If we remember the attributes of our own "Prince of Darkness," we shall not be surprised to find traces of a tendency to make of Susa no wo a personification of the evil principle. He is the arch offender of Japanese myth. The crimes committed by him against the Sun-Goddess agree closely with the so-called "celestial offences" of the Great Purification Ceremony. Hence his identification with the horned Godzu Tennô, a minister of the Buddhist hell. The _Shinto Miomoku_, which makes of him a Trinity under the name Sampô Kwôjin (three-treasure-rough-god), consisting of Kami Susa no wo, Haya Susa no wo, and plain Susa no wo, by the epithet "rough," recognizes the sinister aspect of his character. We may note the same element _ara_, rough, in the name of the Moon-god's shrine at Ise, namely, Aratama no Miya.
Several of Susa no wo's acts have an unmistakably beneficent character, as his rescue of Inada hime, and his provision of useful trees for man. The modern worship of him as (with his wife) a deity of love and wedlock also recognizes a beneficent aspect of his nature. Hirata explains this contradiction by the theory that he is beneficent when his _nigi-tama_ (gentle spirit) is in the ascendant, and malignant when his _ara-tama_ (rough-spirit) gets the upper hand, as in the leading case of Jekyll and Hyde, reported by R. L. Stevenson. The female deity of Yomi, Sasura-hime, is called by Hirata a _waki-dama_ (side spirit, or double) of Susa no wo, forming with him a dual divinity, as in the case of the Wind-Gods.
Etymology helps us little in determining Susa no wo's character. The ordinary derivation connects his name with the verb _susamu_, to be impetuous. Hence the "Impetuous Male" of English translators. It agrees well with the rainstorm conception of this deity. There is at the present day a festival celebrated in his honour at Onomachi in Bingo, described as follows by a Japanese writer: "The procession is a tumultuous trial of speed and strength. Bands of strong men seize the sacred cars, race with them to the sea, and having plunged in breast-deep, their burden held aloft, dash back at full speed to the shrine. There refreshments are served out, and then the race is resumed, the goal being the central flag among a number set up in a large plain. Their feet beat time to a wildly shouted chorus, and they sweep along wholly regardless of obstacles or collisions." The ceremony here described is no doubt intended as a dramatic representation of the impetuous character of the God. The _susamu_ etymology derives some support from a comparison of that of Woden, from _vatha_ (the modern German _wuthen_), to go violently, to rush, and of Hermes, from δρμάω; but it is after all questionable. It implies a noun _susa_, impetuosity, which does not exist. Moreover, one of Susa no wo's wife's names was Susa no yatsu mimi, where it is not disputed that Susa is the name of a town in Idzumo. There is a legend which represents Susa no wo as giving his name to this place and allowing his _mitama_ to rest here. Susa no wo would therefore be simply the male (God) of Susa, a territorial title (of Tsukiyomi?) for which there are many parallels in Japanese mythology.[111]