Shinto, shrines, practices and symbols in daily Japanese life

Shinto is Japan’s original religion and it is very much a part of every day life in many ways both in cities and in the countryside. Shinto is the Japanese religion for this life and all positive rituals: weddings, births, good luck in anything and everything. [Note: Buddhism is much more about death and the next life with some important exceptions, especially at major “tourist temples”.]

Few Japanese have a deep understanding or historical knowledge of Shinto but they call on the gods of Shinto almost every day in one way or another. Shinto for the average 21st century Japanese is a world of superstitious beliefs and practices. It is also, for many, an acknowledgement of “Mother Nature” in all her mysterious ways. And Shinto is animism and devoted to the respect and “worship” of nature. It is a religion of the world of nature, of which humans are just one tiny part. The world of rain, wind, sun, rivers, fog, trees, plants and people . . .

Shinto dates back to the Yayoi period (300 BC – 300 CE), with the very beginnings forming in the late Jōmon period (ca. 1000 – ca. 300 BC). The earliest writings about Shinto kami or deity worship is recorded in the eighth-century Kojiki and Nihon Shoki. Shinto has no holy texts, no real founder, no religious laws, and only a very loosely organized hierarchy of priests. Today, of the 80,000 shrines in Japan, there are only 3-4 Shinto sects that all Japanese people are familiar with.

The most popular Shinto shrine sects in Japan are extremely popular. The Inari shrines provide “assistance” from the kamisama gods for the rice harvest, agriculture and the business and government harvests (profits and power). Hachiman shrines are devoted to the God of Archery and War. Hachiman is a divine protector of Japan, its people and the Imperial Household. And it was also the most popular shrine for warriors and samurai until the middle of the 20th century. Today, people come to these shrines to pray for strength and focus. Tenmangu Shrines are essential for all educational and academic pursuits, and thus crowded with students during key exam periods, etc. And last, but not least, there are the Ebisu shrines, for luck in love and business and life. There are about 3,500 Ebisu shrines across Japan (the mother shrine is Nishinomiya Shrine west of Osaka).

In its simplest form, Shinto is an ancient blend of animism, fertility cults, shamanism, and ancestor worship. In this sense, it can be likened to the spiritual beliefs of North American Indians, they are similar in many respects. Many of the Shinto gods do not have a human form, for example, mountains, rocks, trees, rivers. These “living” things are the guardian deities of a particular geographical area and Japanese clans that first ruled there. And asking these deities for help meant the difference between a good harvest and semi starvation. In the end, without the gods and goddesses on your side how could humans ever prosper in a world of natural destruction and constant fluctuation? Learn more!

Shinto beliefs and practices in daily Japanese life

There are countless ways in which Shinto remains at the heart of much of Japanese daily life in the 21st century. Shinto shrines, with few exceptions, are open 24/7 and free of charge (Buddhist temples lock their door and charge money for entry!).

Shinto and shrines are intimately connected with Japanese celebratory events such as marriage, births, and the New Year, all of which are part of this life (as opposed to the life after death which is the realm of Buddhism).

The beliefs and fundamental philosophies of Shinto are very simple. The main elements of the faith are:

1. Love of nature and the belief in abstract creative forces and that animals are messengers of the kamisama (deities or gods or goddesses)
2. Purity and thus physical cleanliness (when the so-called European barbarians, who bathed once a year, arrived in Japan in the middle of the 16th century, the high-born Japanese were bathing every day)
3. Ancestor worship and by extension the belief in a guardian deity for certain geographical local areas and the clans who first settled there.

It is interesting to note that most Japanese people do not even know what the word Shinto means, and it is a word you rarely hear spoken in Japan. In fact, the word was coined at the end of the 19th century as Japan began to interact with the Western world. Before then, it didn't really have a name. The word Shinto comes from the Chinese characters: god and path. Thus Shinto is The Way of the Gods. But if you want to talk about Shinto it is better to speak about jinja (shrines), as this word and kami (Shinto deity) are the everyday words for the spiritual ways of Shinto and Shintoism.

