mitama

Mitama is a Japanese term meaning “spirit” or “soul,” with a sacred nuance common in Shinto and traditional Japanese thought. The word is often written 御霊 or 御魂 and read mitama, referring to the divine or essential life force that animates a person, ancestor, or sacred object. In Shinto, the mitama is typically distinguished from the physical body and is conceived as an aspect of a being that may be revered, propitiated, or deified.

In practice, mitama can be honored through household rites, offerings at shrines, and the veneration of ancestors whose mitama are believed to reside in or be connected to sacred spaces and objects. The concept also appears in folklore in the phrase mitama no tama, traditionally rendered as the “soul jewel” or core of life force, used to describe the vitality or soul of a person in myth and story.

Mitama is related to other Japanese ideas of spirit and personhood, such as tamashii (soul) and kami (gods or spirits). The term appears across historical and modern texts on Shinto, spirituality, and Japanese culture, though its interpretation varies among regions, schools, and scholars. In scholarly and popular discourse, mitama is typically treated as part of a broader understanding of life force, the relationship between the living and the sacred, and the afterlife as it appears in Japanese belief.