August 19, 2001 ISF Seminar:
Shinto's Encounters with Other Religions
Forms of Religious Acculturation in Japan. |
This ISF Seminar took place in Asahi Tokai
Building near JR Tokyo Station, and was attended
by several hundred people. There were four
presentations: "Shinto and Buddhism",
by Taisho University Professor Fujii Masao;
"Shinto and Taoism," by Kogakkan
University Professor Kawano Satoshi; "Shinto
and Confucianism," by Tokyo University
Professor Emeritus Bito Masahide; and "Shinto
and Christianity," by Italian Institute
for Oriental Studies Director Professor Silvio
Vita.
(1) The complex interactions between various
schools of Buddhism and several forms of
what we today call Shinto are better known
than, say, twenty years ago. They have had
a deep impact on Japanese cultic and cultural
systems, until the Meiji government decreed,
in 1868, the prohibition of such interactions.
In his presentation, Professor Fujii outlined
his personal views on the matter, drawing
from several studies published by Japanese
scholars in a somewhat distant past. He made
five points: first, concerning various conditions
for combinations between Buddhist and Shinto
sacred entities, on various local levels;
second, concerning distinctions between "doctrine-based"
religions (Buddhism) and "rite-based"
cultural systems (Shinto), and the mechanism
of relations between doctrine (founder),
religious groups (institutions and human
organizations), and rituals (activities);
third, concerning the Japanese concept of
divine entities in Shinto and Buddhism, he
suggested that the terms "spirit"
or "divine" were more appropriate
translations for the term Kami than the term
"god"; fourth, concerning historical
stages going from assimilation to distantiation";
and last, concerning the Meiji "divorce"
between the Shinto and Buddhism.
(2) Basing himself on recent scholarship
and on his own research, Professor Kawano
discussed the early influences of Taoist
vocabulary and rituals on texts and practices
of the Nara (710-784) and Heian (794-1185)
periods. First, the presence of Taoist terminology
in the Kojiki (712) and Nihon shoki (720)
documents; second, the non-negligible amount
of Taoist technical terms used in ancient
Japanese shrines; third, the presence of
many shrines in which originally Taoist cults
were (or still are) dedicated; and fourth,
the presence of Taoist cultic elements in
past and present imperial rites. On the basis
of these analyses it is clear that the topic
is important and deserves further study.
In conclusion, Professor Kawano added that
because in China Buddhism had extremely close
interactions with Taoism, it is necessary to include the
history of Buddhism in any discussion of
relations between Taoism and Shinto.
(3) First acknowledging that there were deep
interactions between Confucianism, Neo-Confucianism,
and Shinto on the ritual level, Professor
Bito chose to limit his presentation to his
views of relations on the level of intellectual
history. He focussed his analysis on the
works of the Japanese Neo-Confucian thinkers
Kuriyama Sempo (1671-1706) and Fujita Toko
(1806-55); the former was invited early on
to participate in the compilation of Dainihon-shi
by Tokugawa Mitsukuni, while the latter is
representative of the later trend in Neo-Confucian
studies known as Mito-gaku. According to
Professor Bito, the Chinese Neo-Confucian
view that "Heaven" was an essential
component of the ideas regarding individual
and national "destiny" could not
be used as such in Japan because of the historical
absence of the notion of "Heaven"
there, and this explains why Japanese Neo-Confucian
thinkers decided to replace that term with
the Japanese word Kami, an idea already visible
in Kitabatake Chikafusa's works (1293-1354),
but largely developed by Sempo, who insisted
that the symbolic legitimacy of emperors
(and, therefore, of the moral life of the
people) ultimately resided in the three imperial
regalia, and that it was the duty of the
emperor to be truly loyal to what these regalia
were held to represent. Lest such loyalty
be active, the possession of the regalia
meant nothing. Sempo used this notion to
analyze and evaluate past Japanese history.
Toko upheld the same view, but he emphasized
the need for moral development over the need
to criticize those who failed to follow the
"Way." This emphasis on morality
as a social "Way," Professor Bito
argued can be seen in the subsequent development
on moral thought that culminated in the 1890
"Rescript on Education."
(4) Professor Vita's presentation focussed
on two radically different stages of the
history of contacts between Christianity
and Shinto: the first contact, which took
place in the sixteenth century, and the second,
which arose in the post-Meiji period's years.
The first phase can be characterized as one
of complete misunderstanding, if not outright
condemnation, on the part of European clerics,
well-attested to in a number of vitriolic
writings. The second can be characterized
as more "rational" and "tolerant."
Nonetheless, argued Professor Vita, it must
be said that the choice of the term Kami
to translate the term "God," still
in use at the present, is a source of problems
for the future.
These presentations were followed by lively
comments on the part of Mr. Fukami Toshu
(Leader of World Mate), Mr. Miyake Yoshinobu
(Chief Minister of Konko Church of Kasugaoka),
Professor Yoneyama Toshinao (President of
Otemae University), and Kyoto University
Professor Emeritus Sonoda Minoru (Chief Priest
of Chichibu Shrine). This exchange was then
followed by questions from the floor.
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Allan G. Grapard
University of California, Santa Barbara
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