Religion in Japanese daily life, by David C. Lewis, Abingdon, UK, Routledge, 2017, viii+ 346 pp., EUR €115 (hardback), ISBN 9781138677982

This book focuses on what Lewis calls ‘grass roots’ religious attitudes and practices based on his studies between 1981 and 1984 of two Kansai localities (one a Toray Industries housing block) augmented by ‘examples from more recent informal interviews’ (p. 5) and some later survey material. The result, Lewis claims, is that religious attitudes remain virtually the same as in the 1980s, and he disputes arguments that Japan has become more secularized and that levels of religious practice have declined in the current century. There is also an Appendix with eight case studies of ordinary people and practice, seemingly from the 1980s, although it is unclear when these took place.

Lewis does not define clearly what he means by ‘religion’ and ‘religious’ – terms that have produced extensive debate and analysis in Japanese contexts – and uses ‘non-religious’ rather than ‘secular’ as a contrast to religious/religion. Much of his focus (from New Year shrine visits to death rituals and ground-breaking ceremonies) is on what many (including his interviewees) term customary, although Lewis views them as essentially ‘religious’, based in his notions of ‘latent religiosity’ (p. 305) and “‘passive” belief’ (p. 156, 201) that seemingly lurk within everyone. Thus, the attitudes of a ‘non-religious’ tourist visiting a famous shrine might change because of the visit (p. 226), while the non-religious, upon buying a car, may have this latent religiosity triggered and go to a shrine to get it blessed (p. 156). Lewis does not indicate how commonly ‘non-religious’ people do this; he assumes they do or might. The wider argument – that people are innately religious so that whatever they do in effect becomes ‘religious’ – facilitates the argument that there is no secularization in Japan but it rests on notions such as latent religiosity and passive belief that require a more cogent intellectual underpinning to be viable.

Lewis presents his as a local-level study of religious practices and says that there has been a scarcity of such studies in Japan (p. 1). Oddly, he fails to mention those that have been done, such as Satsuki Kawano’s (2005) study that covers similar ground and critiques secularization in the context of everyday practices in ways that would have helped Lewis. An awareness of recent academic literature in the field is not always his forte.

Lewis suggests his research (on ‘ordinary people’ and real-life behaviour) is more exacting than that of others, remarking that it is ‘easier to study a formal social group’, such as a new religion or observe ceremonies at temples, than to find out what ‘religious practices ordinary people are observing’ (p. 1). Postulating that the research one has done is more difficult than that of others strikes me as contentious, misguided and unnecessary. It also suggests he has not done research in some of these areas. In my experience (including examining ritual practices, interviewing ‘ordinary people,’ and studying religious organizations), it has been organizations and especially new religions that have proved the most problematic to outside researchers – something other colleagues in the field have also commented on to me.

In the chapter ‘Roots of Japanese Religiosity’, Lewis presents a rather fragmentary historical sweep from Yayoi to the present that contains several fanciful claims. He suggests that Jewish settlers came to Japan at some stage, but if they did they intermarried so evidence of their presence has disappeared (p. 70 fn. 53), while they might have influenced early Japanese religion, since some Japanese ritual practices are like and were thus perhaps influenced by Jewish ones and also that kana might be based on Hebrew (p. 46). His suggestions of a Christian presence in Heian Japan (pp. 44–45) cite references to webpages that are reminders that not everything on the internet is academically sound or written by rational people, rather than documented evidence. Lewis ‘substantiates’ these claims as follows:

It is not unlikely that during that period some Japanese visitors to China could have had contact with Christians or that churches were also established in Japan but such contacts have to be inferred from indirect evidence in the absence of explicit references in the extant documents. (p. 45).

In other words, there is no actual evidence. However, Lewis seems keen throughout to emphasize Christianity as a force in Japanese religion. In his final chapter, for example, he suggests that beliefs in a supreme being helped Western scientific discoveries and wonders whether science and technology are influencing Japanese people into believing in a supreme being (p. 293). The evidence is (to say the least) scant, particularly given the low levels of adherence to Christianity, although Lewis is keen to emphasize any account that shows anything higher than the usual one per cent, including studies from half a century ago that are cited as if germane today.

Such citations of old material as if they were contemporary are found throughout. Thus the discussion of hatsu-miyamairi (p. 96) is supported by references, the most recent of which is from 1981 (most are earlier), with no discussion of whether the levels of this practice are now at similar levels to the 1980s. Such, indeed, is the reliance on the 1980s’ material and dated sources that Kawano’s study, published 13 years before Lewis’s, still seems more up-to-date. There are also problems with some of his academic references that did not say what they are claimed to; thus, Lewis talks of how pilgrims in Tokugawa times might not return home afterwards, and cites myself and one other reference for this (p. 54). Since I could not recall writing this, I checked. I had said nothing of the sort, nor had the other source.

