Week 14
Week 14
Week 14
LEARNING COMPETENCY:
SHINTOISM
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Shintoism is considered as the very essence of Japanese devotion to unseen
spiritual beings and powers. It is a very local kind of religion on the land of Japan. An
ethnic religion that is not interested in missionary activities so as to spread it outside
Japan. It espouses the belief that human beings are basically good and has no concept
of original sin. Unlike other religion, it has no known founder nor God, and it may be
practiced with other religions such as Buddhism and Daoism.
This module, will give you understanding the core teaching of Shintoism as how
to worship the ancestors and forces of nature to achieve harmony in all dimensions, the
Kojiki creation story, and why it is important for Japanese people to worship gods
14.3. Evaluate: The core teaching of Shintoism is to worship the ancestors and
forces of nature to achieve harmony in all dimensions.HUMSS_WRB12-II/IVh-14.3
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Task 1: Answer the following questions:
1. Why is Shintoism considered more as a way of life than a religion?
2. Why is it important for Japanese people to worship spirits which they call
kami?
3. What importance do rituals play in the worship of kami?
Task 2: List at least three examples of Filipino practices that show belief in
unseen spirits. Compare it with the Japanese belief of erecting for spirit-worship.
Do you think this aspect of animism (belief in nature as the abode of spirits) still
persists despite the fact that the most Filipinos nowadays practice Christianity?
Can you say the same for japan?
SHINTOISM
Shinto, meaning ‘way of the gods,’ is the oldest religion in Japan. The faith
has neither a founder nor prophets and there is no major text, which outlines its
principal beliefs. The resulting flexibility in definition may well be one of the
reasons for Shinto’s longevity, and it has, consequently, become so interwoven
with Japanese culture in general that it is almost inseparable as an independent
body of thinking. Thus, Shinto’s key concepts of purity, harmony, family respect ,
and subordination of the individual before the group have become parts of the
Japanese character whether the individual claims a religious affiliation or not.
History
Unlike many other religions, Shinto has no recognized founder. The
peoples of ancient Japan had long held animistic beliefs, worshipped divine
ancestors and communicated with the spirit world via shamans; some elements
of these beliefs were incorporated into the first recognized religion practiced in
Japan, Shinto, which began during the period of the Yayoi culture (c. 300 BCE –
300 CE). For example, certain natural phenomena and geographical features
were given an attribution of divinity. Most obvious amongst these are the sun
goddess Amaterasu and the wind god Susano. Rivers and mountains were
especially important, none more so than Mt. Fuji, whose name derives from the
Ainu name ‘Fuchi ,’ the god of the volcano.
In Shinto, gods, spirits, supernatural forces and essences are known as
kami, and governing nature in all its forms, they are thought to inhabit places of
particular natural beauty. In contrast, evil spirits or demons ( oni ) are mostly
invisible with some envisioned as giants with horns and three eyes. Their power
is usually only temporary, and they do not represent an inherent evil force.
Ghosts are known as obake and require certain rituals to send away before they
cause harm. Some spirits of dead animals can even possess humans, the worst
being the fox, and these individuals must be exorcised by a priest.
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Pre-State Shinto
Buddhism arrived in Japan in the 6th century BCE as part of the
Sinification process of Japanese culture. Other elements not to be ignored here
are the principles of Taoism and Confucianism that travelled across the waters
just as Buddhist ideas did, especially the Confucian importance given to purity
and harmony. These different belief systems were not necessarily in opposition,
and both Buddhism and Shinto found enough mutual space to flourish side by
side for many centuries in ancient Japan.
By the end of the Heian period (794-1185 CE), some Shinto kami spirits
and Buddhist bodhisattvas were formally combined to create a single deity, thus
creating Ryobu Shinto or ‘Double Shinto.’ As a result, sometimes images of
Buddhist figures were incorporated into Shinto shrines and some Shinto shrines
were managed by Buddhist monks. Of the two religions, Shinto was more
concerned with life and birth, showed a more open attitude to women, and was
much closer to the imperial house. The two religions would not be officially
separated until the 19th century CE.
