David Chart

Next year is the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. In advance of that, Jinja Shinpō is running a series of articles contributed by the Gokoku Jinja across Japan, each introducing one of the kami venerated there — that is, one of the war dead. (The series title is “Our Jinja’s Enshrined Kami” — わが社の御祭神.) The Gokoku (“Nation Protecting”) Jinja were formalised in the final years, and in a couple of cases the final months, of the war, but many of them have roots in the… Read More »The War Dead

Most jinja are “responsible” in some sense for a particular area, and the people who live in that area are known as the jinja’s “ujiko”, while the jinja is their “ujigami”. (The area is simply called the “ujiko area”.) I don’t know exact proportions, but my impression is that ujigami jinja form a large majority of jinja in Japan. But this is Shinto, so there are, of course, exceptions. These are often called “sūkei jinja”, because people who have particular respect for a jinja that is not their ujigami jinja… Read More »Sūkei Jinja

The September 16th issue of Jinja Shinpō had a report of the general meeting of the Society to Correct the Relationship Between Politics and Religion, which was held on August 22nd. The central concern of this group is Yasukuni Jinja, but they also pay attention to other lawsuits that try to stop the contemporary state having anything to do with Shinto. There were, for example, a number of lawsuits over the Daijōsai ceremony held at the accession of the current Tennō. However, it seems that the courts are generally happy… Read More »Neighbourhood Associations

I’ve just finished reading Kyoto’s Gion Festival by Mark Teeuwen. (That’s a non-affiiliate link to the Bloomsbury site. They are having a 30% off sale on this book and all the others in this series until October 6th 2024.) It is about, well, Kyoto’s Gion Festival, one of the largest matsuri in Japan, and also one of the best-documented. The book traces its development from its origins (probably in the tenth century) up to 1952, and it would not be unfair to say that its motivating question is “why hasn’t… Read More »Kyoto’s Gion Festival

Recently, I read Faith in Mount Fuji, by Janine Anderson Sawada. (That’s an affiliate link to Amazon.) I found the book extremely interesting, mostly because it is about the early years of a tradition that was included in Shinto at the Meiji Revolution, but which is quite different from contemporary mainstream Jinja Shinto. (I believe that the Sect Shinto groups derived from this tradition are still active, but I do not think they are very large.) If you are interested in the historical diversity of religious practice in Japan, I… Read More »Faith in Mount Fuji