Transcript A History of the World`s Religions Thirteenth Edition

A History of the World’s Religions
Thirteenth Edition
David S. Noss
Blake R. Grangaard
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Chapter 11
Shinto
The Native Contribution
to Japanese Religion
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Introduction
• Shinto is the native religion of Japan
• Not fundamentally a system of doctrines
• Reverent alliance with supramundane realities
of Japanese life
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Background of Shinto
• Shinto is derived from the Chinese shendao
meaning “the way of higher spirits or gods
• Kami-no-michi
• Shinto myth holds that Japan was once
peopled exclusively with kami
• Early Japanese regarded the whole of nature
as imbued with kami powers
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Background of Shinto
• Ethnic origins
– Likely a mixed people (Korean, Mongolian,
Malayan)
– Ancient Japan was a loose conjunction of tribes
and clans
– Comingling of magic, taboo, and religion common
in primitive societies
– Passion for personal cleanliness
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Background of Shinto
• Prehistoric cultures
– Jomon period
• Pottery dating to 6000 BCE
– Relics suggest ritual burial, fertility rights
– Yayoi period (250 BCE to 250 CE)
• Cultivation of rice
– Kofun period (250 ce to the 5th century)
• Burial mounds
• Asiatic warriors
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Background of Shinto
• Three main centers of culture (1st century BCE)
– Island of Kyushu
• Concerned with gods of the sea
– Izumo
• Worshiped the storm god
– Yamato
• Adored the sun goddess
• Yamato ascendancy
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Background of Shinto
• The effect of Chinese culture
– Civilizing influences (5th century CE)
– Metalworking, agriculture, engineering
– Language
– The sun goddess
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Background of Shinto
• Early sacred literature
– Buddhist impact
– Chronicle of Ancient Events (712 CE)
– Chronicles of Japan (720 CE)
– Gleanings from Ancient Stories (806 CE)
– The Engi-shiki (10th century CE)
– Manyoshu
– The Tale of Genji
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The Shinto Myth
• The primal progenitors
– Izanagi
– Izanami
• Pollution and the deities of cleansing
• Amaterasu and other kami
• The composite nature of the myth
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Shinto in Medieval
and More Recent Times
• Two orientations
– The family model
– The guest model
• Confucian and Buddhist influence on the elite
• The revival of Shinto as a separate religion
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Shinto in Medieval
and More Recent Times
• Shinto classical scholars
– Kamo Mabuchi
– Hirata Atsutane
– Motoori Norinaga
• Upheld the superiority of the ancient way of Japan
• No need of a moral code
• Advocated for “pure Shinto”
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Shinto in Medieval
and More Recent Times
• The restoration of 1868
• The Constitution of 1889 and the state cult
– Military placed under the emperor’s control
– Incorporation of the emperor’s descent from the
sun goddess into the Constitution
– Buddhism disestablished
– Shinto designated as the state religion
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State Shinto to 1945
• Government-fostered program of patriotic
rites
– Shrines were made national property
– Purpose was the systematic cultivation of patriotic
feeling
– American occupation in 1945 led to voluntary as
opposed to compulsory worship
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State Shinto to 1945
• Western ideas and agnosticism in Japan
– Resurgence of Buddhism
– Reentrance of Christianity
– Estrangement from officially sanctioned shrines
– Disbelief and agnosticism became widespread
• Fueled by introduction of Western science
• Census of university students in 1920 found that 65%
identified as agnostic; 33% identified as atheist; and 2%
identified as Christian
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State Shinto to 1945
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Efforts to revise the myth
Shinto as national ethics
State Shrines before 1945
The Grand Imperial Shrine at Isé
The O-Harai purification rite
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Shinto and the warrior
• The eight attitudes of the Bushido code
– Loyalty
– Gratitude
– Courage
– Justice
– Truthfulness
– Politeness
– Reserve
– Honor
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Shinto and the Warrior
• The example of “The Forty-Seven Ronin”
• The Bushido and the modern warrior
– Harakiri and jigai
– Human Bullets
– Kamikaze pilots
– Mishima
• Pre-World War II ethnocentric rational
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Shrine Shinto Today
• In 1945 110,000 shrines were cut-off from
state supervision and subsidies
• Now 86,000 shrines are maintained by a
nationwide Shrine Association
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Domestic and Sectarian Shinto
• The festivals
• Shinto in the home
– The Dolls’ Festival
– Children’s Day
• Sectarian Shinto
– The new religions
– Sects founded by women
– Continuing growth of new religions
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