Death and Social Order in Tokugawa Japan: Buddhism, Anti-Christianity, and the Danka System. By Nam-lin Hur. Harvard University Asia Center2007. Pp. 409. $55.00. ISBN: 0-067-40253-2 (original) (raw)
The Practice of Religion in Japan: An Exploration of the State of the Field.
In Handbook of Modern Japanese Studies, J. Babb ed., Sage, 2015. (Reprint, with amendments and photos, of the Introduction to Japanese Religions, Sage Major Works, 4 vols, L. Dolce, ed., 2012, vol. 1, pp. xix-lvii).
The Structure of Japanese Buddhist Funerals
University of Hawaii Press eBooks, 2008
Japanese Buddhism today is centered around death rituals and the economy of most Buddhist temples depends almost totally on income derived from death-related services. Since the early modern period, Japanese Buddhists have standardized ritual procedures for funerals according to their respective traditions. This chapter considers the structure and meaning of funerals in the major Japanese Buddhist traditions, focusing on contemporary funerary procedure as prescribed in the Tendai, Shingon, Jodo, Zen, Shin and Nichiren sects.
Based on the premise that there is no single and homogeneous Japanese Buddhism but a multifaceted religious tradition resulting from a long history of adaptations and cross-cultural interactions, this chapter explores some aspects of Buddhism in Japan, including Buddhism-based new religious movements, in connection to the challenges of contemporary society. These include the structure of today’s temples in terms of membership and activities, issues of politics and social engagement closely linked to the role of Buddhism in the public sphere, the innovative ways through which Buddhist institutions are reacting to a deeply mediatized society, and overseas developments. Before proceeding to the contemporary period, the chapter provides a brief overview of the historical developments of Buddhism from its inception to the postwar period.
Religions and Local Society in Historical, Comparative, and Theoretical Perspectives: A Festschrift in Honour of Timothy Brook (edited by Jinhua Chen 陳金華 and Dewei Zhang 張德偉), 2023
Demographic changes and depopulation in rural areas are two of the gravest problems that Japanese society faces today. They affect each and every aspect of the Buddhist sects, from their monks (sōryo 僧侶) to their believers (shinja 信者). Japan is one of the fastest aging countries around the world, and although Bud¬dhism was and still is a major religion with more than forty million registered believers, the statistics show that this number is the result of a sharp decline. Also, these statistics include all new religious organisations which are connected to certain Buddhist teachings but not recognised as the ‘established’ Buddhist sects, such as the Shingon 真言, Tendai 天台, or Jōdo Shin 浄土真 denominations. The temple-parishioner system, established in the Edo Period 江戸時代 (1600–1868) connected all Japanese families to Buddhist temples and brought about the hegemony of Buddhist funeral rites, and this connection and hegemony still stand. However, changes are cracking that system too. Questionable reactions to government policies at the end of the nineteenth century and a new family he¬reditary system in the twentieth century reshaped the ‘established’ Buddhist sects. The temple family system also has its disadvantages. All these factors make the adaptation to modern times and the needs of people hard for the established sects, such as the Nichirenshū, to address. In my paper, I highlight the many factors which led to the need for re-evaluation and reconsideration of the roles and functions of Buddhist temples and their monks. I argue that the temple family and hereditary system may need some changes to adjust to society and the decreasing number of believers, and that Buddhist temples can be an ideal place for community-building, especially for those temples which are maintained by temple families primarily through the hereditary system.
Japanese Temple Buddhism: Worldliness in a Religion of Renunciation ? By Stephen G. Covell
Religious Studies Review, 2007
images from Bankura and Gujarat; the many uses of textiles; posts, pots, and pebbles as aniconic goddess images; paradise symbolism in Muslim architecture; threshold deities and art; pots as embodiments of deities; Jain portable brass boxes with painted Jinas and other symbols, known as guttajis; processional and other smaller images in brass, bronze, and other metals; mobile shrines; Himachal mohras, processional metal masks of deities; mass-produced printed paper representations of deities; and Rajasthani phad paintings of Ramdev, Pabuji, and Dev Narayan; among other topics. Each essay is accompanied by excellent color photographs. The essays range in quality from the solidly academic to the enthusiastically interpretive. As a result of this wide range, I would be cautious in sending beginning students to this book. However, the wealth of information on the visual, material, and ritual cultures of India make this a valuable resource for any library.
Stand by your founder: Honganji's struggle with funeral orthodoxy
Japanese journal of religious studies, 2000
Pure Land Buddhist texts and practices have been part of the fabric of Japanese Buddhism since the Nara period, but they grew to have significantly greater impact in the Kamakura period when the first inde pendent schools of Pure Land Buddhism were founded by Honen and Shinran. This article looks at the evolution of ritual funeral practices car ried out within the Pure Land school of Shinshu, particularly the Honganji establishment, and discusses the apparent conflict many of these practices have had with orthodox Shinshu doctrine. The core issue here is twofold:1)the ways in which Honganji decided to participate in mortuary rites to assuage the anxiety of its lay followers and strengthen its own financial base through the revenue it generated, and 2) the degree to which these practices could be rationalized in terms of their doctrinal orthodoxy. After tracing the historical links between Pure Land Buddhism and the afterlife in Japan, the article looks at the views of Shinran as well as the interpretations of Tokugawa-period scholars who tried to issue "rulings" on where Honganji orthodoxy should stand regarding the funeral rituals performed by Shinshu priests. By the Tokugawa period, mortuary rites had come to dominate Shinshu culture, and the most common of such rites are examined here: the kue-issho，o-toki, eitai-kyd, and hoon-ko.
Japanese Secularities and the Decline of Temple Buddhism
In many ways, Japan provides a predictable example of how historical, political, economic, and cultural factors in the postwar and late-modern periods influence the interactivity of religious affiliations and secular forces. And yet, to grasp the complexity of the situation also requires a broader analytical perspective, one that can incorporate secularizing influences that are harder to identify because they are more globally diffuse. Based on extended fieldwork that has examined the ‘boom and bust’ of contemporary Japanese temple Buddhism, I first discuss historical and political legacies unique to Japan that have shaped local secularities. Additionally, concepts of Japanese religiosity and secularity have been referenced in controversial court cases that are relevant to the practice of religion in the public sphere. Finally, the discussion surveys forces that are domestic and familiar as well as global and invasive—new information technologies, greater personal agency, hyper-consumerism, corporate and bureaucratic restructuring, and a growing tolerance for diversity—impacting traditional temple Buddhism. Each one of these factors is significant in understanding Japan’s secularities. The purpose here is to see them as a mutually-reinforcing and interactive web of relations and consequences for the Japanese people and the religious institutions in their midst.