Lewis’s data sometimes seems at odds with his claims. Citing his 1980s’ survey indicating over 30% of respondents used palmistry (something he includes as religious) and a later Japanese survey showing that levels had fallen to 10.8% in 1999 (p. 118), he then asserts ‘the fact’ (p. 123) that practices such as palmistry are on the increase. Elsewhere he says that new religions’ adherents spend more time than others on chanting at the butsudan and that since new religions are concentrated in urban areas, this counters the assumption that secularization is occurring there (pp. 259–260). The logical gap here is obvious. Moreover, it takes no account of the point that, according to several recent studies, new religions are nowadays ageing and losing adherents. If new religions are declining and ageing, as Lewis elsewhere recognizes (p. 59), this surely raises questions about, rather than serves as a refutation of, secularization in cities.

The chapter on rituals in commercial companies provides interesting material about Toray in the 1980s, and Lewis produces anecdotal comments to suggest other companies perform religious rituals, albeit with no clear evidence about their current levels. Indeed, Lewis says one cannot know whether Toray is representative or exceptional since few studies have been carried out of Japanese business and religion. Since Lewis cannot say whether Toray is typical, his study of it dates from the 1980s, and since he does not have any empirical data on contemporary Japanese companies, one wonders how he can claim that company rituals are increasing and that religion is flourishing in Japanese companies today (p. 192).

In a chapter on leisure, Lewis describes various festive events, states that religion and entertainment are indistinguishable in practice (p. 233) and that ‘former religious practices also permeate modern tourism’ (p. 218). Lewis’s notions of passive belief and latent religiosity mean that any shrine or temple visit as a tourist can become religious and he assumes that ‘this form of “religion”’ may be increasing (p. 225). However, this is unsubstantiated by any contemporary data, while his citations about ‘modern tourism’ are dated (from the 1980s), in a field and context that has developed rapidly since then. It also overlooks the recent rich vein of Japanese studies on religion and tourism, which have presented new angles on the relationship of religion and tourism, often while discussing the issue of secularization. Okamoto’s (2015) work, for example, argues that secularization processes in Japan today are not just reshaping the dynamics of visits to shrines and pilgrimage sites but also raising questions about the meaning of ‘religion’. An awareness of this recent literature would have helped Lewis, since it offers ways of rethinking the wider questions rather than blandly assuming that things remain much the same. Moreover, whether a rise in tourism really means an increase in ‘religion’ is moot; while Lewis assumes so, other studies, such as Astley’s (2015) on Kōyasan showing that while international tourists have increased since its UNESCO accreditation, there has been a decline in the number of religious services and rituals performed there by Japanese visitors, suggest otherwise.

In the chapter on death rituals, Lewis states ‘the situation is practically the same’ as in the 1950s when 80% of households had a butsudan, while in future ‘ancestral rites are likely to continue to be observed by most of the population’ (pp. 265–6). These are unsubstantiated claims. A striking recent book by the Buddhist priest and writer Hidenori Ukai (2015) documents striking changes in attitudes and practices in such areas in recent times and how it has undermined the structures of Buddhism in Japan today. Butsudan ownership has declined; Ishii Kenji, perhaps the foremost specialist on religious statistics in Japan, places it as now around 50% and ancestor veneration practices have diminished (Ukai, 2015, p. 160, 168), while daily butsudan worship fell significantly in the early years of this century (Ishii, 2007, p. 78). Covell (2005, pp. 174–176) also draws attention to falling levels of butsudan use and beliefs in ancestors, while noting an emphasis (citing a Tokyo survey of 2003) on viewing funerals as social customs rather than something religious. Especially in conurbations, increasing numbers of people (by 2006, in over one quarter of all funerals in Tokyo) are making their wish to separate religion from death rituals clear by asking for ‘non-religious’ (mushūkyō) funerals (Reader, 2011; Ukai, 2015). Such things suggest that ‘latent religiosity’ may not be a universal Japanese trait, and they severely undermine Lewis’s assertions that things remain much the same as they did decades ago.

While the descriptions of various rituals and the hypothesis that daily life practices have an enduring nature, are imbued with an innate religiosity and remain relevant for many in Japan are of some interest, these are not exactly ground-breaking new ideas. Overall, Lewis appears locked within the assumption that the 1980s reflects the present day. While he does mention new phenomena (such as contemporary interest in ‘spirituality’), these are mentioned more in passing than in analytical depth or evidence that these are replacing or making up for the decline in older forms of religious practice.

There are thus many problems with this book. By embracing the notion of latent religiosity, Lewis precludes any potential for addressing the vexed question of secularization adequately. While this is a sound localized account of attitudes and ritual practices in the penultimate decade of the last century, it falls short as a study of contemporary religious practices and as a critique of secularization in the present day.

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Ian Reader

Ian Reader is Professor Emeritus at the University of Manchester. He has worked in academic institutions in Japan, Scotland, Hawaii, Denmark and England and has carried out research on various aspects of religion in Japan and elsewhere since 1981. He is the author or co-author of 11 books and numerous academic articles and chapters; his latest book, co-authored with Erica Baffelli, is Dynamism and the Ageing of a Japanese ‘New’ Religion: Transformations and the Founder (in press: Bloomsbury).