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Congratulations on your hard work, but the especially the first paragraph looks like a synthetic research or thesis.
The debate over the relationship between Buddhism and Shinto
These are remote consequence, than direct results. I am guessing the first bullet is referring to maybe a post-war "shinto-ist"? This kind of attitude is more a product of Meiji-WW2-Showa religious policies. The second is maybe a fruit of advanced studies post war. Putting these into contrast and presenting them as if there is a "debate" is somewhat abrupt.
The resulting relationship between Buddhism and Shinto in Japan is so deep and complex that at least two distinct and mutually exclusive views exist on the subject, and this is the root of a discussion that hasn't yet come to a conclusion.
On the one hand, the Shinto establishment states that Shinto is the indigenous religion of Japan and that it has existed as such continuously since pre-history[3]. Shinto consists of all the peculiarly Japanese rituals and beliefs shaped by Japanese history from prehistory to the present[3]. The term "Shinto" itself was coined in the 6th century to differentiate the loosely organized local religion from imported Buddhism[3]. This is the concept normally accepted by both society and traditional historians[4].
On the other one finds the position of Japanese specialist Toshio Kuroda (and his supporters) who, in a famous article ("Shinto in the History of Japanese Religion," published in English in 1981) has argued that Shinto as an independent religion was born only in the modern period after emerging in the Middle Ages as an offshoot of Buddhism[4][5]. Kuroda's main argument is that Shinto as a distinct religion is a Meiji era invention of Japanese nationalist ideologues (see the next section)[4]. He points out how the state formalization of kami rituals and the state ranking of shrines during the Heian period were not the emergence of Shinto as an independent religion, but an effort to explain local beliefs in Buddhist terms[4]. He also says that, if it's true that the two characters for "Shinto" appear very early in the historical record, for example in the Nihon Shoki, this doesn't mean today's Shinto already existed as a religion because they were originally used as a name for Taoism or even for religion in general[4]. Indeed, according to Kuroda many features of Shinto, for example the worshiping of mirrors and swords or the very structure of Ise Shrine (Shinto's holiest and most important site) are typical of Taoism[4]. The term Shinto in old texts therefore does not necessarily indicate something uniquely Japanese[6]. According to the first view, then, the two religions were at the time of their first meeting already formed and independent and thereafter just coexisted with non-essential exchanges while, according to the second, Buddhism, meeting local beliefs in Japan, actually produced today's Shinto.
This section is I think essential because it warns the reader that it's far from clear even to specialists where Shinto ends and Buddhism begins, and that they should therefore take everything they read about Shinbutsu Shugo, including this article, critically and with a grain of salt.
If you want I can provide citations, but I feel they are no necessary. The second sentence you marked is already a direct quotation: it is verbatim the words used by B & T (see references). urashimataro ( talk) 09:55, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
To Yutaka Sozoryoku: I made changes that I believe keep the essence of what I wanted to say and eliminate your sources of doubt.
Does the title, in its use of diacritics (macrons), not violate the WP:MOS-JA convention on spelling? NipponGinko ( talk) 19:20, 10 July 2022 (UTC)
This article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Congratulations on your hard work, but the especially the first paragraph looks like a synthetic research or thesis.
The debate over the relationship between Buddhism and Shinto
These are remote consequence, than direct results. I am guessing the first bullet is referring to maybe a post-war "shinto-ist"? This kind of attitude is more a product of Meiji-WW2-Showa religious policies. The second is maybe a fruit of advanced studies post war. Putting these into contrast and presenting them as if there is a "debate" is somewhat abrupt.
The resulting relationship between Buddhism and Shinto in Japan is so deep and complex that at least two distinct and mutually exclusive views exist on the subject, and this is the root of a discussion that hasn't yet come to a conclusion.
On the one hand, the Shinto establishment states that Shinto is the indigenous religion of Japan and that it has existed as such continuously since pre-history[3]. Shinto consists of all the peculiarly Japanese rituals and beliefs shaped by Japanese history from prehistory to the present[3]. The term "Shinto" itself was coined in the 6th century to differentiate the loosely organized local religion from imported Buddhism[3]. This is the concept normally accepted by both society and traditional historians[4].
On the other one finds the position of Japanese specialist Toshio Kuroda (and his supporters) who, in a famous article ("Shinto in the History of Japanese Religion," published in English in 1981) has argued that Shinto as an independent religion was born only in the modern period after emerging in the Middle Ages as an offshoot of Buddhism[4][5]. Kuroda's main argument is that Shinto as a distinct religion is a Meiji era invention of Japanese nationalist ideologues (see the next section)[4]. He points out how the state formalization of kami rituals and the state ranking of shrines during the Heian period were not the emergence of Shinto as an independent religion, but an effort to explain local beliefs in Buddhist terms[4]. He also says that, if it's true that the two characters for "Shinto" appear very early in the historical record, for example in the Nihon Shoki, this doesn't mean today's Shinto already existed as a religion because they were originally used as a name for Taoism or even for religion in general[4]. Indeed, according to Kuroda many features of Shinto, for example the worshiping of mirrors and swords or the very structure of Ise Shrine (Shinto's holiest and most important site) are typical of Taoism[4]. The term Shinto in old texts therefore does not necessarily indicate something uniquely Japanese[6]. According to the first view, then, the two religions were at the time of their first meeting already formed and independent and thereafter just coexisted with non-essential exchanges while, according to the second, Buddhism, meeting local beliefs in Japan, actually produced today's Shinto.
This section is I think essential because it warns the reader that it's far from clear even to specialists where Shinto ends and Buddhism begins, and that they should therefore take everything they read about Shinbutsu Shugo, including this article, critically and with a grain of salt.
If you want I can provide citations, but I feel they are no necessary. The second sentence you marked is already a direct quotation: it is verbatim the words used by B & T (see references). urashimataro ( talk) 09:55, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
To Yutaka Sozoryoku: I made changes that I believe keep the essence of what I wanted to say and eliminate your sources of doubt.
Does the title, in its use of diacritics (macrons), not violate the WP:MOS-JA convention on spelling? NipponGinko ( talk) 19:20, 10 July 2022 (UTC)