Search

The Chinese and Japanese stories of capturing yaoguai or yōkai and obtaining treasures in haunted houses share a common origin from 'Xì Yāo' narratives. The core motif chain remains largely consistent, despite distinct differences in the treatment of yaoguai. In China, these beings are often expelled or even killed, whereas in Japan they are usually appeased and revered. The underlying reasons can be largely attributed to the influence of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism in China, which perceive yaoguai as ominous and associate them with calamities. In contrast, the integration of Buddhism and Shintoism in Japan has created a cultural landscape that offers a pathway for yōkai to ascend to the status of deities. The dissemination of similar stories primarily relies on the stability of the motif chain, while variations beyond it serve as essential conditions for the acceptance and dissemination of these stories across regions, ethnicities, and even nations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a brief report on a yearly festival at a Shintō shrine in northern Japan, during which salt is produced by a traditional technique: sea water is filtered through layers of salt-saturated kelp in order to increase its salinity. The procedure, which lasts three days, is being kept alive as communal memory and for educational purposes. The successive steps are described as witnessed by the author in 2003. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to create an orderly state, the first imperial chronicles emerged in the early 8th century in the territory of modern Japan through the integration and systematization of mythical elements that proved the legitimacy of the government and the descent of the imperial Yamato lineage from the supreme deity of the Shinto pantheon - the Great Sun Goddess Amaterasu. This mythic paradigm was created on the existing mytho-historical foundations fostered by cultural and political contacts with the Korean kingdoms and the Chinese empire. There is evidence that the cult of the solar deity, originally portrayed as a male principle, originated in a corpus outside the Yamato mythological system. And since male-female pairs of rulers were common (first it was the gods, later the ruler and the shamaness), it is possible that at some point the distinction between the sexes was blurred and then the female side prevailed. However, the female ancestral deity does not indicate a period of matriarchy. This symbolic type of goddess, who initiates a patrimonial lineage with rare female exceptions, was created by members of a privileged group of powerful men to legitimize their own power structures. Moreover, the cult of the mother goddess is not limited to the solar principle, but is associated with weaving, silk production, and agriculture. Thus, the simple assertion that the Yamato imperial lineage descended from the goddess Amaterasu raises numerous questions and doubts, which this essay attempts to answer.

The article aims to better understand Christian nationalism by investigating the cases of Uchimura Kanzō and Nitobe Inazō, two well-known Christians of Meiji Japan. In Meiji Japan, Christianity was a recently re-introduced and foreign faith which was not aligned with the Japanese way of life. However, both Uchimura and Nitobe converted to Christianity in their youth and dedicated their life to the development of Japan. The article investigates what made this possible. It pays particular attention to the relationship between politics and religion and the Meiji government's attempts to adopt the western view of the relationship to the nascent Japanese state. It argues that the invention of state Shintō as a non-religion but an indispensable part of the Japanese polity by the Meiji government created space where Christian faith and Japanese nationalism could co-exist, the space which was increasingly squeezed as Meiji turned to Taishō and then to Shōwa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the role of Shinto in Japanese environmentalism. It first presents perceptions of nature in Japan and the historical role of Shinto, then delves into the conservation of sacred shrine forests – Chinju no mori – within the Shinto environmentalist discourse. The role of Shinto in politics is demonstrated through the activities of the Association of Shinto Shrines – Jinja Honcho. Finally, presenting shrine groves as urban green spaces and community centres shows the potential of Shinto values working together with environmental conservation.

