My God, I have visited on February 16th Atago Jinja*, a Shinto shrine from 1603. It lies in the heart of Tokyo on a hill. I was overwhelmed by the atmosphere, the old trees, the pond with Koi carp, the different shrines, the corners with memorial stones, the honours, the notes you can dedicate in the temple to the god of fire, god of water, god of the mountains, etc.
Would you like to comment on this shrine?
It is indeed an overwhelming religion, with a
wealth of rituals, forms of God, and especially the most important thing it is
a very easy and accessible path to help the common man in his daily life.
All rituals are aimed at nurturing the hope,
supporting a searching, surrendering the fate, asking for blessings and
obtaining favours.
The powers and forces of God on earth as
manifested in the fire and the water, the earth, the spirit of trees, of a
mountain, of a city, of a river, the ancestors who stand by in this religion,
they are all and immediately available to the believer.
This is one of the reasons that the Japanese on
average are becoming the oldest in the world, are eating the healthiest, are
having a lot of compassion for nature, compared to other nations. Didn’t you
notice how clean the streets are?
The Japanese would feel throwing something on
the street, as if he did it in his own home. And that feeling is very correct.
You are doing this then at your own home. For the earth is your home, the only
home you are having. And this thing I am referring to the garbage on the street,
or rather the lack of it, is a symbol of a deeply felt sense of Japanese
culture with its surroundings.
The other hand, nuclear energy, the killing of
whales, the gambling industry are we saving for another blog.
In almost the same time as the Buddha the revelation
of Shintoism arrived on earth, in parallel and independently of this.
And there is almost no religion on earth so
exclusively cherished by one nation and used and developed as Shintoism in
Japan. Japan is after all an island.
And a monotheist would get sick from it, such
multiform religion. God not at all.
For it is true that the monotheistic religions
are cherishing the simple truth, that all is stemming from God, and God alone
should be worshiped and given thanks.And it is true that the Shintoists often forget that behind all the powers of all the spirits only God is in charge, only God and nothing else. But there is more to comment on.
The spiritual world only looks at what a person
does with his faith.
And then is a Japanese Shintoist with a big
heart for his surroundings and being open to the whole spiritual world of more
value than a monotheist. For the sake of argument this contradiction is used.
Because this monotheist (Christian, Muslim,
Jew) is regularly missing much of the power and splendour of God as shown in
the spiritual world on earth and through all Its servants. The wealth of forms,
the forces and powers, the variegation of the multitude, of all energies, of
inspirations, of radiating energies, of situations, of blessings connected with
a cloud, a tree, a river, a flower, a rainstorm. And without feeling this all
everything soon becomes a little bloodless.
For the ordinary person is just an ordinary
man, developing from ape to spirit, and in the long path of evolution, all those
forces and forms and powers are a nice incentive, a tool, an opportunity to
move forward, to overcome life , to endure life, to keep hope.
And therefore the spiritual world has welcomed Shintoism
very much and will continue to do so.
My blessings to you all
Nr. 264
* The image is another Shinto shrine
