What is the name of the heavenly realm of the gods in Shinto?

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What is the name of the heavenly realm of the gods in Shinto? Takamagahara is the heavenly realm where the celestial kami reside.

The name Takamagahara is commonly translated as the “Plain of High Heaven” or “High Plain of Heaven.” In the creation narrative of the Kojiki, it is the abode of the amatsukami, or heavenly gods, including the primordial kami and later figures such as Amaterasu and Susanoo. It is often imagined above the earthly world, though its mythic location is not simply a physical place in the sky.

Shinto cosmology distinguishes the heavenly realm from earthly and underworld regions. The terrestrial world is Ashihara no Nakatsukuni, the “Central Land of Reed Plains,” while Yomi is the shadowy land of the dead. Myths connect Takamagahara and Earth through Ame-no-ukihashi, the Floating Bridge of Heaven.

The name appears prominently in the Kojiki, compiled in 712 CE, but it is far less prominent in the Nihon Shoki. This difference helps explain why Takamagahara is central to popular descriptions of Shinto mythology even though the surviving chronicles do not treat it identically.

Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Sept. 2026

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