By the mid-17th century, Neo-Confucianism was Japan’s dominant legal
philosophy and contributed directly to the development of the kokugak, a school
of Japanese philology and philosophy that originated during the Tokugawa
period. Kokugaku scholars worked to refocus Japanese scholarship away from
the then-dominant study of Chinese, Confucian, and Buddhist texts in favor of
research into the early Japanese classics. The Kokugaku School held that the
Japanese national character was naturally pure and would reveal its splendor
once the foreign (Chinese) influences were removed. The “Chinese heart” was
different from the “ true heart ” or “ Japanese heart .” This true Japanese spirit
needed to be revealed by removing a thousand years of Chinese learning.
Kokugaku contributed to the emperor-centered nationalism of modern Japan and
the revival of Shinto as a national creed in the 18th and 19th centuries.
State Shinto
Prior to 1868, most Japanese more readily identified with their feudal
domain rather than the idea of “Japan” as a whole. But with the introduction of
mass education, conscription, industrialization, centralization, and successful
foreign wars. Japanese nationalism became a powerful force in society. Mass
education and conscription served as a means to indoctrinate the coming
generation with “the idea of Japan” as a nation instead of a series of Daimyo
(domains), supplanting loyalty to feudal domains with loyalty to the state.
Industrialization and centralization gave the Japanese a strong sense that their
country could rival Western powers technologically and
socially. Moreover, successful foreign wars gave the populace a sense of martial
pride in their nation.
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The rise of Japanese nationalism paralleled the growth of nationalism
within the West. Certain conservatives such as Gondō Seikei and Asahi Heigo
saw the rapid industrialization of Japan as something that had to be tempered. It
seemed, for a time, that Japan was becoming too “Westernized” and that if left
unimpeded, something intrinsically Japanese would be lost. During the Meiji
period, such nationalists railed against the unequal treaties, but in the years
following the First World War, Western criticism of Japanese imperial ambitions
and restrictions on Japanese immigration changed the focus of the nationalist
movement in Japan.
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Shrine Shinto
The loss of World War II placed Japan in the precarious position of a
country occupied by the Allied but primarily American forces, which shaped its
post-war reforms. The Emperor was permitted to remain on the throne, but was
ordered to renounce his claims to divinity, which had been a pillar of the State
Shinto system. Today, the shrines in Japan operate independently from the state,
to ensure the separation of religion and state.
Kami
In the Shinto religion kami is an all-embracing term, which signifies gods,
spirits, deified mortals, ancestors, natural phenomena, and supernatural powers.
All of these kami can influence people’s everyday lives and so they are
worshipped, given offerings, solicited for aid and, in some cases, appealed to for
their skills in divination. Kami are attracted by purity – both physical and spiritual
– and repelled by the lack of it, including disharmony. Kami are particularly
associated with nature and may be present at sites, such as mountains,
waterfalls, trees, and unusually shaped rocks. For this reason, there are said to
be 8 million kami, a number referred to as yaoyorozu-no-kamigami. Many kami
are known nationally, but a great many more belong only to small rural
communities, and each family has its own ancestral kami.
The reverence for spirits thought to reside in places of great natural
beauty, meteorological phenomena, and certain animals goes back to at least the
1st millennium BCE in ancient Japan.
Add to these the group of Shinto gods, heroes, and family ancestors, as
well as bodhisattvas assimilated from Buddhism, and one has an almost limitless
number of kami.
Common to all kami are their four mitama (spirits or natures) one of which
may predominate depending on circumstances:
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honor. Annually, the image or object (goshintai) thought to be the physical
manifestation of the kami on earth is transported around the local community to
purify it and ensure its future well-being. Finally, those kami thought to be
embodied by a great natural feature, Mt. Fuji being the prime example, are visited
by worshippers in an act of pilgrimage.
