State Shinto

State Shintō (国家神道 or 國家神道, Kokka Shintō^?) describes Empire of Japan's ideological use of the native folk traditions of Shinto. The state strongly encouraged Shinto practices to emphasize the Emperor as a divine being. This was exercised through control of finances and training regimes for priests.

The State Shinto ideology emerged at the start of the Meiji era, as government officials defined freedom of religion within the Meiji Constitution. Scholars believed that Shinto reflected the historical fact of the Emperor's divine origins, not religious belief, and that it should enjoy a privileged relationship with the Japanese state. For the state, Shinto was seen as a non-religious moral tradition and patriotic practice.

Early Meiji-era attempts to unite Shinto and state failed, but this non-religious concept of ideological Shinto was incorporated into state bureaucracy. Shrines were defined as patriotic, not religious, institutions, which served state purposes such as honoring the war dead. The state also integrated local shrines into political functions, occasionally spurring local opposition and resentment. With fewer shrines financed by the state, nearly 80,000 closed or merged with neighbors. Many shrines and shrine organizations began to independently embrace these state directives, regardless of funding. By 1940, Shinto priests risked persecution for performing traditionally "religious" Shinto ceremonies.

Imperial Japan did not draw a distinction between ideological Shinto and traditional Shinto.US military leaders introduced the term "State Shinto" to differentiate the state's ideology from traditional Shinto practices in the 1945 Shinto Directive. That decree established Shinto as a religion, and banned further ideological uses of Shinto by the state. Controversy continues to surround the use of Shinto symbols in state functions.

Shinto is a blend of indigenous Japanese folk practices, court manners, and spirit-worship which dates back to at least 600 AD. These beliefs were first unified as "Shinto" during the Meiji era (1868-1912), though the Chronicles of Japan (日本書紀, Nihon Shoki^?) referenced the term in the eighth century. Shinto has no set of doctrines or founder, but draws from a set of creation myths described in books such as the Kojiki.

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