The Gist of Japan: The Islands, Their People, and Missions

by R. B. Peery

Not wishing to break entirely with the old religions, she represented her revelation as having been received from the Shinto gods, and gave a place in her teaching to some prominent Buddhist elements. By this means she won popular favor and gained an earnest hearing.

The term "Tenrikyo" signifies the "Doctrine of the Heavenly Reason." While many of its teachings differ but little from current Shinto and Buddhistic ideas, its more prominent tenets are radically different.

In the first place, Tenrikyo tends much toward monotheism. Omiiki herself accepted polytheism, but taught that man's real allegiance is due to the sun and the moon. These she regarded as the real gods; but as they always work together, and as the world and all things therein are the product of their joint working, they are practically one. Since her death the teaching has become more and more monotheistic in tendency, and some of its preachers teach explicit monotheism.

Omiiki taught a new relation between the gods and men—a relation of parents to children. The gods watch over and love their children just as earthly parents do. The emperor is the elder brother of the people, who rules as the representative of the divine parents.

Faith-healing formed a prominent part in the original teaching of Tenrikyo. It asserted that neither physicians nor medicine was needed, but that cures are to be effected through faith alone. Marvelous stories are told of the wonderful cures it has accomplished, many of which seem well authenticated. But while there seems no good reason for doubting the genuineness of some of these cures, the power of mind over mind, and the influence of personal magnetism in certain kinds of nervous disorders, are so well known that they can be easily explained without any reference to the supernatural. The faith-cure feature of this religion is now falling into disuse.

Tenrikyo makes very little of the future state, although Omiiki assumed its reality. In one passage she refers to the soul as an emanation from the gods, and says that after death it will go back to them. She teaches that the cause of suffering, disease, and sin is found in the impurity of the human heart, and that the heart must be cleansed before believers can receive the divine favor. She insists over and over again that no prayers nor religious services are of any avail so long as the heart is impure.

The aim of Omiiki and her followers seems to be a worthy one. The movement is highly ethical, and there is little doubt but that the adherents of the Tenrikyo are superior in morals to the rest of their class. Some features of this new religion are, however, looked upon with suspicion, and it is being closely watched by the government. Charges of gross immorality have been preferred against it, especially in reference to the midnight dances, in which both sexes are said to participate indiscriminately; but these charges are made by its enemies and have never been proved.

In many respects Tenrikyo materially differs from the other religions of Japan. Its adherents assemble at stated times for worship and instruction, while the Buddhists assemble in the temples for worship and preaching only three or four times a year, and the Shintoists seldom, if ever, assemble. The worship of Tenrikyo, for the most part, consists of praise and thanksgiving by music and dancing; but prayer is also practised.

Another distinguishing characteristic of Tenrikyo is that it is exclusive. The other religions of Japan are very tolerant of one another; one may believe them all. But Tenrikyo will not tolerate either Buddhism or Shinto. Its adherents must give their allegiance to it alone.