Purification
Purification is a vital part of Shinto. These may serve to placate any restive kami,
for example: when their shrine had to be relocated. Such ceremonies also have been
adapted to modern life. For instance, a ceremony was held in 1969 to hallow the Apollo
11 mission to the moon, new buildings made in Japan are commonly blessed by a
Shinto priest kannushi (during the ground-breaking ceremony, and many cars that are
made in Japan have been blessed as part of the assembly process. Moreover, every
Japanese car factory that is built outside Japan has had a ground-breaking ceremony
performed by a Shinto priest, with an occasionally annual visitation by the priest to re-
purify. A more personal purification rite is purification by water. This involves
standing beneath a waterfall or performing ritual ablutions in a river-mouth or in
the sea (misogi). This practice comes from Shinto history, at the time when kami
Izanagi-no-Mikoto first performed misogi after returning from the land of Yomi,
where he was made impure by Izanami-no-Mikoto after her death. These two
forms of purification are quite often referred to as harae.
Afterlife
Unlike most other religions, one does not need to publicly profess their belief in
Shinto to be a Shintoist. Whenever a child is born in Japan, a local Shinto shrine will
add the child's name to a list kept at the shrine and then declare him or her a "family
child." After death an ujikowill become a "family spirit", or "family kami"ujigami). One
may choose to have their name added to another list when moving and then be listed at
both places. Names can be added to the list without any consent and regardless of the
beliefs of the person added to the list. However, this is not considered an imposition of
belief, but a sign that they are welcomed by the local kami, with the promise of addition
to the pantheon of kami after their death. Those children who die before addition to the
list are known as "water children" (mizuko), and they are believed to cause troubles and
plagues. Mizuko are often worshipped in a Shinto shrine that is dedicated to stilling their
anger and sadness, called mizuko kuyō.
Japanese Creation Story
The islands of Japan are the subject of a particularly colorful creation myth.
Standing on the bridge or stairway of heaven (known as Ama-no-hashidate ,
which connected heaven — Ama — to earth ), the two gods Izanami and Izanagi
used a jewel encrusted spear to stir the ocean. Withdrawing the spear, salt
crystallized into drops on the tip and these fell back into the ocean as islands.
The first island to be created was Onogoro-shima and the gods
immediately used the island to build a house and host their wedding ceremony.
The ritual involved circling around a pillar (or in some versions the spear) with the
two gods moving in opposite directions. However, during this sacred marriage
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ritual Izanami, the female deity, wrongly spoke first when they passed each other
and as a consequence of this impiety their first child was a miscarriage and born
an ugly weakling without bones. This was the god Hiruko (later Ebisu) who would
become the patron of fishermen and one of the seven gods of good luck. Hiruko
was abandoned by his parents and set in a basket for the sea to take it where it
would.
The second child was the island of Awa but Izanami and Izanagi were still
not satisfied with their offspring and they asked their parents the seven invisible
gods the reason for their misfortune. Revealing that the reason was their
incorrect performance of the marriage ritual, the couple repeated the ceremony,
this time making sure Izanagi, the male deit , spoke first.
The couple then continued to create more auspicious offspring, including
the eight principal islands of Japan — Awaji, Shikoku, Oki, Tsukushi (Kyushu), Iki, Tsu,
Sado, and Oyamato.
Also created were a prodigious number of kami. Other notable children
were Oho-wata-tsu-mi (god of the sea), Kuku-no-shi ( god of the trees ), Oho-yama tsu-
mi ( god of the mountains ) and Kagutsuchi ( god of fire ), often referred to in hushed
tones as Homusubi during ritual prayers.
In Japanese art the two gods are most often depicted standing on Ama-no-
Hashidate stirring the ocean with their spear. The heavenly couple is also
famously referenced in the shrine of the wedded rocks of Meotoiwa, on the coast
of Futami. Here, two large rocks stand in the sea and are attached by a sacred
long rope ( shimenawa ) of plaited rice straw weighing over a ton, symbolic of the
matrimonial bond between the two deities. Atop the larger rock, which represents
Izanagi, there is a white gate or tori, which marks the site as a sacred shrine. Due
to the obvious humidity of the site, the shimenawa is replaced several times a
year with great ceremony.