Japan is a country that is home to polytheistic religions, namely Buddhism and Shintoism. However, in comparison to Buddhism, which is spread widely, Shinto is mainly found in Japan. Thus, foreign visitors are most likely to encounter Shinto and Shinto shrines for the first time when they visit Japan. It can be argued that developing an understanding of the major religion(s) of a country can enhance cultural understanding. However, a clear definition of Shinto is an ongoing debate in Japan and among scholars across the world. Hence, this research tries to understand through Content Analysis of English and German language travel / guidebooks how Shinto is presented to foreign tourists. Previous research showed that these texts can be a major source to learn about other religions. The ‘Shinto Paradigms’ as identified by Aike Rots build a framework to analyse the content. He identified six paradigms, each attributed to certain themes which can be used to define Shinto. The results show that most western travel information sources present Shinto in the context of the ‘Ethnic Paradigm’ that portrays Shinto as an indigenous religion which is deeply intertwined in the Japanese life. However, some of the same sources also show traits of a more recent definition approach, the ‘Environmental Paradigm’ which strongly connects nature and the environment with Shinto. These findings have implications for marketing Shinto shrines for tourism, as a common presentation of Shinto does not exist that can shape the tourist’s experience and understanding of the host culture. Further, the paper shows that the paradigms of Rots provide a base framework for further tourism related Shinto studies, while reflecting the difficulties of portraying a congruent definition of Shinto.

The aim of the article is to reflect on religious themes in contemporary Japanese comics. The manga Mieruko-chan by Tomoki Izumi is analyzed. The themes include the Japanese tradition of horror, derived from folk beliefs, as well as Shintō and Buddhist rituals. The author draws attention to religion as an important element of creating cultural reality and its function that makes it more attractive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The topic of lies is of considerable interest in linguocultural analysis. The article discusses the role of lies in the language behavior of the Japanese in connection with the most important Japanese socio-cultural attitudes. Lying in Japanese culture is characterized as a social phenomenon without negative components. Japanese culture, which reflects the main features of traditional societies of the Far East, has its own special socio-cultural space with the dominant role of Shinto beliefs. Shinto is characterized by following the natural and traditional order of things and the absence of a firm scale of assessment of good and evil. Lies for the Japanese do not create a rejecting effect: they are not condemned harshly and are not punished and lying is not a source of internal experiences and torment. The morality of the Japanese is situational and intuitive, moral virtues are often replaced by a sense of shame, and the Japanese need to maintain harmony, so lies are allowed and accepted favorably. A lie is even necessary as an element of etiquette, polite (decent) behavior to preserve harmony in the group. The Japanese tend to behave relating to the surrounding group members, so the use of easy, inconspicuous, and kind lies may be caused by a specific situation, by the rules of group behavior. In addition, the Japanese are not characterized by the anguish of conscience, internal awareness of their guilt, or reasoning about immorality — the main motivating point for them is what others will say. And people around them will recognize it as acceptable and necessary. Lying is closely related to the concept of tatemae — an external model of behavior demonstrated before another person. A person, hiding behind a facade, under a mask, says what the listener wants to hear. That behavior seems a little insincere or duplicitous but is usually used to avoid conflict and ensure smooth social communication, rather than to trick or deceive. One who does not use the rules of tatemae may hurt the feelings of the person he or she is talking to or make the conversation unpleasant by revealing too much. Lying can take the form of polite and socially acceptable silence when the speaker hides his disagreement and true thoughts from the listener.