Shinto is all about being pure. When you go a shrine the first thing you do is wash out your mouth and wash your hands, a practice known as misogi. This is respectful preparation for entering the sacred space and precinct of the shrine. You purify yourself at the border to the sacred world of the jinja.

Impurity or "spiritual pollution" is referred to as kegare and the opposite, harae, is purity. In Japanese culture kegare is a temporary condition. By practicing basic ritualistic harae the individual is restored to spiritual health which in turn makes them a useful member of society. These are abstract ideas that are rarely talked about in Japan but they are completely woven into everything the Japanese do from spiritual perspective. They are not explicitly referred to. Like so many concepts in Japan they are part of the context of daily life, built in and almost automatic.

Purity and practices to ensure purity are found in many aspects of Japanese culture. Japanese people bath daily to be pure. Farmers purify themselves before planting the rice seedlings. And Noh theatre performers go through a purification ritual before their performance begins.

Things that are especially impure or filled with kegare include death, witchcraft, disease, incest, bestiality, and blood from menstruation and childbirth.

Other ways for Shinto priests and practitioners to purify themselves includes abstinence and avoidance of certain activities before a festival or ritual.

Salt is also symbolic of purification. And one of the oldest Japanese forms of purification is immersing oneself in the sea. And if the sea is far away, then standing under a waterfall is equally effective. People also sprinkle salt on themselves after a funeral. Little Mount Fuji like piles of salt are found at the entrance to many many restaurants in Japan for the same reason.

Most traditional homes, especially in the countryside, have a special god shelf called a kamidama, usually found in the kitchen or near to the kitchen, which in traditional homes is normally the northeast corner of the house. The weakest corner in Shinto geomancy.

The kamidana is usually located high on a wall and is home to a wide variety of Shinto related objects and ritual accessories. In the central place stands the “shintai” figure of the particular kami or deity that household “worships”.

Worship at the kamidana includes offering simple prayers, food for the gods (rice, fruit, water), and flowers.[2] Before kamidana worship the hands and mouth must be washed to be pure before the gods.

Kamidana can also be found in traditional Japanese martial art dojos and more than a few Japanese companies (big, medium and small).

When visiting and entering the sacred space of a jinja or shrine, people do many things. First, they wash their hands and rinse their mouth in a practice known as misogi (body purification). At the main shrine building, worshippers shake the long vertical rope (with bells at the top) to call the deity and, then, they pray. At the end of the prayer, one claps twice, bows, and return to normal life.

The shrine priests or shrine maidens (on occasion) give offerings of food to the gods as well on a daily basis. At Kasuga Grand Shrine in Nara you can, if you are lucky, see this in the late afternoon. The foods are the finest fish and vegetables available in the land: delicacies in every way!

And after the rice harvest, Japanese farmers take handfuls of rice and throw them at the shrine and its gods in thanks for this year and with hopes for a better year ahead.

Japan's festivals, which are now super popular tourist attractions with Japanese city people and foreign tourists, are almost all related to the worlds of Shinto.

So no matter where you go in Japan, you will see Shinto shrines (jinja) large and small. And you will see Japanese people tending to the gods with flowers and water and attention to cleanliness. And you will see Japanese of all generations asking for the assistance of the gods to get through their daily lives. Learn more!

A simple introduction to jinja shrines, symbols, animals, colors

In many shrines, visitors will notice trees and stones decorated with a necklace of rough rice rope and zig zag paper. Any stone or tree marked in this way is a kami or God. Rivers and especially mountains are among the most common kami throughout Japan. In such places the visitor will find countless tiny, very simple forest shrines, made with unfinished wood, dedicated to the deity. The extraordinary relationship the Japanese had with nature was so extreme that there was a point in time when the especially pure and faithful could see the spirits of nature shining like fireflies and hear the voice of every tree and bush.

