Religion in japan

Arc torii at the entrance of a sanctuary.

The religion in Japan is not a defined concept, as the Japanese do not believe in a particular religion. Instead they incorporate traits of many religions into their daily lives in a process known as syncretism. Japanese streets are decorated on Tanabata, Obon, Halloween and Christmas. A recognized prayer when in trouble is "Kami-sama dōka otasuke kudasai." ('God, please help me in some way'), which seems to imply a syncretistic belief.

Many people, especially those belonging to the younger generation, feel that religions in Japan are part of traditional culture.

According to official data from 2017, Shinto is the religion with the largest number of adherents with around 86,166,133 people, followed by Buddhism with around 85,333,050 and in third place is Christianity with 1,921,834. However, many people declare themselves to be Buddhist and Shinto, so the numbers are difficult to separate between these two religions.

Definition

The topic of religion in Japan and religious identification is complex and has been widely discussed and analyzed without reaching a definitive consensus. Statistics show that most Japanese people declare themselves "non-religious" and claim not to belong to any religion. However, some studies show that about 80% of the population participates at some point in their lives in Shinto and Buddhist religious or spiritual activities, often jointly. A common phrase in Japan is that the Japanese " Shinto are born and Buddhists die" because it is common for young children to be presented at Shinto shrines (by tradition at 13 days of birth) but almost all funerals are held in Buddhist temples, due to the characteristics of each religion and its emphasis (Shintoism, for example, It practically does not refer to anything about life after death and concentrates on life, in addition the dead are taboo because they "dirty" a place, while Buddhism attaches great importance to having a good or auspicious rebirth in lives future).

For Japanese culture, many of the Western definitions of adherence to a religion are incomprehensible. For example, in many statistics only 3% of the Japanese report being Shinto, this is because in Japan this is understood as actively participating in one of the many Shinto sects. However many Japanese have Shinto beliefs or even have Shinto shrines in their homes.

Similarly, although only 30% report Buddhism, about 80% also report lifetime Buddhist practices, with that percentage only being those who are relatively "observant." They have also proposed that while Buddhism and Shinto are practiced together, most Japanese who report any religion report Buddhism because it is seen as an established religion in the West with a similar status to Christianity or Islam, while Shinto may be more misunderstood as something "pagan" or superstitious.

The Japanese word for religion is shūkyō which comes from shū "sect" and kyō "doctrine", that is, sectarian doctrine, so it can have a pejorative connotation.

Shinto

The Shinto religion comes from prehistoric times, as a religion with respect to nature and in particular to certain sacred places.

Shinto worship is performed at places considered holy. Above all, the act of purification before visiting these sacred places is important. These sites may have originally been used to worship the sun, rock formations, trees, and even sounds. Since each of these things was associated with a deity this caused a complex religious polytheism. Deities are known in Shinto as "kami", and "Shinto".

Shinto is like an indigenous religion: it has no holy book, no founder, and no canon. The Nihonshoki and the Kojiki, however, contain a record of Japanese mythology. It is one of the largest religions in Japan being in turn the native religion. This originated in Japan and is almost exclusive to there.

Buddhism

Buddhist temple

Buddhism came to Japan in the 6th century from the southern part of the Korean kingdom on the Baekje Peninsula, where King Baekje sent a painting of the Buddha and some sutras to the Japanese Emperor. Japanese aristocrats built many Buddhist statues and temples in the capital at Nara, and later in the capital of Heian (now Kyoto).

Buddhism is divided into three forms:

• The Buddhism more orthodox and impersonal Buddhism Theravāda, which is frequent in India and South-East Asia.
• The Buddhism more personal, Mahāyāna Buddhism extending to North India, China, Tibet, and from there he went to Korea.
• The Buddhism esoteric or also known as tantric, Vajrayāna Buddhism.

Other religions

Christianity

Christianity is also very present in Japanese culture. This came in 1549 from the Spanish missionary Francisco Javier, and was spread by European missionaries, especially by Jesuits; these were known in Japan as Kirishitan (切支丹, 'Kirishitan'^?). At first, the Japanese authorities supported the presence of religion as a way to counter Buddhism; However, soon after they saw that the Europeans were conquering territories in Asia based on religious conversion and saw them as a threat. Thus, in the early Tokugawa era, in the 17th century, Christianity was banned for two centuries until the Meiji Restoration., when the arrival of Christian missionaries was allowed.

From 1900 to 1930 some syncretistic Christian movements took place, such as the Non-Church Movement or Mukyokai, a fusion between Japanese cultural sensibility with a Christian Protestant vision, based on the direct study of the Bible. The Mukyokai is a Christian movement with no apparent organization of its own. They do not have temples, priests or any kind of organization.

During World War II, however, Christianity in all its forms was outlawed. Since 1947 it has been considered a free religion to practice, and currently consists of 1% of the Japanese population, despite the fact that the majority celebrate holidays of Christian origin such as Christmas or Valentine's Day.

Judaism

Judaism, meanwhile, is practiced by a small community of Japanese.

There are also Americans and Europeans in two synagogues and several US military bases in Japan. Synagogues are in Tokyo and Kobe, and there are approximately 600 non-military foreign Jews residing throughout Japan [2].

Shinshūkyō

In Japan, other religions have also emerged, such as the "Japanese New Religions" or Shinshūkyō (新宗教, 'Shinshūkyō'^?), and which originate from Shinto, Buddhism, folkloric traditions and some social elements. They arose from the Meiji Era, and there are hundreds of sects, many of them with deep roots in Shinto, sometimes considered as "Shinto sects", and they do not have a large membership. The most notable is the Soka Gakkai, and which has a small political presence in Japan; other religions are Seicho-No-Ie (生長の家, Seicho-No-Ie^?), the Shinreikyo (神霊教, Shinreikyō^?), the Kōfuku-no-Kagaku (幸福の科学, Kōfuku-no-Kagaku^?), Mahikari, Oomoto (大本, Oomoto^?), Konkokyo (金光教, Konkokyo^?), Tenrikyo (天理教, Tenrikyo^?), and the famous Aum Shinrikyo, who carried out a terrorist attack rorista in 1995 in Tokyo.

Baha'i Faith

The Bahá'í Faith in Japan begins after a couple of mentions of the country by Abdu'l Bahá for the first time in 1875. Japan first came into contact with the religion that came from the west when Kanichi Yamamoto (山本寛 一), who lived in Honolulu, Hawaii, converted in 1902, and the second was Saichiro Fujita (藤田左弌郎?). The first Bahá'í convert on Japanese soil was Kikutaro Fukuta (福田 菊太郎), in 1915. Nearly a century later, the Association of Religion Data Archives (based on the World Christian Encyclopedia) estimates some 15,700 Bahá'í converts on Japanese soil. ís in 2005, while the CIA World Factbook estimates about 12,000 Japanese Bahá'ís in 2006.

Islamic

Estimates of the Muslim population have been placed around 115,000 to 125,000, of whom approximately 90% are foreign residents, and the remainder are ethnic Japanese. Indonesians, Bengalis, Pakistanis and Iranians make up the largest foreign Muslim communities in Japan.

Hinduism

Hinduism is a minority in Japan. However, it has played a somewhat significant role in Japanese culture.