The Violent Invention of Modern Shinto

Shinto is often described as Japan’s ancient indigenous religion — but the version that exists today was largely assembled, reorganized, and in some cases invented across centuries of political need. This episode traces Shinto from Yayoi rice farmers propitiating nature spirits, through a thousand years of Buddhist entanglement, to the moment Meiji bureaucrats separated the gods by government decree and turned emperor worship into civic duty.