The Meiji Restoration and Buddhism

1. Conflict and Cooptation The Meiji Restoration and Buddhism

2. The Attempted Suppression of Buddhism • Charter Oath – April 6th, 1868 – “All absurd usages of the old regime shall be abolished” • Separation Edicts – Office of Rites –Edict 1 – Buddhist Clerics to be removed from Shinto Shrines – Edict 2 Use of Buddhist names for Shinto Deities prohibited • Proponents of National Learning advocate attack on foreign elements – 40,000 temples closed, thousands of priests laicized • Institutionalized Buddhism responded with money and Alliance of United Sects for Ethical Standards • Letter from Ministry of State condemns attacks against Buddhism • Ministry of Doctrine created • Numerous riots express Buddhist discontent • Order 133 issued by Ministry of State • Greater religious freedom established to achieve state mission • State Shinto established – Joseph Kitagawa “State Shinto” was essentially a newly concocted religion of ethnocentric nationalism – Shibata Doken – Given the fact that Japan is a country consisting of a unitary people with shared customs and mores, the assertion that [state] Shinto was not a religion can be sanctioned at least some degree.

3. Early Buddhist Social Ferment • 1889 – United Movement for Revering the Emperor and Worshiping the Buddha – The goal of this organization is to preserve the prosperity of the imperial household and increase the power of Buddhism. The result will be the perfection of the well-being of the great empire of Japan… The time-honored spiritual foundation of our empire is the imperial household and Buddhism. The independence and stability of our empire cannot be maintained if so much as the slightest injury is inflicted upon in it. How can true patriots not be inspired and aroused to defend against such injury. • Buddhist reformer Kato Totsudo (1870-1949) – 1895 – The Zen that philosophers and poets are well acquainted with has [due to the war] also become familiar to military men. Even though the principle of transcending life and death is the basis of all Buddhist schools, Zen has a quality that is most welcome by soldiers, for it possesses a special kind of vigor. • D.T. Suzuki – The morality of the individual toward the state is similar to this. That is to say, in peacetime one works diligently, day and night, seeking to promote the advancement of [such endeavors as] agriculture, manufacturing, commerce, art and science, and technology. In so doing, one must not forget that the purpose of these many endeavors is the advancement of all humanity. This is what is called “peacetime religion.” However, at the time of the commencement of hostilities with a foreign country, then marines fight on the sea and soldiers fight in the fields, swords flashing and cannon smoke belching, moving this way and that. In so doing, our soldiers regard their own lives as being as light as goose feathers while their devotion to duty is as heavy as Mount Taishan [in China] Should they fall on the battlefield they have no regrets. This is what is called “religion during a [national] emergency.” This religion doesn’t necessarily have to be described by [the words] “Buddha” or “God.” Rather, if one simply discharges one’s duty according to one’s position [in society], what action could there be that is not religious in nature.

4. Uchiyama Gudo: Radical Soto Zen Priest • Poverty and Karma – Is this (your poverty) the result, as Buddhists maintain, of the retribution due you because of your evil deeds in the past? Listen, friends, if, having now entered the twentieth century, you were to be deceived by superstitions like this, you would still be (no better than) oxen or horses. Would this please you. • The Emperor System – Thee are three leeches who such the people’s blood: the emperor, the rich, and the big landowners… The big boss of the present government, the emperor, is not the son of the gods as your primary school teachers and others would have you believe. The ancestors of the present emperor came forth from one corner of Kyushu, killing and robbing people as they went. They then destroyed their fellow thieves. Nagasune-hiko and others…. It should be readily obvious that the emperor is not a god if you but think about it for a moment. • Imprisoned and executed for crimes against the throne 1910

5. Institutional Buddhism’s Rejection of Progressive Social Action • Soto Zen – Administrative Head Morita Goyu – I am profoundly dumbstruck that there could have been someone like Uchiyama Gudo in , a sect whose basic principle has been, since its founding, to respect the emperor and serve the state. • Rinzai Zen -Administrative Head, Toyoda Dokutan – We make certain that adherents of our sect always keep in mind love of country and absolute loyalty (to the emperor)… that they don’t ignore the doctrine of karma or fall into the trap of believing in the heretical idea of “evil equality” • Higashi Honganji – Administrative Leaders, OtaniEiryo and KuwakadoShido – Adherents of this sect should quickly rectify their thinking in accordance with this sects teaching that the Law of the Sovereign is paramount and relations between men should be based on benevolence… • Nishi Honganji – Administrative Leader, OtaniSonyu – “infected by dangerous thoughts”… “those who mistakenly involved themselves in such lawless speech and actions are not simply enemies of the state but of the Shin Sect as well.” • Conference of Three Religions – 1912 – Support of Imperial way and national morality.