Superstition, Faith, and Scripture: Sakaino Kōyō and the Politics of Buddhism in Meiji Japan

As described in several recent studies, the appropriation of the concept “religion 宗教” in modern Japan made “Buddhism 仏教” enter a transformation process that led, ultimately, to the reimagining of its very content; according to historian of religions Isomae Junichi, one of these elements was, for instance, an emphasis on “belief” to the detriment of “practice”. However, in terms of Buddhism’s reframing into the category of “religion”, we should also pay attention to the construction of the idea of “superstition 迷信”, which appears during this time as a concept relative to “belief” or “faith”. Often considered the epitome of this belief-centered version of the dharma, the so-called New Buddhism movement (shinbukkyō undō 新仏教運動) that occurred in the turn of the 20th century played a fundamental role in establishing the concept of “superstition”. This paper focuses on Sakaino Kōyō (境野黄洋 1871–1933), a pioneer of Chinese Buddhist studies in modern Japan and one of the main leaders of the movement. In order to explore the intellectual context that gave birth to such reformist efforts, I explore his ideas during the later 1890s, a period in which he was dedicated to differentiating “belief” from “superstition”. During this time, he emphasized the eradication of “superstition”, arguing that it constituted an unsound element both socially and intellectually. Sakaino offered the idea of “poetical Buddhism” (shiteki bukkyō 詩的仏教), a method for interpreting scripture in general, and segments thereof contemporarily regarded as “superstitious” specifically. This paper situates Sakaino’s contributions to Buddhist reform—analyzed through historical and hermeneutical methods and influenced by liberal Christian theology—within the global discourse on religion and science, while critically examining how his reinterpretations navigated tensions between modern rationality and the preservation of Buddhist truth in Meiji Japan.