Shinto texts
There is no core sacred text in Shinto, like the Bible is in Christianity or
Qur'an is in Islam. Instead there are books of mythology and history providing
stories and background to many of the most well-known kami.
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also be considered shrines. Early shrines were merely rock altars on which
offerings were presented. Then, buildings were constructed around such altars,
often copying the architecture of thatched rice storehouses. From the Nara period
in the 8th century CE temple design was influenced by Chinese architecture –
upturned gables, and a prodigious use of red paint and decorative elements.
Most shrines are built using Hinoki Cypress.
Shrines are easily identified by the presence of a torii or ” sacred
gateway .” The simplest are merely two upright posts with two longer crossbars
and they symbolically separate the sacred space of the shrine from the external
world. These gates are often festooned with gohei, twin paper or metal strips
each ripped in four places and symbolizing the kami’s presence.
A shrine is managed by a head priest ( guji ) and priests ( kannushi ), or in
the case of smaller shrines, by a member of the shrine elders committee, the
sodai. The local community supports the shrine financially. Finally, private
households may have an ancestor shrine or kamidana , which contains the
names of the family members who have passed away and honors the ancestral
kami. (27)
Features of Shrines
The typical Shinto shrine complex or jinja includes some or all of the
following common architectural features, depending on its size and importance:
Torii are sacred gateways, which symbolically separate the sacred space
of the shrine from the external world. The simplest and most common are merely
two upright posts with two longer crossbars ( kasagi and nuki ), known as the
myojin torii , but there are many variations, such as the ornate ryobu torii , which
usually stand in water, and miwa torii , which has a triple gate. Torii are usually
made of wood but they can also be of stone, steel, copper, or concrete. Many
torii are painted red, and they are often festooned with gohei , twin paper, cloth or
metal strips each ripped in four places symbolizing the kami’s presence. (34)
Romon
A romon is a large gate building, which marks the entrance to the main
shrine. From the outside, it seems to have two stories, especially when there is a
small balcony running around the building, but actually, it has only one. The
central entrance is flanked by covered bays, which contain guardian figure
statues known as zuijin.
Hondeny
The honden or shrine’s main hall contains an image or manifestation of
the particular kami or spirit worshipped there. The interior is divided into two parts: the
naijin or inner sanctuary and the gejin or outer sanctuary. The naijin contains the
goshintai and is almost always closed to anyone except the shrine’s chief priest and
even he may not have actually seen the goshintai . Sometimes the doors of the naijin
may be opened on special occasions, such as shrine anniversaries. Around the honden
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is a fence, the tamagaki , which limits the sacred area of typically white gravel or sand
and it may even limit the view of the honden from outside. The haiden or oratory hall is
for ceremonies and worship and is usually the most impressive building at the shrine. It
may stand-alone or be connected to the honden by a short covered corridor.
Heiden
The heiden, located between the honden and the haiden , is a building (or simply
part of a covered corridor) used for prayers and making offerings ( heihaku ). The term
shaden refers to the honden, haiden, and heiden, all together.
The most important Shinto shrine is the Ise Grand Shrine dedicated to
Amaterasu with a secondary shrine to the harvest goddess Toyouke. Beginning in the
8th century CE, a tradition arose of rebuilding exactly the shrine of Amaterasu at Ise
every 20 years to preserve its vitality. The broken-down material of the old temple is
carefully stored and transported to other shrines where it is incorporated into their walls.
The second most important shrine is that of Okuninushi at Izumo-taisha.
These two are the oldest Shinto shrines in Japan. Besides the most famous shrines,
every local community had and still has small shrines dedicated to their particular kami
spirits. Even modern city buildings can have a small Shinto shrine on their roof. Some
shrines are even portable. Known asmikoshi, they can be moved so that ceremonies
can be held at places of great natural beauty such as waterfalls.
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Task 3: Answer the following Questions:
1. Why is Shintoism able to co-exist with other religions/philosophies such as
Confucianism and Buddhism?
