Soh means a few things, one being 'ancestor'. Or 'esteemed one'.
宗
But it also means 'ancestral temple'.
A small shrine built at a grave or a place of connection to worship the spirits of ancestors was called a spirit shrine, and a spirit shrine that combined generations of ancestors was called a soreisha((祖霊社). (x)
Sorei(祖霊) means ancestral spirits.
Remember this?
Soh is called 'they' or gender-neutral terms in Japanese because Soh is many spirits of many former Maidens.
There are 7 in total. Her Spirit Stone originally housed all previous Maidens, including her own, and so she is alike a spirit shrine.
(An alternate explanation is that because she's enshrined she no longer has the body of a human and so has no sex. Not until she becomes a full fledged 'god' and is then called a Goddess.)
There is also a belief that spirits can ascend to ancestral spirits and then to gods , and such ancestral spirits are worshipped as ancestral deities (sojin) or ujigami (ujigami) by communities such as clans and villages. In the Okinawa region , it was believed that a person would become a god in seven generations.
This is why Soh ascends into a Goddess. 7 Yoshiros(generations) were contained within her Spirit Stone.
According to Kunio Yanagita, in Japanese folk beliefs (Koshinto), spirits that are the subject of memorial services within a certain number of years after death are called " dead spirits " and are distinguished from ancestral spirits. The more memorial services are performed for the dead spirits, the more they lose their individuality, and when they are "enshrined" a certain number of years after death (50, 33, 30 years, etc., depending on the region), they lose their individuality completely and become part of the ancestral spirits.
This might be what the white light Soh absorbs is. The 'generations' held within Cursed Soh (who was held within Nanamagari).
It's why Cursed Soh emerges on Soh's cycle. Soh is close to becoming a Goddess but the last generation, herself, must be purified.
Once Soh purifies her defiled self, those Yoshiros, 'generations', return to her and with 7 generations now, she is born again as a Goddess.
Remember the Spirit Stone absorbs the previous Spirit Stone. So the very first Maiden, down to the most recent, is prayed to. The older ones lose their individuality, becoming part of 'Soh'.
So she is a Spirit Shrine, her enshrined 'body' containing all the spirits of the Maidens. Because of what occurred to her Spirit Stone and her duty, she is tethered to Yoshiro and so her spirit is no longer in the Spirit Stone.
(But Cursed Soh, who seems to be a defiled part of her spirit, has remained within the stone.)
Yoshiro.
世代
Yoshiro's name is from 'Yorishiro'
A yorishiro (依り代/依代/憑り代/憑代) in Shinto terminology is an object capable of attracting spirits called kami, thus giving them a physical space to occupy during religious ceremonies. Yorishiro are used during ceremonies to call the kami for worship. The word itself literally means "approach substitute".
She is this generation's substitute for the Goddess and her body acts as an abode for the Goddess.
In the opening, she offers up her body for the Goddess to inhabit. In the Japanese, she says:
大いなる山祇様へ 信をいたしこの身を献上しまする故 村々は平穏と繁栄の糧を 今日も与えられ給へ (x)
I believe in the great Mountain Goddess and dedicate my body to her, so that the villages will be given the food of peace and prosperity today as well. (bootleg translation)
But she's also offering up her body to the goddess as a human sacrifice.
This was done when she was still a child and I wonder if it prevented her reaching puberty?
Then again, Soh was a Maiden and doesn't seem to be as small as Yoshiro, with her slightly different proportions.
The Maidens may be all different ages.
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| A pair indeed |
Yoshiro is the Spirit Stone. Soh is the Spirit Shrine.
The stone channels the enshrined spirits in the shrine: spirits of Maidens who held the Goddess within.
One is the body spirits tether to. One is a spirit, given physical form through the body. the Spirit Stone.