Shinto As An Environmentalist Religion

Shinto is an expression of Japanese environmentalism, which is evident through: the locations of shrines which are commonly located in rural surroundings that is essential to Shinto worship; the rituals and modern practices undertaken by Shinto worshippers as they often revolve around nature or heavily use natural elements in their prayer; both the origin of Shinto belief, and the historical transformation Shinto has undergone. Also, I will explore the new perspective scholars have of Shinto as an environmentalist religion and the impact this has on Shinto becoming more environmentalist. Sonoda Minoru defined Shinto as ‘The ritual means by which early Japanese transformed their natural surroundings into a cultural landscape infused with religious

From his analysis of the definitions of the word Shinto, along with the transformation over time of customs and beliefs, he argues that ‘Shinto emerged as an independent religion only in modern times, and then only as a result of political policy’ (20). Therefore, this shows that the religion is environmentalist as it emerged from Japanese people’s agricultural and geographical needs. Although we cannot regard Shinto as Japanese environmentalism since the origin of the environmentalist aspects of the religion come from foreign beliefs and religions, thus making it non-indigenous. Whilst Shinto does not originate from Japanese environmentalism, it does apply environmentalism from a Japanese understanding of other religious Asian attitudes towards the

In support, Tsunetsugu Muraoka explains that ‘Aside from Kami that were identified with concrete objects, there were cases of a deification of the power that resided in nature’ (55). This proves that Shinto has always historically been an environmentalist religious as one of the key elements of the religion -kami- is intrinsically connected to nature. Therefore, the spiritual aspect of Shinto cannot be contextualised or understood under any other framework that ignores the impact of nature on the faith. In addition, Boyd and Williams claim that Shinto is environmentalist due to the Shinto worldview being something that ‘focuses on the generative, connecting force (musabi) inherent to the natural world’ (36). This means that Shinto is environmentalist as it emphasises both spiritually and philosophically nature into every element of the religion, and nature cannot be separated from the religion otherwise it cannot be considered