Shinto is polytheistic, involving the veneration of many deities known as "kami", or sometimes as "jingi". As is often the case in the Japanese language, no distinction is made here between singular and plural, and hence the term "kami" refers both to individual kami and the collective group of kami. Although lacking a direct English translation, "kami" has sometimes been rendered as "god" or "spirit"; the historian of religion Joseph Kitagawa stated that these English translations were "quite unsatisfactory and misleading", and various scholars urge against translating "kami" into English. In Japanese, it is often said that there are eight million kami, and Shinto practitioners believe that they are present everywhere. They are not regarded as omnipotent, omniscient, or necessarily immortal.