Ian Reader

Turning to the Gods in Times of Trouble: The Place, Time and Structure of Japanese Religion

Not long after I first arrived in Japan in 1981 two Japanese friends, knowing my interest in religion, decided to take me out for the day to visit some Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines.* Before setting out they assured me that they were neither religious nor did they have any interest in religion: their participation in the trip was purely to show me some places that would be of interest to me in my studies. I have long since become inured to Japanese people telling me that they are not religious, even whilst performing acts of an overtly religious nature such as praying at a shrine or walking a pilgrimage route dressed in the traditional clothing of a Japanese pilgrim, so that nowadays I hardly take any notice of such protestations. At the time, however, I did, assuming that this meant my friends would act similarly to me at such places — interested, respectful but not worshipful.

Individuals, Ascetics and the Expression of Power

While the religious world in Japan has provided a basis for social harmony, cohesion and belonging, it has also offered ample scope for self-expression and individuality, as the sociologists Sugimoto and Mouer have commented: Given the syncretic nature of Japanese religious practices and a tradition of many gods, each individual is able to choose a unique combination of gods and practices to suit his or her own individualistic needs.1

Sites and Sights: Temples and Shrines as Centres of Power and Entertainment

There are enormous numbers of shrines and temples in Japan: some are primarily local community shrines or temples for memorialising the ancestors, yet others extend their influence beyond the environs of their local community. Many of the religious centres that permeate Japan’s landscape have widespread reputations as locations and centres of religious power, and as arenas at and through which the spiritual world and power of the kami, Buddhas and other entities may be contacted, encountered and assimilated for human benefit. Often there is a link here to the powerful individuals and ascetic figures discussed in the previous chapter, for the reputations of many of these religious centres are founded in oracles, omens, stories of miraculous events and transcendent deeds that centre on or are attributed to ascetic wanderers and sages of the distant past. When, as is common, these are aligned to such additional factors as a beautiful physical setting, fine architecture and good transport access they become magnets drawing in large crowds.

Unifying Traditions, Cosmological Perspectives and the Vitalistic Universe

Situation and circumstance are intrinsic elements in the Japanese religious world, amply demonstrating its populist, pragmatic and ethnic orientations relevant to the Japanese people, their life styles, needs and environment in this world. All these elements have their roots in the enduring Japanese folk religious tradition that was based originally in a primarily agricultural society in which such actions as cyclical observances and rituals, petitions to deities for good harvests, concern for the spirits of the dead and their potential for malevolent actions against the living, and beliefs in the powers of the spiritual world to help or hinder humans in their pursuit of happiness in this life were paramount, but which continues to exert its influences in contemporary, industrialised Japan. Over the centuries the folk tradition has provided what Miyake Hitoshi has termed the ‘frame of reference’ through which organised religious traditions have found their roots and grown in Japan,1 providing a centralising dynamic through which all the religious traditions found in Japan have been interpreted and assimilated in such a way that each has added to the overall picture, contributing to a whole that is more than simply the sum of its parts.

‘Born Shinto …’: Community, Festivals, Production and Change

Religion has always had an intensely social nature in Japan, providing, and being used to provide, a sense of social cohesion, continuity, community and identity on many levels at once, from local and familial to regional and national. In national terms Shinto in particular has long had close ties to concepts of Japanese national unity and identity: the very creation of early writings such as the Kojiki, for instance, with their legitimations of Imperial rule and assertions of Japanese descent from the kami, testifies to this.

Spirits, Satellites and a User-Friendly Religion: Agonshū and the New Religions

Probably the single most discussed and dynamic phenomenon in the Japanese religious world in the past few decades has been the rise and proliferation of new religions (known in Japanese as shin shūkyō).1 Since the early nineteenth century many hundreds of religious movements have developed in Japan in a constant process of flux, growth, decline and renewal. Some have flourished and grown into massive organisations.

‘… Die Buddhist’: Zen, Death and the Ancestors

On the surface at least it might appear rather ironic that the religion that started when the Buddha left his family in order to seek awakening and enlightenment in his own lifetime, a religion that has evolved an immense depth of scriptural teaching, philosophical erudition and spiritual practice, should be seen by the vast majority of Japanese as something associated with the rites of death, with social bonding and the preservation of the household. As was noted in Chapter 1, most Japanese, even if they have no other or prior contact with, knowledge of or belief in Buddhism, ‘die Buddhist’. Buddhism is both the agency for dealing with death and the religion of the household, supporting the community of lineage that provides its individual members with a sense of identity and continuity in generational and historical terms, its social roles interlocking with the support and structure given to the community of belonging in geographical and regional terms by the Shinto shrine and its cycle of rites and festivals.

Actions, Amulets and the Expression of Meaning: Reflections of Need and Statements of Desire

Japanese people are rarely passive within the framework of temples and shrines, but generally interact actively with the religious environment around them and with all the diverse objects signifying the presence and nature of the spiritual within that environment. Religious sites are basically settings in and through which religious power may be accessed and diffused, and the various signs and symbols present within them are vehicles of that power, conduits through which its beneficial aspects may be disseminated and shared out. All these signs and symbols, from the rows of statues and the myriad signs of the presence of kami indicated by the ropes tied round trees and rocks to the numerous talismans and amulets signifying good fortune and protection, provide enormous scope and choice of action, each providing an opportunity and setting for interactions through which relationships may be created, whether temporary and conditioned by needs and circumstances or regular and underpinned by personal affinity and devotion.