Fujin

Fūjin (風神, designated in archaic Shinto records as 志那都比古神 / Shinatsuhiko no Kami and in esoteric Buddhism as 風天 / Fūten) is the Japanese deity of winds, atmospheric currents, morning mist dissipation, and agricultural typhoons. His foundational genesis appears in the cosmogonic narratives of the 'Kojiki': when the primeval creators Izanagi and Izanami were fashioning the archipelago, heavy damp mists smothered the newborn islands; Izanagi drew a mighty breath and blew forcefully across the waters, and from that very exhalation of his breath was born Shinatsuhiko ('Prince of Long Soughing Breath'). In the 'Nihon Shoki', he appears alongside his divine female counterpart Shinatobe no Mikoto, establishing the paired wind deities revered at the imperial sanctuary of Tatsuta Taisha in Nara, whose classical liturgies (the Tatsuta Norito in Book 8 of the 'Engishiki') were instituted in 675 CE by Emperor Tenmu to avert destructive typhoons from rice paddies. Inseparable from his brother Raijin (the thunder god), Fūjin was syncretized with the Buddhist deva Vāyu as a fierce temple guardian, famously captured in thirteenth-century National Treasure wood carvings at Sanjūsangen-dō and in the iconic seventeenth-century folding screens by Tawaraya Sōtatsu. Iconographically, Fūjin appears as a muscular, oni-like demon with green or dark complexion, fierce fangs, and a giant billowing sack of wind (kazabukuro) slung over his shoulders, holding both nozzles open to unleash atmospheric currents and summon the historic Kamikaze storms.

8 min read · Reviewed on September 30, 2026 · How we research

The bag of winds, the green skin, the clouds and the typhoon

Primary sources

• Ō no Yasumaro (太安万侶), Kojiki (古事記 / Records of Ancient Matters). translation: Basil Hall Chamberlain (1882) / Donald L. Philippi (1969). read
• Toneri Shinnō (舎人親王), Nihon Shoki (日本書紀 / Chronicles of Japan). translation: William George Aston (1896). read
• Fujiwara no Tadahira (藤原忠平), Engishiki (延喜式 / Procedures of the Engi Era). translation: Felicia Gressitt Bock (1972). read
• Priests of Iwashimizu, Hachiman Gudōkun (八幡愚童訓). translation: Kuroita Katsumi, Shintei Zōho Kokushi Taikei.
• Priests of Ise, Kōtai Jingū Gishikichō (皇太神宮儀式帳). translation: Documentary edition of the Jingū Shichō. read

Studies

• Carmen Blacker, The Catalpa Bow: A Study of Shamanistic Practices in Japan. George Allen & Unwin, 1975. open
• William George Aston, Shinto: The Way of the Gods. Longmans, Green, and Co., 1905. open
• Thomas D. Conlan, In Little Need of Divine Intervention: Takezaki Suenaga's Scrolls of the Mongol Invasions of Japan. Cornell East Asia Series, 2001. open
• Mark Schumacher, Fujin - Japanese God of Wind. A-to-Z Photo Dictionary of Japanese Buddhist & Shinto Deities, 2013.
• Felicia Gressitt Bock, Engi-shiki: Procedures of the Engi Era (Books 6-10). Sophia University, 1972. open