In The God Strategy, David Domke and Kevin Coe introduced the concepts of God talk and faith talk to distinguish between explicit and implicit references to religion in American political discourse. Although God talk is perhaps more prevalent in nations where allusions to religion are commonplace in political language, faith talk – speaking to adherents through the use of “cues” that are often imperceptible to outsiders – is more likely to be used by politicians in states such as Japan, where secular legislation restricts the political discourse. In this paper I will illustrate how faith talk is used as a rhetorical strategy in the discourse of politicians representing Japan’s conservative right, with a particular focus on the rhetoric and public image of Abe Shinzō. Abe fostered an image of himself as a self-proclaimed nationalist and devoted “Shintoist,” and he retained close ties to many of the organizations that together form the postwar “Shinto establishment,” including the Association of Shinto Shrines (Jinja Honchō, NASS). Although Abe was rarely as explicit as U.S. presidents tend to be, through his words and actions he disseminated the image of Japan as a “Shinto” nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Croatian Journal of Ethnology & Folklore Research / Narodna Umjetnost is the property of Institute of Ethnology & Folklore Research and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Japan is a country that is home to polytheistic religions, namely Buddhism and Shintoism. However, in comparison to Buddhism, which is spread widely, Shinto is mainly found in Japan. Thus, foreign visitors are most likely to encounter Shinto and Shinto shrines for the first time when they visit Japan. It can be argued that developing an understanding of the major religion(s) of a country can enhance cultural understanding. However, a clear definition of Shinto is an ongoing debate in Japan and among scholars across the world. Hence, this research tries to understand through Content Analysis of English and German language travel / guidebooks how Shinto is presented to foreign tourists. Previous research showed that these texts can be a major source to learn about other religions. The ‘Shinto Paradigms’ as identified by Aike Rots build a framework to analyse the content. He identified six paradigms, each attributed to certain themes which can be used to define Shinto. The results show that most western travel information sources present Shinto in the context of the ‘Ethnic Paradigm’ that portrays Shinto as an indigenous religion which is deeply intertwined in the Japanese life. However, some of the same sources also show traits of a more recent definition approach, the ‘Environmental Paradigm’ which strongly connects nature and the environment with Shinto. These findings have implications for marketing Shinto shrines for tourism, as a common presentation of Shinto does not exist that can shape the tourist’s experience and understanding of the host culture. Further, the paper shows that the paradigms of Rots provide a base framework for further tourism related Shinto studies, while reflecting the difficulties of portraying a congruent definition of Shinto. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Spanish Journal of Comparative Education / Revista Española de Educación Comparada is the property of Editorial UNED and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Yijing ('Classic of Changes') is an important text in Daoist and Confucian traditions in China. It also served as a building block of ancient Japanese culture. The Japanese creation myth described in the Jindai no maki ('Chapters on the Age of the Gods') of the Nihon shoki ('Chronicles of Japan', 720 CE) was strongly influenced by such Yijing -related concepts as taiji ('Supreme Ultimate'), yinyang (the two complementary and contradictory forces in the universe), qiankun (first two trigrams representing heaven and earth), sancai (three powers or realms of the universe: heaven, earth, man), wuxing (five phases or agents), and bagua (eight trigrams). The Japanese creation myth was later Confucianised in the Tokugawa period (1603–1868), when Japanese Confucian and Shinto scholars provided the Neo-Confucian metaphysical underpinning for Shinto mythology. Based on a close reading of the Jindai no maki , this study aims to investigate how Yijing -related concepts were used to construct the Japanese creation myth and how Tokugawa Confucian and Shinto scholars further elaborated upon it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When discussing the role of the sacred in design education, the conversation focuses on a transcendent divinity, the dominant paradigm of divinity in the West. This orientation towards a divine other underscores the separateness of rare, specific acts of design-for-the-divine from the majority of the projects students engage in studio and, later, in practice. Of greater value in contemporary classrooms may be student explorations of immanent forms of divinity; of spaces and objects that are not infused with spiritual meaning by their orientation towards some other, higher divinity but by the divinity present within themselves. An immanent orientation in student design studios can add layers of significance to finished projects and overlay the processes of design and production themselves, transforming them from simple acts of production into spiritual acts of communion with the divine. Seeking as a model an extant design culture whose processes and products are intimately interlaced with the immanent-divine, this paper proposes a study of Japanese craft practices and the Japanese native religion of Shinto. Because it emphasizes practice over dogma, vernacular Shinto permeates modern Japanese culture, especially its art and design traditions. From this fusion of Shinto and contemporary Japanese craft, this paper derives three core lessons for Western designers and explores ways of incorporating these lessons into the western design education.

