Princess Mononoke

Princess Mononoke, a Japanese animation released in 1997, was a very interesting movie. A prince named Ashikata from Emishi village is cursed by a demon in a battle of trying to defend the village from the demon. The curse of hatred is expected to consume Ashitaka’s body and ultimately kill him unless he finds a cure. On his journey to find the origin of an iron ball, the only evidence of finding a cure, he finds himself tangled in a battle between the humans and the forest gods. Lady Eboshi, a strong female leader governing Iron Town, wants to clear the forest for the expansion of Iron Town for wealth and agricultural boom. However, the forest gods stand against the humans to protect their homes. San, a human girl who was raised by wolf gods fight with the forest gods to stop Eboshi from taking over the forest.

The director of the film, Hayao Miyazaki, stated that he wanted to “portray the very beginnings of the seemingly insoluble conflict between the natural world and modern industrial civilization.” Human greed is portrayed well throughout the film as Miyazaki intended. Some key scenes were when the boar god, Okkoto-nushi is overtaken by violence and hatred towards humans which turns him into a demon, which also caused the attack in Emishi village where Ashitaka got his curse. The film effectively show that although trying to advance human civilization is a good goal, the methods of acquiring that goal is wrong. The hate from both the humans and the forest gods towards each other magnified the violence and the destruction of each other.

One interesting thing I realized in the film is that although the forest gods look like animals, they are called “gods.” This made me think about the idol and false gods in the world such as the golden cow in the bible. It made me relate to how there are people who worship the nature and animals especially because Japan is known to have thousands of idols and false gods.

However, there were scenes in the movie which reminded me of our God the Holy Spirit. There was a particular scene where two assassins were hiding in the bushes to see the “Forest Spirit,” a god portrayed as mystical, legendary, and all-powerful. While in the bushes, one assassin says, “it is forbidden/sin to look at the forest spirit.” This reminded me of the tabernacle and the court Holy of Holies where it was a sin to directly look at God. I’m not sure if that is the case for any other gods in our world but that fact that humans were trying to kill the gods and take their place further pushed me to think about the tower of Babel when the humans rebelled against God to reach the heaven. Similarly, the Iron City is destroyed by the forest spirit just as how God swept the earth with the great flood. Even in the last scene when Ashitaka says “the forest spirit lives with us” reminded me of Jesus’ death and resurrection which assures that God is with us in our everyday life even though we can’t see Him through our eyes.

Some discussion questions are: 

-Could the gods in the movie also represent many gods and idols in our life (games, media, pornography, etc) that we must conquer? if so, can the people of Iron city represent as people fighting for the Kingdom of God? 

-What would hate towards sin look like in our daily life? should hate towards sin be acceptable to Christians?