As with most public services, expect hilarity to ensue if Death Takes a Holiday, unless someone steps up to the task of Relieving the Reaper. See also Archangel Uriel, Enemies with Death, The Problem with Fighting Death, and Hanging Up on the Grim Reaper. Compare to Horsemen of the Apocalypse - for when the rest show up - and Afterlife Express - when the Grim Reaper is or rides on a vehicle, especially a train. May overlap with Destroyer Deity if they're not separate entities. If something does take down the Reaper, you may have The Death of Death on your hands.Ī subtrope of Psychopomp. Thus, the concept of being able to defeat or kill Death in combat ( Castlevania) or Grim Reaper figures themselves being able to die ( Death Note) can seem absurd to Western viewers. Shinigami are more typically spirits associated with death, rather than being the singular Anthropomorphic Personification thereof. Japanese media then proceeded to play with the character to the point that many shinigami no longer have anything in common with the Grim Reaper, aside from the name. When this concept was imported to Japan in the 19th century, they translated the name as Shinigami (while typically translated as 'god of death', it is literally 'death kami ', which doesn't have quite the same connotations). He is sometimes described as mute, and in some accounts you can challenge him to a game of chess for the right to stay alive.Ī frequent variation is the notion that instead of the Grim Reaper, there is a Grim Reaper - that it's a position offered to certain people after they die.

This god, in turn, was drawn from the Ur-Example of the Sassanid sect's Zoroastrian god Zurvan Akarana.

These dual accouterments are Older Than Steam, but both were drawn from the ancient Greco-Roman god Χρόνος (Chronos).

He is also often shown with an hourglass as a symbol of elapsing life. The nature and purpose of the Grim Reaper (also simply known as 'Death') varies between two different versions: one version describes him as a simple guide, the supernatural being who takes you to the next world after you die (the fancy word for this is ' psychopomp') the other version sees him as the entity of death, you die when he touches you.Įither way, he is generally seen as a tall, often skeletal, specter in a black hooded robe, who wields a Sinister Scythe when he visits commoners and a sword when he visits royalty, though the scythe is the most common of his symbols.

Grim reaper scythe