In modern Japanese daily life, Shinto beliefs are still everywhere to be seen. White, pure white, is a very important color in Japan. It is the most popular car color, by far. Makoto or true heart or sincerity is a prized virtue that originates in Shinto. Salt, for purification, is used at the entrances to restaurants and bars and in the ring of sumo wrestling, which developed as a Shinto rite along with matsuri festivals and ritual kagura dance. Visits to a shrine occur at celebratory moments in life: rice planting and harvesting, births, weddings, coming of age, and other lucky moments (every shrine offers a different kind of luck or protection charm called mamori).

Ema Prayers: At many shrines, especially bigger ones, you will see small pieces of wood, all hanging together in one place, on which are written prayers to the deity of that shrine; many of these boards have colorful paintings of symbols (animals, etc) of the shrine on them.

Guardian Animals: At the entrance to the central grounds of any shrine, where the buildings are (remember the entire forest or area surrounding the main buildings are also part of the shrine precinct), you will find a pair of animals; they guard the shrine from evil; common guardian animals include Chinese dogs, Korean lions, foxes (inari), cows, even rats or monkeys; these guardian spirits appeared after Buddhism came to Japan and mimic the deva statues in the gate that guard the entrance to most large temples.

Shrine Colors: In any shrine you will notice the repeated use of four basic colours: white, black, green and red; white for autumn and Byakko, the white tiger god of the west; black for winter and Genbu, the snake god of the north; green for spring and Seiryu, dragon god of the east; red for summer and Shujaku, red sparrow god of the south; often in Japanese poetry these mythological beings will be alluded to refer to direction.

Offering Shrines: Within in the larger grounds of many shrines you will notice tiny shrines, made of wood with a long sloping roof towards the front; each of these shrines, probably donated by a worshipper, has a flask of sake for ritual use, salt, and a vase of sacred sakaki leaves on either side; these are simply another space where you can pray to the deity; they are usually lined up on the west side or the north side of the precinct.

Omamori Goodluck Charms: The most common souvenir for people to buy at a shrine is a lucky charm called an omamori which usually resembles a luxury embroidered baggage tag. Omamori contain printed prayers which have been consecrated before the gods by the priests who made them. They are generally used to ward off evil, but now can be bought for many different purposes, ranging from easy childbirth to traffic safety. People hang them in their cars and homes and carry them around on bags and purses.

Omikuji Goodluck Slips: The white pieces of paper that you see tied to tree branches in Shinto shrines all contain the unlucky character and have been left at the shrine in the hope that the deity enshrined there will change the luck to good. These pieces of paper are called omikuji and you get them like this: a numbered strip of bamboo is drawn at random from a cylindrical container with a small hole in one end. Then, for a nominal charge of about ¥100, the strip is exchanged for an omikuji. The good luck omikuji are taken home and treasured, but as bad luck is contagious, the ones informing people that they have no rice in their pots are left behind..

Shimenawa rope: In many shrines you will notice thick pieces of rice straw, always woven of an odd number of strands for good luck (usually somewhere between 17 and 21), wrapped around a tree or stone; this rope indicates that the thing encircled is sacred.

Shrine Gates: Torii gates, painted or unpainted, wood or stone, mark the entrance to the sacred precinct of the shrine; once you have passed through you have entered the sacred space where the deity of that shrine lives.

White Sand: White sand marks the area where the deity is present.

Zigzag Paper: Called gohei this paper marks the boundary or beginning of a sacred space.

The world of Shinto and Shintoism and jinja shrines is alive and well in Japan in the 21st century. The best shrines are the ones in the countryside as they are still “rooted” in the natural forces that created them over 3,000 years ago. Experience Shinto in all it’s forms more than once during your next trip to Japan. Everyone can use a little help from the gods and goddesses of Japan!

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