2. Why is Shintoism considered not only as a religion but a way of life for
Japanese?
3. Why do you think do religions, especially Shintoism practice purification? Why
is it essential?
► The essence of Shinto is the Japanese devotion to invisible spiritual beings and
powers called kami, to shrines, and to various rituals.
►Shinto is not a way of explaining the world. What matters are rituals that enable
human beings to communicate with kami.
►Kami are not God or gods. They are spirits that are concerned with human beings -
they appreciate our interest in them and want us to be happy - and if they are
treated properly they will intervene in our lives to bring benefits like health,
business success, and good exam results.
►Shinto is a very local religion, in which devotees are likely to be concerned with their
local shrine rather than the religion as a whole. Many Japanese will have a tiny
shrine-altar in their homes.
►However, it is also an unofficial national religion with shrines that draw visitors from
across the country. Because ritual rather than belief is at the heart of Shinto,
Japanese people don't usually think of Shinto specifically as a religion - it's simply
an aspect of Japanese life. This has enabled Shinto to coexist happily with
Buddhism for centuries.
►The name Shinto comes from Chinese characters for Shen ('divine being'), and Tao
('way') and means 'Way of the Spirits'.
►Shrine visiting and taking part in festivals play a great part in binding local
communities together.
►Shrine visiting at New Year is the most popular shared national event in Japan.
Because Shinto is focussed on the land of Japan it is clearly an ethnic religion.
►Therefore Shinto is little interested in missionary work, and rarely practised
outside its country of origin.
►Shinto sees human beings as basically good and has no concept of original sin, or of
humanity as 'fallen'.
►Everything, including the spiritual, is experienced as part of this world. Shinto has no
place for any transcendental other world.
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►Shinto has no canonical scriptures.
►Shinto teaches important ethical principles but has no commandments.
►Shinto has no founder.
►Shinto has no God.
►Shinto does not require adherents to follow it as their only religion
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I have learned that ________________ ________________ ______.
Task 6: Make an analysis showing your analytical opinion about Shintoism. Use the rubric as
a guide
RUBRIC FOR COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
STANDARDS DESCRIPTION POINTS POINTS OBTAINED
Content Information used were accurate; 10
analysis and explanation were
substantial
Presentation Ideas were easy to comprehend 5
Conclusion Main ideas and analysis were 5
effectively connected
TOTAL:20
Glossary
The following terms used in this module are defined as follows:
Heiden- located between the honden and the haiden , is a building (or simply part of a
covered corridor) used for prayers and making offerings ( heihaku ).
Honden- or shrine’s main hall contains an image or manifestation of the particular kami
or spirit
Izanagi- the male deity
Izanami- the female deity
Kami - an all-embracing term, which signifies gods, spirits, deified mortals, ancestors,
natural phenomena, and supernatural powers.
Kokugak- a school of Japanese philology and philosophy that originated during the
Tokugawa period
Obake- known as Ghosts and require certain rituals to send away before they cause
harm
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Purificatio- is a vital part of Shinto. These may serve to placate any restive kami, for
example: when their shrine had to be relocated. Such ceremonies also have
been adapted to modern life
Romon-is a large gate building, which marks the entrance to the main shrine.
Shintoism - considered as the very essence of Japanese devotion to unseen spiritual
beings and powers
Shrines- or jinja, are the sacred locations of one or more kami, and there are some
80,000 in Japan.
Torii- are sacred gateways, which symbolically separate the sacred space of the shrine
from the external world
Answer Keys:
References
INTERNET SOURCES:
TEXBOOK
Ong, Jerome A. and Jose, Mary Dorothy dl. Introduction to World Religions and Belief
Systems (Senior High School Textbook) Ground Floor, Bonifacio Bldg., DepEd
Complex Meralco Avenue, Pasig City, Philippines 1600, Vibal Group 2016
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Prepared by:
FLORECIL L. BALLENER
SST-III
Passi National High School- Senior High
Division of Passi City
Region VI- Western Visayas
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