Shinbutsu shūgō

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Incense (usually an attribute of Buddhist temples) at the Zeniarai Benzaiten Shinto shrine in Kamakura
Incense (usually an attribute of Buddhist temples) at the Zeniarai Benzaiten Shinto shrine in Kamakura

Shinbutsu shūgō (神仏習合 literally "fusion of practices from both Shinto and Buddhism"?) (also called Shinbutsu konkō (神仏混淆?), term which however has a negative connotation) is the Japanese syncretism of Buddhism and Shinto. When Buddhism was introduced through China in the late Yamato period (6th century), rather than discard the old belief system the Japanese tried to reconcile it with the new, assuming both were true. As a consequence, Buddhist temples were attached to Shinto shrines or viceversa and devoted to both kami and Buddha. In 1868 as part of the Shinbutsu Bunri (the attempt for a separation of Shinto and Buddhism during the Meiji period), temples (寺, tera) and shrines (神社, jinja) were separated, the former functioning for Buddhism, the latter for Shinto.

In spite of more than a century of formal separation of the two religions, temples or shrines that do not separate them are still common, as proven by the existence of numerous Buddhist Inari temples[1][2]. Oki no Gū shrine in Okinawa is one that has maintained Shinbutsu shūgō and has images of Buddha and Shinto deities. Other cases are Zeniarai Benten shrine, Kōmyō-ji temple and Hase-dera in Kamakura, the first being a shrine including Buddhist elements, the second and third examples of the contrary. Karen Smyers says:

The surprise of many of my informants regarding the existence of Buddhist Inari temples shows the success of the government's attempt to create separate conceptual categories regarding sites and certain identities, although practice remains multiple and nonexclusive.[3]

The separation of the two religions must therefore be considered superficial, and shinbutsu shūgō still an accepted practice.

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[edit] The assimilation of Buddhism

The fusion of Buddhism with the local kami started as soon as the first arrived in Japan, as proven by Mononobe no Okoshi's statement that:

The kami of our land will be offended if we worship a foreign kami [4]

In other words, Mononobe saw Buddha as just another kami, and not as a different kind of God possibly different in nature from his own[4]. Other documents of the period refer to Buddha as "the Buddha kami"[4]. Initially therefore the conflict between the two religions was political, and not religious, in nature, a struggle between the progressive Soga clan, that wanted a more international outlook for the country, and the conservative Mononobe clan, that wanted the contrary[4]. The religions however had very different underlying visions of man, and would later find reason for overt contrast[4]. The first articulation of the difference between the two religions and the first effort to reconcile them is attributed to Prince Shōtoku (574 - 622)[4]. The first signs that the differences between the two world views were beginning to become manifest to the Japanese in general appear at the time of Emperor Temmu (673 - 86)[4].

Accordingly, one of the first efforts to reconcile Shinto and Buddhism was made during the Nara period founding so-called junguji (神宮寺?), that is "shrine-temples"[5]. Behind the inclusion in a Shinto shrine of Buddhist religious objects was the idea that the kami were lost beings in need of liberation through the power of Buddha[5]. Beginning at the end of the Nara period, some promoted the view that kami were the tutelary gods mentioned by the Buddhist teachings[5].

Even further went later the honji suijaku (本地垂迹?) theory, according to which Japanese kami were just manifestations (suijaku) of buddhas, which were the "original ground" (honji) of form of the kami[5]. The buddhas and the kami were therefore indivisible[5]. The depth of the influence of Buddhism on Shinto can be seen in the fact that the type of shrine we see today, with a large worship hall and images, is itself of Buddhist origin[6]. Traces of the pre-Buddhist style can be still sometimes seen in shrines like Ōmiwa Shrine in Nara, which contains no religious images[6].

The two religions however always remained distinct because of their very different outlook on life and the beyond. While Buddhism rejects this world and seeks to transcend it, Shinto is immanent and positive, with an afterlife that duplicates this world[4].

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Smyers, pag. 119
  2. ^ Toyokawa Inari accessed on June 6, 2008
  3. ^ Smyers, pag. 119
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h Tamura, pages 26 to 33.
  5. ^ a b c d e Satō Makoto
  6. ^ a b Tamura, page 21

[edit] References

[edit] External links

[edit] See also

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