Monday, March 23, 2026 · 天火 · tianmu.org
Japanese
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Texts
Ryukyuan Religion — The Way of the Sacred IslandsAn ethnographic introduction to the indigenous religion of the Ryukyu Islands: a tradition built on female spiritual authority, the sacred groves called utaki, the paradise beyond the sea called Nirai Kanai, and a thousand years of priestess civilization — shattered by annexation, bombed to rubble in 1945, and quietly returning.Shinto — The Way of the KamiAn ethnographic introduction to Shinto: the indigenous religion of Japan, with no founder and no fixed dogma, built around the presence of kami (sacred powers) in all things — the mountains, the rivers, the rice, the storm, the emperor's unbroken line — and around the human practice of approaching those presences through purification, prayer, and festival. One of the world's most continuously practiced indigenous religious traditions.Shugendo — The Way of the MountainAn ethnographic introduction to Shugendō: Japan's ancient tradition of mountain asceticism, founded by the legendary En no Gyōja and practiced by the Yamabushi — the mountain-prostrating ascetics who sought supernatural power through radical physical ordeal. A syncretic religion blending esoteric Buddhism, Shinto, Taoism, and indigenous mountain worship, Shugendō was suppressed by the Meiji government in 1872 and revived after World War II. One of the most distinctive spiritual traditions in the world.