand. At the beginning of the document were these words: “The sun, moon, and stars wish to lighten the world, but they are hidden by great banks of clouds and the sky is dark.” Without reading further, Michinaga rolled up the document and burned it.[57]
He had probably recognized a written curse. Eiga’s silence about his discovery does nothing to make this unlikely. No such sentiments, written or oral, would be mentioned in Genji, either, but the bitter succession struggle between the factions represented by Genji and Suzaku is central to the tale. The narrative describes the spirit of Genji’s father hurrying to the palace and glaring angrily into Suzaku’s eyes, and it also mentions the death of Suzaku’s maternal grandfather and the grave illness of his mother. Although the narrator blames neither the death nor the illness on Genji’s father, people might well have feared under the circumstances that he had “taken” one and meant to “take” the other. From the standpoint of the reader, whose sympathy lies with Genji, the Kiritsubo Emperor’s partisan intervention merely upholds right and justice. Seen from Kokiden’s side, however, he is an onryō. Suzaku could therefore be one, too, as long as a reason can be found to explain his condition.
[49] Yamanaka et al., Eiga monogatari 1:388–90; McCullough and McCullough, A Tale of Flowering Fortunes 1:265–6.
[50] The Kegonkyō, Daihōdōdaishūkyō, Daibon hannyakyō, Hokekyō, and Nehangyō.
[51] Quoted in Katō, “Shōkū kyōdan ni yoru ichinichikyō kuyō,” 122.
[52] Quoted in Katō, “Shōkū kyōdan ni yoru ichinichikyō kuyō,” 123. Katō noted that in Godaiteiō monogatari, a historical tale (rekishi monogatari) written prior to 1327, Gotoba plays a major role as an onryō.
[53] Katō, “Shōkū kyōdan ni yoru ichinichikyō kuyō,” 128.
[54] Gukanshō describes fears that Goshirakawa’s onryō had become active. Okami and Akamatsu, Gukanshō, 293–4; Brown and Ishida, The Future and the Past, 168–71.
[55] Yamanaka et al., Eiga monogatari 1:484; McCullough and McCullough, A Tale of Flowering Fortunes 1:309–10.
[56] Yamanaka at al., Eiga monogatari 1:465–8; McCullough and McCullough, A Tale of Flowering Fortunes 1:318.
[57] Okami and Akamatsu, Gukanshō, 173; Brown and Ishida, The Future and the Past, 58.