Onmyōji

What it is

An onmyōji was a technical official in the Japanese court's Bureau of Onmyō, an office attached to the Ministry of the Center within the ritsuryō system. The work rested on yin-yang and five phases thought, a Chinese model that treats events as combinations of two forces and five elements. Onmyōji handled divination and geomorphology, the reading of land and direction that overlaps with what is now called feng shui. The same bureau also kept astrology, calendars and water clocks. From the medieval and early modern centuries the word shifted outward: it could mean people who offered prayers and fortune-telling outside government, and some were seen as a kind of clergy.

Where it comes from

Yin-yang and five phases ideas grew in China over the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties. They reached Japan during the Asuka period, either straight from the mainland or through the Korean peninsula. Records place Five Classics teachers from Baekje in Japan in 512 and I Ching teachers in 554. In 602 Gwalleuk, also from Baekje, taught the system to 34 officials, including Prince Shōtoku. Japan then adopted an official calendar and sent missions to Sui China from 607. In 676 Emperor Tenmu established a state observatory and the Bureau of Onmyō; the label onmyōji appears in 685. The Yōrō Code of 718 fixed the bureau's technical posts. Later, the Kamo and Abe families made the office hereditary.

How it is done

The bureau's officers cast I Ching readings, judged land and direction, watched the sky, prepared calendars, named auspicious and inauspicious days, and kept time with water clocks. They did not begin as ritual specialists: early duties were technical and administrative. Their advice mattered when the capital moved, because repairs and relocation called for chosen days and a reading of the ground. In later centuries, practitioners outside the bureau offered prayers and fortune-telling for clients.

Tools and materials

Work depended on texts and instruments: the I Ching, astronomical equipment, water clocks and calendrical records. Geomorphology supplied a way to read land and direction, close to modern feng shui. The bureau also held books of onmyōdō. Under the ritsuryō order these items were not ordinary property. Observational and timekeeping gear, and books on the craft, could not leave the bureau, and private ownership was forbidden. That rule made the technical knowledge a guarded court resource.

What it is for

Court clients wanted guidance on fortune and misfortune, disasters, the future and the choice of officials. Onmyōji were asked to select lucky or unlucky days and to assess land and direction, especially around building work and moves of the capital. The same skills served the calendar and the clock, giving the court a shared framework of time. In the Heian period the practices of the Kamo and Abe families were used by regents, chief advisors and other court figures. The aim was practical judgment, as the court understood it, not a promise of results.

Who does it

A Head of Onmyō directed the bureau. Administrative officials served under him, while technical staff included doctors, trainees and general workers. Early technical posts often went to learned monks and scholars from China, Goguryeo and Baekje, and rarely from Silla. Because monks needed special permission to hold office, the court also trained secular students, but kept their number small. By the 10th century the Kamo and Abe families controlled the top places. The Head alone could enter the Seiryōden, the emperor's daily hall, to report. In the Muromachi period the Abe family, under Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, took the name Tsuchimikado.

Peoples and places

The system belonged to Japan's court and was described as a Japanese profession. Its personnel were not all Japanese: the bureau drew on scholars and monks from mainland China and from the Korean kingdoms of Goguryeo, Baekje and Silla, with Baekje exiles arriving in larger numbers after its defeat at Baekgang in 663. Those men supplied the reading skills and classical Chinese learning the technical posts required. Over time, secular trainees and two court families, Kamo and Abe, came to dominate. The Tsuchimikado name marked the Abe family's later noble status.

What people believe

The underlying view held that all phenomena arise from the pairing of yin and yang and from five phases: wood, fire, earth, metal and water. Within that frame, the positions of Chinese constellations, the compatibility of birth and death, and the pattern of land and direction could be read for signs of fortune or disaster. The court treated these readings as a guide for decisions and for the calendar. Early bureau officers were not ritual specialists, but later onmyōdō practice took on a religious cast, with prayers and private divination.

When it is done

The bureau's calendar work gave the court a common measure of days, months and time. Officers named lucky and unlucky days, and those choices governed repairs and the movement of the capital. Water clocks marked the hours. An official calendar was adopted after Gwalleuk's teaching in 602. Later practitioners continued to read days for clients. Calendar making and day judging remained part of the craft.

Compare and confuse

Onmyōji in the narrow sense meant officers who specialised in the I Ching and geomorphology. Broadly, the word took in every technical post in the bureau, including astrology, onmyō, calendar and water-clock roles; this wider group was sometimes called onmyōdō. The land-reading side is compared to feng shui, and its cosmology came from China. The bureau shared divination work with turtle-shell diviners in the Department of Divinities.

Law and persecution

Ritsuryō rules made the bureau a closed professional body. Outsiders, whether monks, government officials or private citizens, were forbidden to learn the four technical fields or to proclaim omens. Instruments and books could not be removed or owned privately. Enforcement loosened by the early 9th century, and the bureau's staff grew during the Heian period. Within the court, technical officers of the Bureau of Onmyō held higher rank than technical officers in other ministries, though the office remained below its parent ministry. A Head of Onmyō had the rare right to report in the Seiryōden.

Questions people ask about Onmyōji

Good reading and sources

• Encyclopaedia BritannicaArticle

• Onmyōji on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data