Katashiro

Katashiro are substitutes for or representations of a deity: a prime example would be a figurine, doll, or statue. Katashiro sometimes function as stand-ins for ancestral spirits during memorial rites, and in that sense the earthenware figurines (dogū and haniwa) of prehistoric Japan may be considered a type of katashiro. In some Shinto purification rituals (misogi), a katashiro is rubbed over a person’s body to transfer their energies onto it before it is set afloat on a river or other body of water. This is the origin of the hina nagashi (“doll floating”) festivals in various parts of the country. The word hina for “doll” originally signified a katashiro.
Katagiro is not the form itself, but the agent that allows the form to have power. It is the agent force that causes the form to become what it is supposed to be. Since we cannot see such a thing, it is God’s involvement that allows the form to take form.