Shinto (the Way of the Gods)

by W. G. Aston

Worship has a secondary but most important function. It is addressed not only to the Gods but to our fellow-men. It is a means of communicating religious thoughts and emotions from man to man and from one generation to another.

Obeisance.--The simplest and most universal mode of showing reverence to the Gods is by bowing. In Shinto it is the custom to bow twice before and after praying or making an offering. The word ogamu, to pray or worship, means to bend. Kneeling is also practised--one of the norito has the phrase "bending the knee like a deer"--but is less common. Squatting (kashikomaru) is another form of obeisance.

Clapping Hands.--Clapping hands (kashihade), primarily a sign of joy, as it still is in our nurseries, was in ancient times in Japan a general token of respect. The Nihongi[176] states that the Ministers clapped hands in honour of the Empress when she ascended the throne. More recently, this form was confined to divine worship. One of the norito has the rubric, "Offer three cups of sake, clap hands, and retire." The number of hand-clappings was minutely prescribed in the old ritual. In some ceremonies it was done thirty-two times. A silent hand-clapping (shinobi-te) was sometimes directed. It seems possible that in Shinto at least this was the origin of the simple folding of the hands in prayer, common to so many nations, and explained by anthropologists as the attitude of an unresisting suppliant holding out his hands for the cord.

Other Gestures.--Respect may also be shown by raising objects to the forehead or placing them on the head (ita-daku), as the most honourable and important part of the body. This is done in the case of the implements used in the greater divination. Among less formal gestures used in worship are reverent upward looks (awogu), an almost instinctive practice, which has its root in the idea that Heaven is the dwelling-place of the Gods, and has certainly nothing to do with ghost-worship.

I cannot point to any case of prostration or of uncovering the feet as a form of Shinto worship. Uncovering the head is known in modern times, but I do not find it mentioned in the older ritual.

Offerings.--As the attitude of devotees towards myth varies according to their intelligence and culture, some distinguishing, more or less clearly, between the truth which it adumbrates and its fictitious embroidery, and others accepting it indiscriminately as absolute fact, as the image is by some regarded simply as an aid to devotion and by others as a true representation of the God, or even as the God himself, so in the case of offerings, a double current of opinion is to be traced. There are always worshippers who well know that the God does not eat the food, drink the wine, or wear the clothing which is laid upon his altar; but there are also more literal-minded people who cling, in the face of cogent evidence to the contrary, to the idea that in some ill-defined way he does benefit physically by such offerings. A story in the Konjaku Monogatari tells how a boy, possessed of superior insight, could see the devils carrying away the offerings of the purification ceremony. Even Hirata, a highly educated man, thought that food-offerings lost their savour in a way that is inexplicable by natural causes. Incense and burnt-offerings are adapted to the mental capacity of worshippers of this class.[177] The true reason for making offerings, whether to Gods or to the dead, is to be sought elsewhere. Men feel impelled to do something to show their gratitude for the great benefits which they are daily receiving, and to conciliate the future favour of the powers from whom they proceed. Offerings are part of the language by which the intention of the worshipper is manifested to Gods and men. It is in this rather than in any supposed actual benefit that their chief value consists. The norito state explicitly that the offerings were symbolical. They are called iya-jiro no mitegura, or offerings in token of respect. There is frequent mention of "fulfilling the praises" of the Gods by plenteous offerings. Symbolic gifts are, of course, not confined to religion. In ancient Greece a gift of earth and water indicated a surrender of political independence.

It is on the recognition of the symbolical value of offerings that the practice of substituting humaner, cheaper, or more convenient articles rests. Shinto has many illustrations of this principle.

I shall only mention Herbert Spencer's view that "the origin of the practice of making offerings is to be found in the custom of leaving food and drink at the graves of the dead, and as the ancestral spirit rose to divine rank, the refreshments placed for the dead developed into sacrifices." It must stand or fall with his general theory of the origin of religion, of which the reader will form his own judgment. I would suggest that the earliest offering was rather a portion of the ordinary meal set apart in grateful recognition of the source from which it came.

I find little or nothing in Shinto to bear out Jevons's opinion that "the core of worship is communion. Offerings in the sense of gifts are a comparatively modern institution both in ancestor-worship and in the worship of the Gods." Communion is, of course, out of the question in the case of the various offerings of clothing and implements. Even in the case of food-offerings there is no evidence in Shinto of a "joint participation in the living flesh and blood of a sacred victim."[178]

The general object of making offerings is to propitiate the God. There are several cases in the norito where they are made by way of reward for their services or in bargain for future blessings.[179] Some are expiatory, and are made with the object of absolving the worshipper from ritual impurity. These are called aga-mono, or "ransom things."