Word: shinto
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...days, Japanese jingoism centered around the strident, state-supported cult of Shinto. The big holiday for nationalist noisemaking was Feb. 11, known as kigensetsu (Foundation Day), solemnly determined by later scholars as the day in 660 B.C. when Japan's founder, Emperor Jimmu, great-great-great-grandson of the Sun Goddess, ascended the throne with the divinely sanctioned mission of making Japan "the center of the world...
...Foundation Day, schoolchildren in black robes were led out for compulsory rites honoring the God-Emperor, bowing toward the great walled palace in Tokyo as Moslems bow toward Mecca. Shops were closed, and throughout Japan's four main islands Shinto priests, stiff-backed, wearing their lacquered black horsehair headgear, intoned the virtues and divinity of Japan and its Emperor in high-pitched ululations understandable for the most part only to relatively few initiates...
Flutes for Founders. The U.S. occupation changed all this. The Emperor was divested of his divinity; Shinto was cut off abruptly and completely from state support. But many Japanese, uncertain about the future, seeking comfort in things past, were doubtful of the wisdom of this action. "The pull back," they liked to tell Western friends, "is much stronger than the push forward...
...Provincial Conceit." But Japan's Socialists, along with many others who genuinely fear a revival of Shinto, were flatly opposed to the government's bill. "Foundation Day," snapped one young business executive, "should be the day Japan surrendered." The government, modifying its bill, dropped the controversial word kigensetsu, added rather apologetically that Japan has been admitted to the U.N., and that it was "appropriate" for the country to have a holiday celebrating national foundation. Japanese politicians for the most part were doubtful that they could push the bill through-or at least the Feb. 11 date. "We cannot...
...Mammon have long been partners in Kyoto, whose centuries-old Buddhist and Shinto temples are a potent magnet for worshipers and sightseers from all over the world, but changing times have exacted a telling strain on the partnership. When they were cut off from government subsidy by the MacArthur constitution, which divorced Japanese church and state, most of Kyoto's temples began charging admission fees in order to support themselves. The result was a bonanza of tax-free riches. This delighted the Buddhist and Shinto priests but filled Kyoto's Mayor Gizo Takayama, a Congregationalist, with ill-concealed...