In 1994, I migrated to New York City to pursue my art, freedom, and potential. Over the last 27 years, I learned to understand and respect the differences of people with different values, genders, religions, and races. I continued self-transforming by looking at issues from different angles with flexible thinking. Living far away from Japan, I reaffirmed my roots and rediscovered myself objectively. It's especially interesting to me that the relationship between Japan and the United States has been strengthened through the atomic bomb. Behind this is the influence of Shinto and Buddhism on the Japanese way of thinking. Their teachings play a major role in peace operations. In addition, the power of faith is sometimes abused, and serious social problems are occurring. "Kusudama" means medicine ball. In my Peace and Harmony Workshop , many individual participants, who all experienced the same pandemic disaster, created medicine balls while sharing our common wishes for health, long life, and peace. Faith is, to me, the power to believe in ourselves. The symbolic work of a sphere, connecting faith and art, opens up a world full of charity, not division. Looking back on what I learned through my life and artwork, I consider and write about what kind of future we hope for, and what role religion and art can play. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The “modernity” of Japan is to overcome and transcend other principal civilizations. From the perspective of historical context, Japan first overcame the influence of traditional Chinese order and civilization by “leaving Asia”. Then Japan resisted the West to eliminate the psychological depression of the failure to “join Europe” and constantly surpassed and overcome its previous modern identity, in an attempt to achieve the pattern of leading Asia and rivaling Europe and the United States.From the perspective of religious context, through institutionalization and homogenization of God and human, Shinto rose to the national religion at the ideological level, and then became the religion that dominated the national consciousness in the process of “integration of politics and religion”. As a result, it fulfilled the two transcendences in the face of “modernity”,and realized the integration of internal thoughts, and making a contribution to foreign aggression. Therefore, it has become an important factors for Japan to launch many aggressive wars from the 19th century to the 20th century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Japan, the ideal of economic practice has long been rooted in a native Shintō-inspired religious sensibility according to which the world is populated by a myriad of deities (yaoyorozu no kami; lit., “the eight million gods”). This engenders an understanding of the other in an economic transaction as having a transcendent nature, and of the household and wider society as a fortiori transcending (both spiritually and diachronically) the individual economic actor. In turn, the transcendent view of the human person has nurtured a person-centered approach to economic activity in Japan. The author examines three iterations of Japanese spiritually-inflected economic activity—the Ōmi merchants, the Shingaku teachings of Ishida Baigan, and the “unity of economic and moral practice” views of Shibusawa Eiichi and later business ethics thinkers—to show that, regardless of specific creed, Japanese economic thinking tends to reproduce the understanding of economic activity as ideally beneficial for human persons. By viewing the human person as an end and never as a means—an anthropology which is ultimately Shintōist, although broadly compatible with other beliefs—the standard economic actor in Japan works for the betterment of his counterpart and of society as a whole. This human-centered approach should and can be replicated in other countries around the world.

The video game Ōkami encourages players to immerse themselves in a digital gamescape that incorporates Japanese aesthetics, stories, and religious philosophies. The designers have gamified Shintō holographic reasoning, Confucian virtues, and Buddhist metaphors of fighting demons of the mind to create a world modeled after a mythological retelling of medieval Japan. A significant portion of the player's gameplay involves purifying pollutants from the environment, which improves the player character and the Japanesque world's citizens. The game acts as a playable metaphor that teaches the player about Japanese religion and culture by allowing them to enact an interpretation of it interactively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the career of ethno-nationalist leader Kageyama Masaharu, who was active during the greater part of the Showa era. It argues that though the notion of 'Showa Restoration' is typically understood in terms of the bloody coup d'état attempts of the prewar era, the postwar career of its participants necessitates a broader understanding of the term. Kageyama is best known as a conspirator in the failed terrorist attack known as the Shimpeitai Incident of 1933, but he also played a major role in nationalist politics in