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The State of Nippon-Nihon.
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日本 | Religion
░░ 日本 • NIHON ░░
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R E L I G I O N
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Article 20 of the 1947 Constitution states: "Freedom of religion is guaranteed to all. No religious organization shall receive any privileges from the State, nor exercise any political authority. No person shall be compelled to take part in any religious act, celebration, rite or practice. The State and its organs shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity". This change in constitutional rights provided mechanisms for limiting state educational initiatives designed to promote Shinto beliefs in schools and freed the populace from mandatory participation in Shinto rites. Shintō ▬▬▬ Shinto (神道, Shintō), also kami-no-michi, is the indigenous religion of Japan and of most of the people of Japan. George Williams classifies Shinto as an action-centered religion; it focuses on ritual practices to be carried out diligently in order to establish a connection between present-day Japan and its ancient roots. The written historical records of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki first recorded and codified Shinto practices in the 8th century. Still, these earliest Japanese writings do not refer to a unified "Shinto religion", but rather to a collection of native beliefs and of mythology. Practitioners express their diverse beliefs through a standard language and practice, adopting a similar style in dress and ritual dating from around the time of the Nara (710–794) and Heian (794–1185) periods. The Japanese adopted the word Shinto ("way of the gods"), originally as Shindo, from the written Chinese Shendao (Chinese: 神道; pinyin: shén dào), combining two kanji: shin (神), meaning "spirit" or kami; and tō (道), meaning a philosophical path or study (from the Chinese word dào). The oldest recorded usage of the word Shindo dates from the second half of the 6th century. Kami are defined in English as "spirits", "essences" or "gods", referring to the energy generating the phenomena. Since the Japanese language does not distinguish between singular and plural, kami refers to the divinity, or sacred essence, that manifests in multiple forms: rocks, trees, rivers, animals, places, and even people can be said to possess the nature of kami. Kami and people are not separate; they exist within the same world and share its interrelated complexity. Buddhism ▬▬▬ Buddhism (仏教, Bukkyō) first arrived in Japan in the 6th century, introduced in the year 538 or 552 from the kingdom of Baekje in Korea. The Baekje king sent the Japanese emperor a picture of the Buddha and some sutras. After overcoming brief yet violent oppositions by conservative forces, it was accepted by the Japanese court in 587. The Yamato state ruled over clans (uji) centered around the worship of ancestral nature deities. It was also a period of intense immigration from Korea, horse riders from northeast Asia, as well as cultural influence from China, that had been unified under the Sui dynasty becoming the crucial power on the mainland. Buddhism functioned to affirm the state's power and mold its position in the broader culture of East Asia. Japanese aristocrats set about building Buddhist temples in the capital at Nara, and then in the later capital at Heian (now Kyoto). The six Buddhist sects initially established in Nara are today together known as "Nara Buddhism" and are relatively small. When the capital moved to Heian, more forms of Buddhism arrived from China, including the still-popular Shingon Buddhism, an esoteric form of Buddhism similar to Tibet's Vajrayana Buddhism, and Tendai, a monastic conservative form known better by its Chinese name, Tiantai. When the shogunate took power in the 12th century and the administrative capital moved to Kamakura, more forms of Buddhism arrived. The most culturally influential was Zen, which focused on meditation and attaining enlightenment in this life. Two schools of Zen were established, Rinzai and Sōtō; a third, Ōbaku, formed in 1661. With the Meiji Restoration in 1868 and its accompanying centralisation of imperial power and modernisation of the state, Shinto was made the state religion. An order of elimination of mutual influence of Shinto and Buddhism was also enacted, followed by a movement to thoroughly eradicate Buddhism from Japan. Another prevalent form of Buddhism is Nichiren Buddhism, which was established by the 13th century monk Nichiren who underlined the importance of the Lotus Sutra. The main representatives of Nichiren Buddhism include sects such as Nichiren Shū and Nichiren Shōshū, and lay organisations like Risshō Kōsei Kai and Soka Gakkai. Common to most lineages of Nichiren Buddhism is the chanting of Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō (or Nam Myoho Renge Kyo) and the Gohonzon inscribed by Nichiren. Christianity ▬▬▬ Christianity (キリスト教 Kirisutokyō), in the form of Catholicism (カトリック教 Katorikkukyō), was introduced into Japan by Jesuit missions starting in 1549. In that year, the three Jesuits Francis Xavier, Cosme de Torres and Juan Fernández, landed in Kagoshima, in Kyushu, on 15 August. Portuguese traders were active in Kagoshima since 1543, welcomed by local daimyōs because they imported gunpowder. Anjirō, a Japanese convert, helped the Jesuits understanding Japanese culture and translating the first Japanese catechism. These missionaries were successful in converting large numbers of people in Kyushu, including peasants, former Buddhist monks, and members of the warrior class. In 1559, a mission to the capital, Kyoto, was started. By the following year there were nine churches, and the Christian community grew steadily in the 1560s. By 1569 there were 30,000 Christians and 40 churches. Following the conversion of some lords in Kyushu, mass baptisms of the local populations occurred, and in the 1570s the number of Christians rose rapidly to 100,000. Near the end of the 16th century, Franciscan missionaries arrived in Kyoto, despite a ban issued by Toyotomi Hideyoshi. In 1597, Hideyoshi proclaimed a more serious edict and executed 26 Franciscans in Nagasaki as a warning. Tokugawa Ieyasu and his successors enforced the prohibition of Christianity with several further edicts, especially after the Shimabara Rebellion in the 1630s. Many Christians continued to practice in secret. However, more importantly, the discourses on Christianity became the property of the state during the Tokugawa period. The state leveraged its power over to declare Christians enemies of the state in order to create and maintain a legally enforceable identity for Japanese subjects. As such, Christian identities or icons became the exclusive property of the Japanese state. Although often discussed as a "foreign" or "minority" religion, Christianity has played a key sociopolitical role in the lives of Japanese subjects and citizens for hundreds of years. In 1873, following the Meiji Restoration, the ban was rescinded, freedom of religion was promulgated, and Protestant missionaries (プロテスタント Purotesutanto or 新教 Shinkyō, "renewed teaching") began to proselytise in Japan, intensifying their activities after World War II, yet they were never as successful as in Korea. |
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Designed by 
Paramountica, Assembled for Commonwealth of Liberty.
Paramountica, Assembled for Commonwealth of Liberty.
