Making the Heart Lighter with Shinto and Buddhism: Chapter 3　The Path Where the Two Faiths Met and Blended Together

＊This series is planned to conclude with a total of 9 chapters + appendix.

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Hello everyone. This is Akira.

In the previous chapter, we organized the differences between Shinto and Buddhism, focusing on the feeling in the heart.

So, how did these two originally meet, and why did they end up blending so deeply?

When we look back at history, it feels like there was not a “competition of correctness,” but rather a choice to live together.

When Buddhism Was Introduced

Buddhism was introduced to Japan in the 6th century.

It is said to have been formally transmitted via the Korean Peninsula.

Not everyone accepted the new teaching with open arms from the beginning.

There was also confusion and resistance toward the new teachings.

However, eventually the Japanese people did not choose to exclude Buddhism as “something foreign and alien,” but chose the path of incorporating it into themselves.

When Buddhism arrived in a land where Shinto already existed, the people did not ask “which one to discard,” but thought “how can both live?”

The result of that thinking was the uniquely Japanese way called “Shinbutsu Shūgō” (syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism).

When the Gods and the Buddha Began to Support Each Other

One of the ideas in Shinbutsu Shūgō is the “Honji Suijaku theory.”

Simply put, this is the interpretation that “the gods are the Buddha appearing in this world in temporary forms.”

With this way of thinking, the gods and the Buddha were no longer seen as opposing each other, but understood as different forms born from the same root.

Scenes of Buddhist statues being placed inside shrines, or small shrines being built within temple grounds, spread as something natural.

Over a long period of time, Shinto and Buddhism gradually adjusted their forms, as if quietly living together in the same house.

The Meiji Separation and What Still Remained

However, this blending did not continue forever.

In the Meiji era, the government issued the “Shinbutsu Bunri Rei” (Order to Separate Shinto and Buddhism).

This was a movement to clearly separate shrines and temples and place Shinto at the center of the state.

At that time, many temples and shrines had things that had been together for a long time forcibly separated.

In some places, Buddhist statues were removed from shrines, and the forms of temples and shrines changed significantly.

Even so, in the hearts of the people, they were never completely separated.

Going to a shrine for the first shrine visit of the year, going to a temple during Obon or the equinox.

Having both a kamidana and a butsudan in the house.

Such everyday feelings quietly remained, even after the system changed.

The fact that places like Naritasan Shinshoji Temple, which is a temple, are visited by many people for the first shrine visit of the year, can be said to be a remnant of this long history.

What History Teaches Us

When we look back at this history, it feels like Shinto and Buddhism blended together not because someone forced it, but because the people chose the “form that felt natural to the heart.”

They recognized the differences, did not exclude them, and tried to make the best of each.

That choice may still be quietly breathing in our daily lives today.

Knowing the differences is not for denying one side.

Rather, it may be a path to quietly realizing that “both are supporting our hearts.”

In the next chapter, I would like to take a look at the forms of the gods and the Buddha that appear in myths and stories.

Please look forward to it!

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Akira

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