Magic and morality in modern Japanese exorcistic technologies: A study of Mahikari

要旨

Observers of Japanese New Religions are much perplexed by the unanticipated resurgence, especially among the Neo-New Religions (shinshinshukyo 新新宗教) such as Mahikari 真光 and Agonshu 阿含宗， of belief in spirits, the decline of which had long been predicted as an unavoidable sacrifice to modernization. Contrary to some social science theorists who maintain that rationality —the sine qua non of all processes by which societies transcend primitive or feudal insti­ tutions—is antithetical to spiritism, what we see in Japan today sug­ gests the very opposite. Rather than an archaic cognitive anomaly, contemporary spirit-belief might better be understood as an ex­ panded rationality with its own modality of logic. Spiritism is not simply compatible with modernity but is also capable of enhancing the meaning of life in Japan’s highly urbanized and industrialized society where often a sense of disconnectedness prevails that no dose of pure, scientific, or empirical reason appears able to cure. Not only disinterested specialists but also those who actively pre­ serve Japan’s elite or established religions (kisei shukyd 既成宗教） ， which，at least in principle if not in practice, have traditionally been antagonistic to spirit belief, are puzzled by its revival. Their con­ sternation is articulated by Sasaki Shoten, a Jodo Shinshu theolo­ gian, who laments that

主題