God

by Nao

kami, shin, jin

Before God of Christianity was brought to Japan, kami meant only Gods in Shinto or Shitoism. Both kami and the shin of Shinto are today’s character. Gods in any religions are called kami indiscriminately.

In Shitoism, a Japanese religion, there are many Gods. Unreligious people use the word, kami, casually. They worship Gods, hoping that Gods will reward them some day. It is believed that Gods live in shrines called jinja. Ja means a shrine. Every town and village has a shrine. In the early twentieth century, there were about 190,400 shrines. The government reduced the number by making more than one God worshipped in each shrine. Currently, it is said that the number of shrines is about 80,000. The number of Gods is bigger than the number of shrines. Moreover, Gods are not always enshrined in shrines. Some Gods like Binbōgami haunt people. Binbo means poverty. Gami is the voiced sound of kami. People possessed by Binbōgami are poverty-stricken. Nobody worships such a God but many people are friends with nasty Gods and can’t drive them off.

The name of the prefecture, Kanagawa, begins with this character.

Draw the left-hand side of the character first.

1. Draw the dot from the upper left corner.
2. Draw the hook. After changing the direction, draw a sweeping stroke.
3. Draw the vertical stroke.
4. Draw the dot touching the previous stroke.
5. Draw the left side of the rectangle.
6. Draw the upper and right sides of the rectangle.
7. Draw the horizontal stroke in the rectangle.
8. Draw the lower side of the rectangle.
9. Draw the vertical stroke from top to bottom. This is a sweeping stroke. Make it thinner at the end.