Shinto and Buddhism
I'm busy grading the midterm exams. One misunderstanding that I've seen a few time is in regards to the origins of Shinto. While Shinto and Buddhism have developed in tandem for the last 13 or 14 centuries (since Buddhism was introduced to Japan in the 6th century), Shinto does not originate from Buddhism. More properly, Shinto is a collection of native myths and traditions that have their origins to the middle of the first millennium BC. See here for a good discusion of these topics. In some sense, Buddhism is a 'foreign' religion while Shinto is a 'native' religion. This distinction doesn't really work perfectly because, as we saw in our readings, the Buddhism Japanese practice is of a very Japanese form.