What is aburabo?
Aburabo is a mysterious-fire yokai told of in Omi Province (today’s Shiga Prefecture) and elsewhere. It is a fireball drifting through the night sky, in which the figure of a monk is sometimes said to appear.
The spirit of a monk who stole oil
According to Edo-period gazetteers, at the foot of Mount Hiei in Omi Province, strange fires appeared at night from spring to summer, and people called them “aburabo.” Tradition says it is a monk of Enryakuji on Mount Hiei who stole the precious oil for the lamps lit before the Buddha, and for that sin could not rest after death but wanders as a fireball. Lamp oil was precious, and stealing it was considered a grave sin.
Oil fires around Japan
Stories of those who stole oil becoming fireballs after death exist in Kyoto and other places too, sometimes called “abura-gaeshi.” Like fox fires and will-o’-the-wisps, unidentified fires in the night hills and fields were feared by people of the past.
