S H I N T O 2

SHINTO

Basix of Shintoism Shintoist Worldview Shinto Charms Shintoist Clan Gods & Shrines
Shinto & Bushido Synchretic Shinto Yamabushi BIG PICTURES of Shinto
Shrine Maidens Shinto Heroes Shinto Gods Shinto Brides Real Onmyoji

 

Visual manifestations of the 'sons of the Goddess of the Sun' concept: The 'Hinomaru' banner, the state's name 'Nihon', the national anthem 'Kimigayo', and all cosmological expressions that relates the country with the rising sun, despite the fact that it is the entire solar system's sun (see History of Japan).

Places of worship: The Japanese call Shinto spots of worship 'shrines' ('jinja' in Japanese).

That's one thing you can hold on to, in order to avoid getting pushed by tour guides into Buddhist temples ('ji') that you have been fed-up with during an earlier holiday in China.

For example, 'Awashima-jinja' is Shinto; Todai-ji is Buddhist. Kiyomizudera doesn't have a 'ji' tailing its name, but it is Buddhist. Temples built on some higher ground (doesn't have to be a mountain) are all dubbed '_dera'. Buddhist temples that serve as monasteries are called something ended with '_in'. So, other than those, the place is Shintoist.

Besides, the visual appearance of all the temples versus shrines is glaringly different even to the most clueless of all eyes: Buddhist temples tend to get lavishly gilded and decorated and to stand out in a landscape or crowd of urban clutter; Shinto shrines are blending with the environment, let the building materials stay the way they are, and never get visually aggressive.

 

shrines versus temples

Exceptions to the Above Surest Sign of Shinto Surest Sign of Buddhism

 

If a Shinto shrine is built for an Imperial spirit, it is called 'jingu' -- as in the 'jingu' of Empress Jingu (it happens to be her name).

There are a dozen pages about the Meiji Confusion at this site; this one monarch had tempered with everything and drastically re-shaped Japan down to the World War II. Not only that; Emperor Meiji's administration was the one responsible for the systematic Shinto that you brush shoulders with today.

In 1872, the Meiji Ministry of Religion released a decree containing these items:

1. Every Japanese shall revere the gods and love the country.

2. Every one of them must clearly understand the principles of Heaven (beliefs) and those of man (laws).

3. Every one of them takes the Emperor as the ultimate sovereign, and must obey the will of His Majesty and the Imperial Court.

In the language of laypersons: the Shinto of the last 1872 years was, thereby, overhauled into a personal cult, not of the Emperor, which would have meant every single one of them, but of Emperor Meiji.

And the paradox was never felt by anybody in Japan at the time, least of all the Emperor himself; while busy americanizing everything, cutting samurais' hair short, pushing women into American dresses, and so forth, the country was pulled all the way back to the spiritual Year One of Emperor Jimmu's reign, in which the Emperor was the god.

Buddhism suffered some near-oblivious existence those years.

So, following the line of thought of Shintoism, Emperor Meiji was added to the countless (well, perhaps a hundred thousand) Shinto 'deceased superhumans' spirits' ('tenjin' in Japanese).

 

Empress Jingu Emperor Meiji Taira Masakado offerings
Empress Jingu Kogo Emperor Meiji Taira Masakado Shinto inari shrine in Taishi

 

Hence the majestic must-see for every weary tourist for the last hundred years, Meiji shrine, AKA 'Meiji-jingu'. The latter part of the name means more or less 'Imperial'.

Shintoists only elevate the VIP's among the RIP's onto the seats of local, regional or national gods if the personalities therein are scary.

That's the essence of the much sugar-coated fact of Shintoism's system of deification.

Earthquakes blasted through Tokyo in 1920's, so the formerly outlawed Taira Masakado was deified to prevent similar expressions of his wrath from below the grave in the future.

 

Sugawara Michizane Sugawara shrine Gion Matsuri
Lord Sugawara Michizane Sugawara shrine in Mt. Tatsuoka 'Gion Matsuri' in Kyoto, 2005

Big photographs of Sugawara Michizane's Gion Matsuri

 

Sugawara Michizane (845-903) was lifted to the same position after Kyoto was ravaged by some Albert Camusian plague -- he was a victim, to begin with, of the intrigues that cemented the Fujiwara clan in and around the Imperial House of 800's.

That's how tourists got Gion Matsuri, a.k.a Lantern Festival, to clog their blogs with, until today. The Japanese in 2000's might have forgotten about who Lord Sugawara was -- but maybe even then the millions of lanterns lit at once still make the good Lord happy wherever he is. (Click here for pictures of Sugawara Michizane as a Shintoist product).

A quiver was used to get hung at the front gate of the house or shrine of deceased people who were, in life, in no good terms with the reigning Emperor, whenever something bad was happening. Sugawara Michizane's shrine got quivers at their gates when Emperor Kuammu fell ill, and when there was an epidemy in Kyoto. Later the quivers were replaced by the Imperial Seal. The meaning of both quivers and seals are prohibitive; if put at the door of a living citizen, the entire members of the household were not allowed to get out of the house, and other people were not allowed to get in. Those were markers of some policial biz, like today's yellow plastic 'ribbons' put around crime scenes when the crimes are still under investigation.

But no matter how terrified people are of your afterlife-anger, you can't get a 'jingu' and are only entitled to reside in a 'tenjin' or 'tenmangu' if there is no imperial DNA in your previously august presence in the flesh, although today among the myriad of 'superspirits' deified in Japan the title 'tenjin' is almost monopolized by Sugawara Michizane.

 

portable shrine Shinto tree Shinto shrine
Shinto portable shrine Shinto cinnamon tree Shinto offerings of saké & rice

The Most Shintoist Origami How To Make Shimenawa ('Shinto Rope') Shinto Brides & Weddings

 

The ubiquitous household shrines, and the mini portable shrines, are all Shintoist.

Torii, i.e. the thing for birds to perch on, associated with Japan all these two millennia, is Shintoist. Today, probably half of all the Buddhist temples in Japan also got torii, because they appropriated it, mistaking it in 600's, like tourists from New Jersey in 2005, to be gates.

 

torii
torii

 

Natural stuff -- trees, bushes, branches, precipices, rocks, etc. -- being adorned with twisted white paper and natural fiber ropes ('shimenawa') are all Shintoist. The whole mountain of Fuji is worshipped as one spirit or god. The whole island -- which, therefore, is called 'the Shrine Island', AKA 'Miyashima' -- is also worshipped as one god. (See big pictures of Miyashima at the Japanese Architecture section).

 

rice wine bottle mirror doll offerings
saké bottle Hosokawa clan's mirror Kaga doll Abe Seimei's offerings

 

Mirrors are sacred objects to Shintoists, so are dolls. Click here for everything about Japanese dolls, their history and pictures, and what Shinto does with them.

Clan gods and shrines are Shintoist. Click on to the next page for those and other Shinto manifestations.

 

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Basix of Shintoism Shintoist Worldview Shinto Charms Shintoist Clan Gods & Shrines
Shinto & Bushido Synchretic Shinto Yamabushi BIG PICTURES of Shinto
Shrine Maidens Shinto Heroes Shinto Gods Shinto Brides Real Onmyoji

 

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Nina Wilhelmina

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