Each of these numerous demigods was supposed by the adherents of the religion of Shintō to preside over a special paradise of his own; this one in the air, that one at the bottom of the sea, one in the moon and another in the sun, and so on; and each devotee, choosing his god according to the paradise that pleased him best, spared no pains to gain admission into it. For what St. Paul had said of the Athenians, might, according to the missionaries, be applied with equal truth to the Japanese,—they were excessively superstitious, and this superstition had so multiplied temples, that there was scarcely a city in which, counting all the smaller chapels, the number did not seem at least equal to that of the most pious Catholic countries.
The temples of the Shintō religion, called Miya, were and are—for in this respect no change has taken place—ordinarily built upon eminences, in retired spots, at a distance from bustle and business, surrounded by groves and approached by a great avenue having a gate of stone or wood, and bearing a tablet or door-plate of a foot and a half square, which announces, in gilded letters, the name of the Kami to whom the temple is consecrated. These exterior appendages would seem to foretell a considerable structure; but within there is usually found only a wretched little building of wood, half hid among trees and shrubbery, about eighteen feet in length, breadth, and height, all its dimensions being equal, and with only a single grated window, through which the interior may be seen, empty, or containing merely a mirror of polished metal, set in a frame of braided straw, or hung about with fringes of white paper. Just within the entrance of the enclosure stands a basin of water, by washing in which the worshippers may purify themselves. Beside the temple is a great chest for the reception of alms, partly by which, and partly by an allowance from the Dairi, the guardians of the temples are supported, while at the gate hangs a gong, on which the visitant announces his arrival. Most of these temples have also an antechamber, in which sit those who have the charge, clothed in rich garments. There are commonly also in the enclosure a number of little chapels, or miniature temples, portable so as to be carried in religious processions. All of these temples are built after one model, the famous one of Ise, near the centre of the island of Nippon, and which within the enclosure is equally humble with all the rest.
Ise Temple
The worship consists in prayers and prostrations. Works of religious merit are, casting a contribution into the alms-chest, and avoiding or expiating the impurities supposed to be the consequence of being touched by blood, of eating of the flesh of any quadruped except the deer, and to a less extent even that of any bird, of killing any animal, of coming in contact with a dead person, or even, among the more scrupulous, of seeing, hearing of, or speaking of any such impurities. To these may be added, as works of religious merit, the celebration of festivals, of which there are two principal ones in each month, being the first and fifteenth day of it, besides five greater ones distributed through the year, and lasting, some of them, for several days, in which concerts, spectacles, and theatrical exhibitions form a leading part. We must add the going on pilgrimages, to which, indeed, all the religious of Japan are greatly addicted. The pilgrimage esteemed by the adherents of Shintō as the most meritorious, and which all are bound to make once a year, or, at least, once in their life, is that of Ise, the name of a central province on the south coast of Nippon, in which Tenshō-daijin was reported to have been born and to have died, and which contains a Miya, exceedingly venerated, and already mentioned as the model after which all the others are built.
Though it is not at all easy to distinguish what, either of ceremony or doctrine, was peculiar or original in the system of Shintō,[33] yet in general that system seems to have been much less austere than the rival doctrine of Buddha, which teaches that sorrow is inseparable from existence, the only escape from it being in annihilation. The adherents of Shintō were, on the other hand, much more disposed to look upon the bright side of things, turning their religious festivals into holidays, and regarding people in sorrow and distress as unfit for the worship of the gods, whose felicity ought not to be disturbed by the sight of pain and misery. And this, perhaps, was one of the causes that enabled the religion of Buddha, which addresses itself more to the sorrowing hearts of which the world is so full, to obtain that predominance of which the Portuguese missionaries found it in possession.
A Shintō Priest
Of this religion of Buddha, by no means peculiar to Japan, but prevailing through the whole of central and southeastern Asia, and having probably more adherents than any other religious creed, it is not necessary here to speak at any length. A much more correct idea of it is to be obtained from the recorded observations of our modern missionaries, and from the elaborate investigations of Abel Rémusat, and several other learned Orientalists, who have shed a flood of light upon this interesting subject, than can be gathered from the letters of the Portuguese missionaries, whose comprehension of the Buddhist doctrine was, on many important points, especially as to the cardinal one of annihilation, exceedingly confused, contradictory, and erroneous; and, indeed, the same confusion and error exists in almost all European travellers in the East, down to a very recent period. Suffice it to say, that in the austerities and contempt for the world and its pleasures, practised and professed by the bonzes of the Buddhists, even Xavier and his brother Jesuits found their match; while, in the hierarchy into which those bonzes were arranged; the foreign language, imperfectly known even to themselves, of their sacred books and their liturgy, and which recent investigations have detected to be, with the bonzes of China and Japan, not Pali alone, but also pure Sanscrit; their doctrine of celibacy; the establishment of monasteries and nunneries; their orders of begging devotees; their exterior of purity and self-denial, but supposed secret licentiousness;[34] their fasts; their garbs; the tinkling of bells; the sign of the cross; the rosaries on which they counted their prayers; the large number of persons of noble birth who entered upon the clerical life; their manner of preaching; their religious processions; their pilgrimages; the size, splendor, and magnificence of their temples, known as Tera, the roofs supported by tall pillars of cedar; the altar within, and the lamps and incense burning there; the right of asylum possessed by the Tera; and even the practice of confession, prayers for the dead, and the sale of merit;—in all these respects, this system presented a complete counterpart at least to the show and forms and priestly devices of that very scheme of Roman Catholic worship which Xavier and his brother missionaries sought to introduce into Japan. The only striking difference was in the images, often of gigantic size, to be found in the Tera, but which, after all, were no more than a set-off against the pictures of the Catholic churches.
At the head of the Buddhist hierarchy was a high priest called Shaku, resident at Miyako, and having much the same spiritual prerogative with the Pope of Rome, including the canonization of saints. With him rested the consecration of the Jūji, corresponding to the bishops, or rather to the abbots, of the Catholic Church—all the Buddhist clergy being, in the language of Rome, regulars (similar, that is, to the monks and friars), and living together in monasteries of which the Jūji were the heads. These Jūji, however, could not enter upon their offices, to which great revenues were attached, except by the consent of the temporal authorities, which took care to limit the interference of the Shaku and the Jūji strictly to spiritual matters.[35]