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An akuma (悪魔) is an evil spirit in Japanese folklore, [1] [2] sometimes described in English-language sources as a devil or demon. [2] [3] An alternative name for the akuma is ma (ま). [4] Akuma is the name assigned to Satan in Japanese Christianity, and the Mara in Japanese Buddhism.
There is widespread belief in ghosts in English-speaking cultures, where ghosts are manifestations of the spirits of the dead. The beliefs may date back to animism or ancestor worship before Christianization. The concept is a perennial theme in the literature and arts of English-speaking countries.
All Japanese ghosts are called yūrei, and there are several types within this classification. However, a given ghost may be described by more than one of the following terms, as the following terms are used differently depending on which elements of a ghost's characteristics are focused on:
Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (怪談, Kaidan, also Kwaidan (archaic)), often shortened to Kwaidan ("ghost story"), is a 1904 book by Lafcadio Hearn that features several Japanese ghost stories and a brief non-fiction study on insects. [1] It was later used as the basis for a 1964 film, Kwaidan, by Masaki Kobayashi. [2]
In a broad sense, Goryō (御霊, Japanese:) is an honorific for a spirit, especially one that causes hauntings, and the term is used as a synonym for onryō (怨霊, vengeful Japanese ghosts).
This Japanese compound kotodama combines koto 言 "word; speech" and tama 霊 "spirit; soul" (or 魂 "soul; spirit; ghost") voiced as dama in rendaku.In contrast, the unvoiced kototama pronunciation especially refers to kototamagaku (言霊学, "study of kotodama"), which was popularized by Onisaburo Deguchi in the Oomoto religion.
Jikininki (食人鬼, "human-eating ghosts") appear in Lafcadio Hearn's Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (1904) as corpse-eating spirits.In Japanese Buddhism, jikininki ("human-eating ghosts"; pronounced shokujinki in modern Japanese), are similar to Gaki/Hungry ghost; the spirits of greedy, selfish or impious individuals who are cursed after death to seek out and eat humans and ...
Ikiryō (生霊) from the 1776 book Gazu Hyakki Yagyō by Sekien Toriyama. Ikiryō (生霊, lit. "living ghost"), also known as shōryō (しょうりょう), seirei (せいれい), or ikisudama (いきすだま), [1] is a disembodied spirit or ghost in Japanese popular belief and fiction that leaves the body of a living person and subsequently haunts other people or places, sometimes across ...