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From: loren@dweasel.llnl.gov (Loren Petrich)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.eastern
Subject: Some Shinto Mythology
Message-ID: <1991Jan3.083714.3406@nas.nasa.gov>
Date: 3 Jan 91 08:37:14 GMT
Sender: news@nas.nasa.gov
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
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Approved: prabhu@amelia.nas.nasa.gov


	I have some questions about Shinto mythology that I have been
trying to find answers to.

	I remember reading somewhere that there is one creation story
that states that some primordial goddess had given birth to the
islands of Japan. Does anyone know of any more details? Or any books
that discuss Japanese mythology in any detail?

	On the subject of State Shinto, Japan's official religion
earlier in this century, Bertrand Russell claimed something very
unflattering, in a discussion of Plato's Republic in "A History of
Western Philosophy" (published in 1944). He claimed that there were
some official dogmas to the effect that the Emperor was descended from
the Sun Goddess Amaterasu and that Japan had been created earlier than
the rest of the world. Those who questioned these dogmas, even in a
learned work, he had said, would get into trouble. Presumably it would
be very unpatriotic to believe that the there was some land mass older
than the ones on which their great nation is situated. Does anyone
know more of the official dogmas of State Shinto?

	On the subject of obnoxious nationalism, I have read of some
claims that the founder of Nichiren Buddhism had made some claims of
that nature about Japan, that that was where humanity had first
emerged and that Japanese was humanity's first language. If that is
correct, then what "evidence" did he offer for these hypotheses? These
claims seem especially far out since Buddhism is supposed to be a
non-nationalist religion.


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Loren Petrich, the Master Blaster: loren@sunlight.llnl.gov

Since this nodename is not widely known, you may have to try:

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