the postwar era. His activities ranged from lobbying for the recuperation and repair of physical and temporal institutions related to the imperial house, such as rituals at Ise Shrine and National Establishment Day, to the nurturing of young ethno-nationalists at his Great East Institute. The ideas and platforms of Showa Restorationists like Kageyama survived the US Occupation and the Cold War era in the form of ethno-nationalist (minzokuha) activists and lobbyists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus of this Special Issue is on medieval Japanese religion. Although Kamakura "new" Buddhist schools are usually taken as unquestioned landmarks of the medieval religious landscape, it is necessary to add complexity to this static picture in order to grasp the dynamic and hybrid character of the religious practices and theories that were produced during this historical period. This Special Issue will shed light on the diversity of medieval Japanese religion by adopting a wide range of analytical approaches, encompassing various fields of knowledge such as history, philosophy, materiality, literature, medical studies, and body theories. Its purpose is to expand the interpretative boundaries of medieval Japanese religion beyond Buddhism by emphasizing the importance of mountain asceticism (Shugendō), Yin and Yang (Onmyōdō) rituals, medical and soteriological practices, combinatory paradigms between local gods and Buddhist deities (medieval Shintō), hagiographies, religious cartography, conflations between performative arts and medieval Shintō mythologies, and material culture. This issue will foster scholarly comprehension of medieval Japanese religion as a growing network of heterogeneous religious traditions in permanent dialogue and reciprocal transformation. While there is a moderate amount of works that address some of the aspects described above, there is yet no publication attempting to embrace all these interrelated elements within a single volume. The present issue will attempt to make up for this lack. At the same time, it will provide a crucial contribution to the broad field of premodern Japanese religions, demonstrating the inadequacy of a rigid interpretative approach based on sectarian divisions and doctrinal separation. Our project underlines the hermeneutical importance of developing a polyphonic vision of the multifarious reality that lies at the core of medieval Japanese religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines Jūzenji 十禅師, a medieval god worshiped within the Sannō cult at Hie Shrine during the twelfth to sixteenth centuries. The article demonstrates that Tendai thinkers promoted Jūzenji to a supreme ontological status since his liminal and ambivalent character afforded him the unique role of redirecting the sinful desires of the flesh into awakening. Three different figures promoted Jūzenji. First, the Tendai abbot Jien 慈円 (1155–1255) constructed ritual programs that raised Jūzenji to the apogee of the Sannō Shintō pantheon, which combined with engi literature concerning Jien's sexuality, permitted the re-envisioning of Jūzenji as a libidinal god. Second, the preceptors of Mt. Hiei (kaike 戒家) transformed Jūzenji into an embodiment of the precepts, which enabled Jūzenji to encapsulate morality and thereby render sexual sins null. Third, Tendai Sannō Shintō theologians (kike 記家) interweaved Jūzenji with the doctrine of the threefold truth (santai 三諦), which became the basis of the Taimitsu sexual initiation known as Chigo Kanjō 児灌頂. As such, this article offers an important case study whereby a subsidiary god outshines its own godhead for the purpose of legitimating sexuality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A survey of the history of medieval Kōyasan, an important mountain-based headquarters for esoteric Shingon Buddhism since the early ninth century, cannot omit significant developments in the worship of kami (tutelary and ancestral gods) from the end of the Heian period (794–1185) to the Muromachi period (1333–1573). A fundamental aspect of kami worship at Kōyasan was the regular offering to the kami (shinbōraku 神法楽) of mondō-kō 問答講 (catechism/dialogue form, or 'question and answer' 'lectures') and rongi (debate examinations in the form of mondō). The relationship between Buddhist scholarship and kami worship has not been fully elucidated and such will enrich understanding of both subjects. The identities and meanings of the two oldest kami enshrined at Kōyasan, Niu Myōjin 丹生明神 (also called Niutsuhime) and Kariba Myōjin 狩場明神 (also called Kōya Myōjin), were delineated in texts produced by scholar monks (gakuryo 学侶) during a period when the debates were re-systematized after a period of sporadicity and decline, so the precise functions of this cinnabar goddess and hunter god in the related ritual offerings deserve attention. In this paper I examine ideas about the Kōyasan kami that can be found, specifically, in the institution and development of these mondō and rongi 論義. Placing them in this context yields new information, and offers new methods of understanding of not only related textual materials, but also of the