This fusion of the sacred and the secular in daily life,
made practical and specific in its form, was Sho ̄san’s most
important contribution to Buddhism. It is not to be seen as
a mere assertion of the innate sacrality of the secular and the
profane, regardless of religious tradition. It is an assertion of
the potential sacredness of all human effort and a strong pro-
test against a Buddhism interpreted as otherworldly detach-
ment in the name of a religious transcendence of time and
space.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The English-language discussions of Suzuki Sho ̄san are meager.
There is one volume, Selected Writings of Suzuki Sho ̄san,
translated by Royal Tyler (Ithaca, N.Y., 1977), which is a
serviceable treatment with substantial footnotes and a brief
introductory treatment of Sho ̄san. Hajime Nakamura has
dealt briefly with him in A History of the Development of Japa-
nese Thought, vol. 2, From 592 to 1868 (Tokyo, 1967), and
“Suzuki Sho ̄san, 1579–1655, and the Spirit of Capitalism in
Japanese Buddhism,” Monumenta Nipponica 22 (1967):
1–14. Two essays, “Suzuki Sho ̄san, Wayfarer” and “Selec-
tions from Suzuki Sho ̄san,” translated by Jocelyn and Wins-
ton King, appear in the Eastern Buddhist 12 (October 1979).
See also my chapter “Practising Dying: The Samurai-Zen
Death Techniques of Suzuki Sho ̄san,” in Religious Encounters
with Death, edited by Frank E. Reynolds and Earle H.
Waugh (University Park, Pa., 1977), pp. 143–158, and my
Death Was His Ko ̄an: The Samurai-Zen of Suzuki Sho ̄san
(Berkeley, Calif., 1985), which is a substantial treatment of
Sho ̄san’s life, thought, meditational method, and embodi-
ment of Tokugawa social and religious values.
New Sources
Braverman, Arthur, trans. and ed. Warrior of Zen: The Diamond-
Hard Wisdom Mind of Suzuki Shosan. New York, 1994.
WINSTON L. KING (1987)
Revised Bibliography
SVENTOVIT was the four-headed “god of gods” (deum
deus) of the pre-Christian northwestern Slavs. His name,
*Sventovit, is variously written—as Sventovit, Svantevit, Sua-
tovitus, and, in the Knythlingasaga (c. 1265), Svantaviz—but
his cult is precisely described in the Gesta Danorum (14.564)
of Saxo Grammaticus (late twelfth century).
The center for the worship of Sventovit was in Arkona,
on the Baltic island of Rügen. In the center of town was the
citadel-temple, a wooden structure of consummate work-
manship, built with logs and topped by a red roof. Inside the
surrounding fence was a barbican, whose four posts stood
free of the outer walls of the temple and adjoined some of
the beams of the roof. The inner chamber, partitioned by
heavy tapestries, held an enormous statue of Sventovit. Its
four heads and necks were joined together: facing north,
south, east, and west, they apparently corresponded to the
four columns of the barbican. The faces were beardless and
the hair short. The statue’s right hand held a drinking horn
inlaid with various metals; the left was set akimbo. A close-
fitting mantle, reaching to the idol’s knees, was made of sev-
eral kinds of wood. The idol stood on the temple floor, with
its base hidden in the ground below. Nearby lay the god’s
bridle and saddle, along with an enormous sword whose
blade and scabbard were richly chased and damascened with
silver.A retinue of three hundred horsemen served Sventovit,
and the plunder they won in war went to the head priest.
Saxo mentions that tribute was paid not only by the Wends
but also by the Scandinavians. In time, a treasure of incredi-
ble value was amassed; when the Christian Danes stormed
Arkona in 1168, they removed the statue and carried away
seven boxes of treasure, including two gold beakers.A white horse consecrated to Sventovit was venerated
as an incarnation of the god himself. Success or failure in war
was foretold through the horse in the following manner:
three rows of palings or lances were laid by the priest in front
of the temple; if the horse stepped across the first row with
its right foot first, the omen was favorable. The prophetic
role of the horse in the divination ceremonies of the north-
western Slavs is confirmed by its magic function in Russian
popular tradition, particularly by the traditional horse epi-
thet, veshchii (“seer”), which has an exact correspondence in
the Avesta.Shortly after harvest, a great festival was held in honor
of Sventovit. Cattle were sacrificed, and prophecies were
made from the quantity of mead that remained in the drink-
ing horn held by the god: if the liquid had diminished during
the previous year, a bad harvest was predicted for the next.
At the end of the ceremony, the priest poured the old liquid
out at the god’s feet and refilled the vessel, asking the god
to bestow victory on the country and to increase its wealth.
Then a man-sized festal cake was brought in. Placing the
cake between himself and the people, the priest asked if he
was still visible; if the people answered in the affirmative, the
priest expressed the wish that they would not be able to see
him the next year. This ceremony was believed to ensure a
better harvest for the following year. (Similar customs of
foretelling the future from gigantic cakes are known among
Belorussians and Russians in the twentieth century.)Disposition of the Sventovit idol from Rügen is un-
known. In 1857 a carved wooden post was discovered in
Zbruch, near Husjatyn in southeastern Poland, that bears a
striking resemblance to Saxo’s description. Carved on all four
sides, in four registers, it shows four terminal figures, one of
which holds a drinking horn. Another four-headed statue,
called Chetyrebog (“four-god”), stood in Tesnovka, near
Kiev, until 1850. Prehistoric stone stelae depicting the same
god, helmeted and holding a cornucopia in the right hand,
and occasionally with a horse engraved on the back, are
known from various Slavic territories. A stela from Stav-
chany, in the upper Dniester Basin, can be dated to the
fourth to sixth century CE, but most of the finds are acciden-
tal and undated.8888 SVENTOVIT