The History of Animism in Japan

Paddy Ricefield: animism is defined as the belief that living beings are composed of two substances, spirit and body. He says during this phase in Japanese history dreaming was considered a domain where powerful persons communicated with each other. During this time, there was use of oracle bones to tell the future in Japan, excavated artifacts demonstrateThis period begins 500 BCE and goes until roughly the 5th century CE. Koyama basically is asserting that the ancient Japanese art and stories point toward a belief dividing the world into a material reality and a spiritual reality that are separate.