[2] The cave is believed to mark the entrance to the underworld where Izanagi attempted to find Izanami after she died giving birth to Kagu-tsuchi.

The 10th century priest and poet Zōki, in his pilgrimage account Ionushi (庵主, The Master of the Hut), describes how the area around the cavern that was identified as the tomb of Izanami, as well as the cave itself, was full of buried sutras, in the belief that the texts will later rise up from the earth when Maitreya, the future Buddha, arrives.

D. Max Moerman describes the sutra burials as a way of making the area sacred to both a Buddhist future and the Imperial House of Japan as the descendants of Izanami.

A 170-meter shimenawa (標縄), made by local citizens from seven intertwined ropes, is extended from a concrete pole (previously a sacred pine tree) and the 45-meter high rock face that blocks the entrance to the underworld.

[9] A rope-changing festival called otsunakake shinji (御綱掛け神事) is held semiannually, on February and October 2, following a sacred dance to the gods.