#like you throw random leftovers into a broth and hope it makes a decent soup

[mustardyellowsunshine]

Hi there! Love your Inuyasha manga panel edits ^_^

I’m rewatching the Inuyasha anime and was curious as to your thoughts regarding the size of Kagome’s soul. During the 15th episode where Kikyo is revived, the characters comment about how large Kagome’s soul is - indeed, it’s massive when the ogress pulls it from her body. Why do you think her soul is so large? What does this signify? I’m wondering if it correlates to the strength of her spiritual powers or if it has something to do with Shintō that I’m unaware of.

Thanks for considering this question! 🫶🏼

Omg, thank you! 💖💖

So I sat on this ask for a long time because I wanted to give you a thoughtfully reasoned response, but the longer I thought about it, the more I realized that the answer is fairly simple from a story perspective: the size of Kagome's soul correlates with Kagome's power. I don't think it has anything to do with how often her soul was reincarnated, or the accumulated experiences of her reincarnated soul, or anything like that — it simply symbolizes Kagome's immense spiritual power.

I know very little about the Shinto religion, so take all this with an entire box of salt. But based on some internet searching, it doesn't seem like Shintoism espouses reincarnation the same way Buddhism does. "Shinto traditions lean heavily on the concepts of the presence of kami and not reincarnation. The spiritual energy, or kami, in everyone is released and recycled at the time of death. The spirits live in another world... where the spirits reside. They can connect and visit the present world when people correctly perform rituals and festivals" (x).

So in other words, souls are a kind of spiritual energy, which reside in other worlds after death. And in fiction we see souls being treated that way in the InuYasha series. After Kikyo is revived, for instance, she absorbs random souls to keep herself going; Kagome is able to call her soul back to her body after Urasue tries to steal it, as though she's calling on power or energy; when Kikyo is ultimately laid to rest, her soul flies off into the sky as though departing for that "other world" (note that her spirit does not return to Kagome, which certainly suggests that no part of Kagome's soul was left in Kikyo's resurrected body after the Urasue incident).

Obviously Rumiko Takahashi did incorporate Buddhist beliefs into the InuYasha story—the biggest example probably being Kagome's status as a reincarnation—but whenever the nature of "souls" is explicitly dealt with, they seem to be treated according to Shinto belief. I mean, the explanation for the Shikon no Tama itself—the Jewel of Four Souls—comes straight from Shinto belief/philosophy on the nature of soul.

All that to say: if the InuYasha series predominantly treats souls as a kind of spiritual energy, independent of reincarnation, and if Kagome's soul is repeatedly described as "large"... then I think her large soul indicates her level of spiritual power/energy. Her remarkable level of power is continually commented on throughout the series, which supports this.

Hope that wasn't too boring or rambling. ^^; Thanks for the ask!