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The Meiji Restoration, or: How The Bourgeoisie Turned Folk Religion Into Fascism - A Thread
When the MR is talked about in a historical context, it's often reduced to, "and then the Emperor got power back and Japan industrialized just in time for two world wars." As Marxists, it's important to note there's far more to it than that, that directly led to rise of fascism.
Marxists recognize that industrialization is NOT a magical process. A great change in the mode of production necessarily produces incredible change in class relations and wider societal superstructure as a whole. In Japan, a huge emphasis of this change was placed on religion.
But first we need to widen our focus a bit. The Meiji and Showa Eras, from 1878 to 1945, saw the centralization of state power (into the Diets and oligarchies behind each Emperor), the liquidation of feudal class relations, and crucially, the centralization of state ideology.
State ideology was especially important given that as Japan observed its new place post-1854 forced opening, it found itself in a world increasingly dominated by Western imperialism, especially in the East. To combat this, Japanese leadership became determined to unify the state.
The pre-Meiji Era slogan of 「尊皇攘夷」"Revere the Emperor, expel the barbarian" arguably became a guiding value here. In building a new social structure within Japam around the concept 国体 Kokutai, national identity/essence/sovereignty, the Meiji govt built its value system...
...around excising elements deemed "foreign" from its culture primarily Chinese and Western, and promoting new interpretations of elements deemed natively Japanese, even as it quickly worked to industrialize and imperialize on its own interpretation of the Western model.
In religion (at least as much as the concept exists in Japan), this manifested in 神仏分離 Shinbutsu Bunri, the forced split of Shinto (indigenous folk traditions and beliefs) and Buddhism, which had more or less comfortably and naturally syncretized for the past THOUSAND YEARS.
Buddhist elements were torn out of the fabric of life; artifacts destroyed, temples shut down, monks exiled. Into the combined vacuum left by this AND the liquidation of samurai/peasant class structure into a wider Japanese proletariat, the state injected itself.
I should make it clear now that up until ~1860s, there had never been one single, unified idea of what "Shinto" was, even pre-Buddhism. So to put the task of creating this idea solely into the hands of bourgeoise intelligentsia behind 国学 kokutai and bureaucracy was...not good.
At this point I have to unpack the few ideas that all of Shinto shares.
All things hold mitama 御霊 (spirit, soul, essence) with especially awe-inspiring mitama being venerated and enshrined as 神 kami. Traditions were mostly localized, but most recognized legitimacy of others.
All things hold mitama 御霊 (spirit, soul, essence) with especially awe-inspiring mitama being venerated and enshrined as 神 kami. Traditions were mostly localized, but most recognized legitimacy of others.
Kami are universal and interconnected, acting as a spiritual network that informs and influences the material world.
Certain kami are very well known. For instance, Inari-Okami, a kami of agriculture, and Amaterasu-Omikami, the sun kami. The latter becomes important here...
Certain kami are very well known. For instance, Inari-Okami, a kami of agriculture, and Amaterasu-Omikami, the sun kami. The latter becomes important here...
...Because one of the few other things Shinto theologians have always agreed on is that the Emperor can trace one singular line of descent straight back to the first Emperor, Jimmu, great-grandson of Amaterasu-Omikami herself. This became the concrete base of the new Shinto.
Bringing the entire shrine system under the wing of the state through state-ordained priests, co-opted for adoration of the Emperor and through him, Amaterasu-Omikami, and through her the Japanese isles, people, and empire as a whole, State Shinto became a self-serving cycle.
This is also where it becomes a tool of colonialism and imperialism. Under State Shinto, lands conquered by Imperial Japan would "come under the protection" of the Emperor through rite of building shrines that would hold both native kami and Amaterasu-Omikami.
At the same time, State Shinto could be seen as an (albeit twisted) tool of national and even continental liberation, as it was in its time and place. Japan's idea of the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere was a reactionary defense against Western imperialism.
It's also important to note that State Shinto was a critical aspect of Japanese fascism and ideas of Japanese supremacy vs other Asians. Belonging to a nation with the direct descendent of Amaterasu at its head, along with Japan's growing material power, lent the bourgeoisie...
...a narrative strikingly similar to that of American Manifest Destiny, one equal parts believable, alluring, and soothing to a still-coalescing and volatile proletariat. State Shinto proved an invaluable asset of the new bourgeoise superstructure.
This is hypercondensed and lacking a lot of context but I hope it explains a bit about why and how State Shinto developed into what it did. I can and will expand on other aspects in other threads, eventually.
