𝗔 𝗬𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗶𝗻 𝗙𝗮𝗶𝘁𝗵, 𝗗𝗮𝘆 𝟱: 𝗦𝗵𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼
Shinto is the native faith of Japan and can be traced back, in one form, to roughly 300 BCE. It is centered on the belief in Kami, a category of supernatural entity I will expound upon further along in this entry. The word “Shinto” is written with the characters “神道”. The first character is the same one used to write “Kami” (in this word it used a pronunciation based on the Chinese “shén”). The second character means “path” or “way”, the same as the “tao” in Taoism. Thus “Shinto” is “the way of the Kami”.
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀𝗻’𝘁 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗶𝘁
Classifying Shinto has been difficult for Western academics, as it is structurally quite different from the typical Western concept of religion. Unique situations aside, making the claim “I am a Christian” also comes with implicit information that you are not a Buddhist, Jew, Sikh, etc. Shinto, on the other hand, is not only not exclusive, but has a long-standing history of incorporation with other traditions, most prominently Buddhism. In fact, some academics even say it is improper to truly classify Shinto as Japan’s indigenous faith as it may be more accurate to say it is a fusion of indigenous faith, Buddhism, and Chinese Folk Religion. Furthermore, Shinto has no central text, no founder, no messiah, no central temple or indeed any kind of true central authority. There was a brief period of some kind of unity; the reign of State Shinto, also called Imperial Shinto. This was a religious movement that we can see mirrored in the empires of Rome and the Aztec (Triple Alliance), where the state, in this case Japanese Empire in the Meiji era (1868-1912), modified the common religion into a central government controlled doctrine that promoted themes of nationalism and deified the Emperor. After WWII State Shinto was largely supplanted by the pre-existing traditions focused on shrines and local communities. It’s worth noting that many of these terms are used more by Westerners than Japanese people. It is difficult to draw specific lines between Shinto as a faith and Shinto as an extension of Japanese secular culture. Though almost all Japanese people participate in Shinto rituals and practices many would not identify themselves as practitioners of Shinto.
𝗞𝗮𝗺𝗶
Across the world, every faith and tradition has their own words for their specific supernatural entity. All translations are always somewhat imperfect. The English word “god” is not necessarily equivalent to the Hindu “Deva” or the Norse “Ǫ́ss”, but the slight imperfection is generally considered to be within the realm of acceptability, at least for none academic conversation. “Kami”, by contrast, is not normally translated. This is because English words like “god” or “spirit” do not fall within an acceptable realm of definition. Kami includes entities that we would call “gods”, like Amaterasu (the sun goddess) but it can also refer to very localized entities, such as the spirit of a specific forest or even a specific tree. Ancestral spirits can become Kami. Much like Shinto itself, Kami can vary widely. Some are powerful, some are weak. Some are eternal, some are fleeting. It is often said that there are “8 million” Kami, though this number is a common metaphor in cultures impacted by Buddhism to mean “infinity”. Kami are generally regarded to be mostly benevolent forces representing the natural order. Often shrines are placed around or even made out of distinctive natural formations, old trees and rocks being very common. A distinctive kind of rope called “shimenawa” can be tied around sacred objects or around shrines to demark the boundary between our world and the sacred place of the Kami.
𝗦𝗵𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗶𝗻 𝗔𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻
In another blow to typical Western conception, Shinto does not have much of a prescribed moral ethic. Instead, it is primarily focused on participation in rituals, a theme we also see in many Chinese religions like Confucianism. These rituals can be participation in yearly festivals, acts of ritual purification and hand-washing before entering sacred spaces, or even just the modest act of bowing and clapping in passing a shrine or sacred place. Showing respect to the Kami is more significant than enforcing a specific moral code. Especially with the onset of modern industrialization and the global climate crisis, Shinto has become increasingly perceived as an environmental tradition. Reverence for the Kami necessitates maintaining their homes, creations, and the natural cycles they are responsible for. Historically, shrines would often relocate as a means to maintain purity, kind of the religious version of letting a field lay fallow. Nowadays shrines can be more resilient to the idea, as moving may open up sacred land for permanent industrial development.
Image Credit: Fuba Hachimangu shrine in Shimanto City, Japan. Picture taken by Wikipedia user Reggaeman.
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