The subject of this volume is the historical development of shint� and national thought in premodern and modern Japan. After examining the first instances of shint�-confucian syncretism in the early Edo period, the author investigates the function of shint� as a religious system to legitimize political power and explores how during the late Edo period this culminates in the concept of a specific Japanese national polity(kokutai). Though the main caesurae in the process of modern Japanese history (e.g. Meiji ...
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The subject of this volume is the historical development of shint� and national thought in premodern and modern Japan. After examining the first instances of shint�-confucian syncretism in the early Edo period, the author investigates the function of shint� as a religious system to legitimize political power and explores how during the late Edo period this culminates in the concept of a specific Japanese national polity(kokutai). Though the main caesurae in the process of modern Japanese history (e.g. Meiji restoration and the end of the Pacific War in 1945) play a dominant role in this context, the author points out that the main historical, religious and ideological continuities are of much greater importance; The ideas and concepts elaborated by shint� thinkers during the Edo period became reality in modern Japan.
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