The Meaning of Shinto - Softcover

Mason, J.W.T

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1553691393 ISBN 13: 9781553691396

Publisher: Trafford, 2007

Synopsis

J.W.T. Mason presents rare insight not only into the basic beliefs of Shinto, but also into the importance of mythology and creativity to the evolution of our understanding of life and the universe. Mason begins by establishing his view of the development of man, language, and spiritual expression. Early man had an innate, intuitive understanding of the universe. This understanding was expressed through mythology and ritual.
Shinto's traditions and practices still reflect this ancient understanding that all things, living and non-living are of divine spirit. Man is an integral part of Great Nature, Dai Shizen. In Shinto, man seeks to re-establish the natural harmony, to return to the path and rhythm of Great Nature, through prayer, ritual, and daily routines.
Mason explains the vitality of Shinto in today's modern world. In this valuable work, the reader will find not only an insightful explanation of Shinto beliefs and ritual, but also a challenge to individuals of any spiritual tradition that their religious experience remain rooted in ancient, intuitive wisdom while simultaneously developing conscious understanding and contemporary expression.

About this title

About the Author

John Warren Teets Mason (1879 to 1941) was an American journalist who published several works on eastern spiritual traditions, including The Meaning of Shinto, The Creative East, and Creative Freedom. These writings all focused on spirituality of Eastern traditions and the notion of creativity in mythology and religious practices.

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From chapter II, Mythology and Creative Beginning:

Primaeval man was not godless nor profane. His subconscious psyche held him within the deep spiritual current of life and he could not pursue a cult of self-consciousness because his self-conscious mind was in the primary stage of evolution. Primaeval man was a self-conscious infant, but subconsciously and in his responses to intuitive knowledge he was more mature than modern man. The modern mythologies of poetry, fiction and the drama, show far higher language competence than do the mythologies of primitive man, and much more self-conscious analytical powers; but they do not reach to the subconscious depths, where knowledge of universal reality is concealed. Primaeval man communed with the depths but lacked the language ability. The mythologies of the primaeval past talk in spiritual terms about all existence, for the subconscious knowledge of the universe points that way. We speak of primitive "religion" but the ancient mythologies, when devoid of self-conscious sophistication are much broader in their conceptions than any religious doctrine, self-consciously formulated, ever has been:

Primitive religion, though devoid of insight into its own deeper meaning, has a certain advantage over religion as an element in modern civilization, in that if less coherent, it is more comprehensive. All the values of life, utilitarian and humane, from food to sculpture and painting, from the study of plants and beasts to the study of the heavens, are primarily viewed by the savage as religious interests. After all, he lives in such a little world that he has in some ways a better chance of seeing the various institutions of society in their entirety as a way of life than can modern man, who to get a grip on his moral universe, must take so much more into consideration.

From Chapter III The Meaning of Shinto

The indicated meaning of Shinto or Kami no Michi becomes: Man is divine spirit at the divine cross-road or in the divine universe, choosing his way. To understand the full content of the primaeval spiritual conception, however, Kami Nagara should be united to Kami no Michi, as Kami Nagara no Michi. The complete primaeval intuition then appears: Whatever is, is divine spirit; man is divine spirit in the divine universe choosing his way. This is the subconscious truth of life's knowledge of reality that primaeval man sought to express in Shinto.

Divine spirit, however, in Shinto, does not mean theological omnipotent divinity. Divine spirit in Shinto is the universe in every aspect, seeking self-creative growth, with freedom of choice. So, divine spirit can take the wrong road as well as the right, and can sacrifice itself to its own eventual progress. Whatever the result, good or bad, Kami is always Kami: divine spirit can never lose its divinity.

Kami Nagara, "whatever is, is divine spirit," is not a philosophic phrase nor a mystical idea without practical reality in Shinto. The woodlands, the flowers of the field, crops in their seasons, the dust of the road and the water that lays the dust and the germs of disease in the dust, animal life and humanity, beneficial or harmful, are all divine spirit. Fire, mountains, seas, every material as well as every living form of the universe Is Kami or divine spirit. Shinto does not mean Nature was made by divine spirit, for to Shinto there are not two entities, divine spirit and Nature. Nature is divine spirit come forth from subjectivity as the objective universe. Mountains and seas do not have spirits dwelling in them. Everything is divine spirit, for there are many ways for the Kami creative spirit to express itself. Thus Motoori Norinaga says:

There are many cases of seas and mountains being called Kami. It is not their spirits which are meant. The word was applied directly to the seas or mountains themselves as being very awful things.

Hirata Atsutane says the same, adding that the word Kami was used directly "of the sea on account of its depth and the difficulty of crossing it; of the mountain on account of its loftiness." Here, however, is an instance of self-consciousness attempting to add to the mythological intuition, for shallow waters and low hills are likewise Kami in Shinto. No reason is given in the mythology itself for Kami becoming mountains, seas and all Nature. To primaeval man, no reason was necessary for he accepted without any reservation the intuitive truth that the entire universe is Kami or divine spirit.

Edition details

• Publisher: Trafford
• Publication date: 2007
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1553691393
• ISBN 13: 9781553691396
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 180