icons used in the debates, and the related major ceremonies (hōe 法会) and individual ritual practices (gyōbō 行法) that were involved. Given that the candidates of a major ritual debate examination—to be discussed—that has been practiced from the Muromachi period up to the present day are said to 'represent' kami, and are even referred to by the names of kami, the history of the precise relationship between the kami and the debates invites more detailed explanation that has so far been largely lacking in the scholarship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As more and more religious content appears in anime, the actual meaning of its use in anime may be different. This phenomenon is known as religious cosmetics introduced by Jolyon Baraka Thomas. Religious cosmetics introduces the term religious vocabulary and religious imagery. This study focuses on analyzing religious vocabulary, and aims to prove whether the Shinto religious vocabularies that appears in the anime Enen no Shouboutai season 1 (2019) are religious cosmetics. The method used in this study is qualitative descriptive. The use of words in the anime Enen no Shouboutaiseason 1 will be compared with the meaning of the vocabulary from the Shinto religious dictionary compiled by Brian Bocking. The results showed that there are eighteen data of religious vocabularies that appear in anime Enen no Shouboutai season 1, which can be divided into five categories, namely (1) ‘amaterasu’, (2) ‘kami’, (3) ‘matsuri’, (4) ‘oni’, and (5) ‘sake’. However, among those five categories appeared throughout the series, four were found as Shinto religious vocabularies which used as religious cosmetics while one category (3) ‘matsuri’ was not used as religious cosmetics. The reason is because the meaning and the use of the word is getting wider, not only used in Shinto related topics, but also in daily life generally.

Japanologists have identified the intellectual movement called Kokugaku ("national learning") as early modern Japan's version of nativism, even though it bears no resemblance to the original American version of nativism from the 1840s, namely Know-Nothingism. Instead, Kokugaku had striking intellectual and institutional similarities with pre-Civil War Transcendentalism. Americanists have associated Transcendentalism with the broader ideological phenomenon known as exceptionalism, rather than with nativism. For this reason, this article proposes to reclassify Kokugaku as exceptionalism, instead of nativism, via a comparison between it and Transcendentalism. The intellectual linchpin between Transcendentalism and exceptionalism is Fichte, whose ideas influenced Japan's literary genre known as Nihonjinron ("theories of Japanese[-ness]"), the modern successor of Kokugaku, a connection that bolsters the intellectual legitimacy of the view that Kokugaku and Transcendentalism are analogous versions of exceptionalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the concept of covenantal pluralism in a context of postwar Japan, with a focus on the legal framework separating the state from religion and guaranteeing the rights of religious minorities. The article argues that while there are relatively few instances of sectarian strife, the lack of agreement on how to interpret the category of religion, in particular in relation to Shrine Shinto, continues to lead to struggles between different camps. The article also questions the feasibility of covenantal pluralism as an ideal in a country where national identity is so closely linked to ideas of social homogeneity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars of Japanese religion have recently drawn attention to the global repositioning, "greening", and international popularization of Shinto. However, research on Shinto ritual practice and material religion continues to focus predominantly on cases located within the borders of the Japanese state. This article explores the globalization of Shinto through transnational practitioners' strategic glocalization of everyday ritual practices outside of Japan. Drawing upon digital ethnographic fieldwork conducted in online Shinto communities, I examine three case studies centering on traditional ritual offerings made at the domestic altar (kamidana): rice, sake, and sakaki branches. I investigate how transnational Shinto communities hold in tension a multiplicity of particularistic understandings of Shinto locality and authenticity when it comes to domestic ritual practice. While relativistic approaches to glocalization locate the sacred and authentic in an archetypical or idealized form of Japanese tradition rooted in its environment, creolization and transformation valorize the particularities of one's personal surroundings and circumstances. Examining these strategies alongside recent and historical cases in Shinto ritual at shrines within Japan, I propose that attending to processes of "parallel glocalization" helps to illuminate the quasi-fictive notion of the religious "homeland" and close the perceived gap in authenticity between ritual practices at home and abroad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]