Shinto

The constraints of Shinto: Shinto as dance

Someone asked "How is Shinto constrained? Is it Japanese social conditioning?" And this is how I responded.

This is a big issue. And there are quite a few things going on.

You seem to be exploring the limits of Shinto, wondering whether it has limits, and how these are defined. And also here you mention the issue of the extent to which Shinto is bound up with being Japanese.

In my opinion, dealing with the constraints first of all, Shinto does have limits of a short. It is not "any thing goes," libertine, unconstrained. It may appear that way for several reasons such as, in my humble opinion:

1) Shinto is not the same
Shinto constrains things that other religions do not constrain, and does not constrain things that other religions do constrain. Take for example, being naked. Shinto does not constrain nakedness (or at least male nakedness). For Christians, the fig leaf is one of the most primal constraints. So Shinto can be, is, really liberating in this area. You can take your clothes off! But that is not to say that it does not make you put other things on. It is, I believe, constraining in other ways.

2) Shinto comes in waves
Shinto emphasises festival. There are a lot of festivals in Shinto. And, as the theorists
will tell you, and as is obvious from taking part, festivals contain quite a lot of liberation. Christianity contains festivals too, and there is some liberation. Otherwise relatively puritan, non-extravagent Protestants may suddenly eat lots and give each other a
lot of things at certain times of year, before going back to being Protestant again. But it seems that generally Christianity is more time constant. The rules are the rules, and they do not change much from one day to the next. Shinto on the other hand comes in waves. There are times and places where things are allowed, and other times and places where they are not (this relates to your post about the localisation of Kami). So coming from the West to a Shinto *festival* one may gain the impression that Shinto is one big party but that would be missing the preparation for the festival, or even the strict bits - the rituals - within the festival itself.

3) Shinto is like a dance
Not withstanding Shakers and "The Lord of the Dance" (one of my favourite Christian songs), Christianity tends to shy away from dancing, seeing it as heathen and all. In Shinto there is nothing more sacred than dance. An important point is that Shinto is something that you do, and that you learn by watching, copying and doing rather than from reading a book. One can convey a dance to an extent in words - you swing your hips, you go to the top of a hill and pray - but they wont so proscriptive. The dance, or perhaps the state of mind that accompanies the dance, is the important thing. The lack of "thou shalts" means that Shinto may appear unconstrainded, but this is because it has "moves," and these are perhaps just as constrained. 

Now returning to the Japanese question. You asked if Shinto was "Japanese social conditioning".

I think that a lot of Shinto may be "Social conditioning" but not only "social." A lot
of Shinto can and is done on ones own. While most Christians go to church all at once as a group and listen to sermons, most Shintoers do it on their own. But being a dance, Shinto is in a sense "conditioning" or rather "practice," and one usually learns the practice from someone else. But that other person, and the person doing the practice does not, in my opinion have to be Japanese.

I don't think that Shinto is exclusively social. There is an extent to which it just comes, since there is an extent to which it is natural in the sense of already there. But I don't think that it is all already there; there are moves.