331
biology here, living with us, in us, Sun and Moon we cannot moderate, back-breed,
or change.
37.2 The Deification of Thomas Edison
What we can point out are the heavily leaning paradoxes with which these same
astrogeophysics, spirituality, and poetics must contend. And, curiously, just 23 kilometers south of Kyoto, there is a shrine—Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu—sacred to both
Shinto and Buddhist, which contains a statue commemorating Thomas Edison.
5
Unlike Buddhism, the Shinto religion has no actual founder, but, rather, is an early
eighth-century outgrowth of early Japanese community animism, a profound worship of nature that today recognizes over 2.4 million kami, invisible to humans but
critical sentinels at every sacred place on earth. A primary goal of Shinto is to ultimately secure magokoro, the pure heart that comes from being in tune with the
kami. It is a tall order. But at Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu, a Shinto temple founded in
859, we watched as the Shinto priest or kannuchi and his colleagues lit many hundreds of bamboo lanterns before an image and stone memorial of Edison
(1847–1931), who is considered one of the kami. For it was precisely here, in these
hills above Kyoto, that Thomas Edison’s assistant, William H. Moore, discovered a
unique sub-species of bamboo, the filament of which was so tenacious as to be the
one chosen by Edison for his first light bulb. The Festival of Light, every May 4th,
celebrates that connection to Shinto’s primary deity, Amaterasu, Japan’s sun goddess, the alleged daughter of Izanagi and Izanami, creators of the world.
6
Like the atom, so tortured, compromised, and perversely manipulated by Einstein
and friends, Edison’s successful fixation with the light bulb, relying upon the carbonized paper filaments demonstrated in the 1860s by the British chemist Joseph
Swan (1828–1914), and following a century of research into the nature of heating
up a wire into an incandescent state, exerts a persuasive force that today lights up
Kyoto and every city and nearly every human household on the planet. Edison electrocuted an elephant named Topsy on Coney Island in 1903 (it was filmed) before
eager investors to persuade them of the power of direct current electricity versus
Tesla’s alternating current. Debate persists regarding the veracity of the “string of
animal electrocutions Edison staged”
7
but irrefutably, the rage for electricity and the
energy sources to produce it are destroying the very world that Edison, Einstein, and
5 See “Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu Shrine,” https://www.japanvisitor.com/japan-temples-shrines/
iwashimizu-hachiman-gu-shrine, Accessed March 31, 2020.
6 See Ono, Sokyo. Shinto: The Kami Way. Translated by William Woodard, Charles E. Tuttle
Company, Rutland, Vermont, 1962.
7 See “Topsy the Elephant Was a Victim of Her Captors, Not Thomas Edison,” by Kat Eschner,
January 4, 2017, Smithsonianmag.com, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/topsy-elephant-was-victim-her-captors-not-really-thomas-edison-180961611/. Accessed March 21, 2020.
37.2 The Deification of Thomas Edison
biology here, living with us, in us, Sun and Moon we cannot moderate, back-breed,
or change.
37.2 The Deification of Thomas Edison
What we can point out are the heavily leaning paradoxes with which these same
astrogeophysics, spirituality, and poetics must contend. And, curiously, just 23 kilometers south of Kyoto, there is a shrine—Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu—sacred to both
Shinto and Buddhist, which contains a statue commemorating Thomas Edison.
5
Unlike Buddhism, the Shinto religion has no actual founder, but, rather, is an early
eighth-century outgrowth of early Japanese community animism, a profound worship of nature that today recognizes over 2.4 million kami, invisible to humans but
critical sentinels at every sacred place on earth. A primary goal of Shinto is to ultimately secure magokoro, the pure heart that comes from being in tune with the
kami. It is a tall order. But at Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu, a Shinto temple founded in
859, we watched as the Shinto priest or kannuchi and his colleagues lit many hundreds of bamboo lanterns before an image and stone memorial of Edison
(1847–1931), who is considered one of the kami. For it was precisely here, in these
hills above Kyoto, that Thomas Edison’s assistant, William H. Moore, discovered a
unique sub-species of bamboo, the filament of which was so tenacious as to be the
one chosen by Edison for his first light bulb. The Festival of Light, every May 4th,
celebrates that connection to Shinto’s primary deity, Amaterasu, Japan’s sun goddess, the alleged daughter of Izanagi and Izanami, creators of the world.
6
Like the atom, so tortured, compromised, and perversely manipulated by Einstein
and friends, Edison’s successful fixation with the light bulb, relying upon the carbonized paper filaments demonstrated in the 1860s by the British chemist Joseph
Swan (1828–1914), and following a century of research into the nature of heating
up a wire into an incandescent state, exerts a persuasive force that today lights up
Kyoto and every city and nearly every human household on the planet. Edison electrocuted an elephant named Topsy on Coney Island in 1903 (it was filmed) before
eager investors to persuade them of the power of direct current electricity versus
Tesla’s alternating current. Debate persists regarding the veracity of the “string of
animal electrocutions Edison staged”
7
but irrefutably, the rage for electricity and the
energy sources to produce it are destroying the very world that Edison, Einstein, and
5 See “Iwashimizu Hachiman-gu Shrine,” https://www.japanvisitor.com/japan-temples-shrines/
iwashimizu-hachiman-gu-shrine, Accessed March 31, 2020.
6 See Ono, Sokyo. Shinto: The Kami Way. Translated by William Woodard, Charles E. Tuttle
Company, Rutland, Vermont, 1962.
7 See “Topsy the Elephant Was a Victim of Her Captors, Not Thomas Edison,” by Kat Eschner,
January 4, 2017, Smithsonianmag.com, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/topsy-elephant-was-victim-her-captors-not-really-thomas-edison-180961611/. Accessed March 21, 2020.
37.2 The Deification of Thomas Edison