Welcome to the Archive of the Sealed Gods
The purpose of this project is to explore and document the esoteric in Touhou Project games and the associated media.
The worldbuilding of this well-beloved doujin media empire is full of refrences to real life mythology, religion, history, esoteric traditions, paranormal, occult and fringe science ideas.
These ideas strongly root the games and their associated print works in to the more numinous, magical and mysterious side of reality.
This no doubt greatly contributes to what people refer to when they say Touhou feels "souled" or "magical" or "haunted".
Some even say, perhaps jokingly, perhaps more seriously than they would like to admit that "Touhou is divinely inspired".
Certainly the way ZUN himself speaks of his creative process makes it seem more like he is channeling Touhou than creating it all by himself...
This project poses a bold statement based on research into Touhou, spirituality, occultism, paranormal topics as well multiple individual's - including my own - experiences:
Touhou is "souled" in a literal sense.
Touhou is a divinely inspired, channeled work of art.
Touhou is greatly influenced by real-life mythologies and beliefs from three religions: Shinto, Buddhism and Taoism as well as how influences from these three came together to shape Japanese folklore, folk religion and history.
Touhou is also influenced by some ideas from Western esoteric tradition and paranormal research.
Inspiration rooted in real life spirituality and history gives Touhou exceptional spiritual potency that explains it's enduring popularity.
The fierce adoration roused by it's spiritual potency has at least turned Touhou into an egregore.
However, there are indications that Touhou serves as an interface for spirits of non human-origins.
Gensokyo is at the very least heavily inspired by real-life locations in Japan, particularly Nagano.
There exists and intersection of Touhou fandom and real-life holy locations that manifests as pilgrimmages to holy sites referenced to in Touhou.
The various entities within Touhou represent spirits tied to Shinto, Buddhism, Taoism, Japanese folk religion and certain Western beliefs.
Spirits have taken many different manifestations over time, and the way they are represented in Touhou is continuation of this.
In the history of Japanese religion, different spirits and deities changing appearances, names and characteristics is almost more of a norm than an exception.
Spirits change their appearances to suit the times, forming kind of networks of manifestations centered around certain archetypes and physical locations.
It is possible to reach out to these spirits and to contact them and multiple people have done so.
The spirits of Gensokyo are capable of supernatural feats and can offer guidance.
The most powerful of these spirits are genuine deities and are most worthy of reverence.
It's possible to radically change your relationship with Touhou, yourself and the world at large by taking the spirits of Gensokyo as your mentors and by exploring the wisdom found within the deep spiritual and cultural traditions that Touhou is a continuation of.
These traditions offer actionable practices which have potential to enhance the quality of your life and your relationships with others.
Be aware though: it is a path of transformation which may get difficult and even scary.
But you should already know: nothing worth pursuing comes easy.
You are warmly welcome to never again view Touhou the same way as you did before.
The Esoteric in Touhou
In this long-form series of articles, I explore the spiritual side of Touhou's influences and make the case that Touhou is an interface or host for real, non-human spirits to interact with a new, broader "audience" than what has been possible before. As of now, this section is split into four parts:
Part 1 explores the historical spiritual traditions of Shinto, Buddhism and Taoism and how they influenced Touhou.
Part 2 explores the influence of Western esotericism, fringe science and paranormal research on Touhou. This section also explores the hybridization of Eastern and Western influences to form ZUN's depiction of the Moon as a home of an ancient civilization of godlike beings.
Part 3 makes the case that Touhou has at the very least become an egregore, an autonomous psychic entity. However, as Touhou draws so heavily from exisiting spiritual traditions and real-life locations, many of the venerated sacred sites, it seems unlikely that Touhou's numinous potential is of just human origin. This section also explores how spirits have manifested differently over the course of history.
Part 4 offers a number of spiritual practices you can take up in preparation for reaching out to the spirits of Gensokyo, or any other spirits of your choosing.
Other's Words
These are articles and testimonials contributed by people other than the administrator of this site. Multiple people who have had contact with the spirits of Gensokyo have made themselves known to me and agreed to share their experiences. Beyond those with direct experiences, there are many more who are interested in the esoteric, spiritual, religious and folkloric elements connected to Touhou.
Letters from the Archive
This is a more blog-like section of this site where I post occasional updates, articles and reviews that do not fit into the main body of this site. I don't follow a set schedule, but I try to post at least on astrologicaly significant dates such as the equinoxes and solar and lunar new years.
Downloads
You will find downloadable content here. These current include the Introductory Practices guide.
Please wait warmly...this site is living and growing
This site is meant to be an evolving, living text, a dialogue and not a monologue.
The site will be updated as new relevant information is found.
Please check this site from time to time if you become interested in the topic.
I'm currently planning a major overhault for The Esoteric in Touhou to improve it's quality and to bring for new information learned since the creation of this site.
Please check the Update plan for full overview of planned changes.
Webring
If you would like to link the Archive to your site you can use either of these two buttons.
This site is for adults
Please note that there are some texts dealing with mature topics related to the Touhou Project and spirituality here. Please leave if you are not an adult.
