View Single Post
Old 07-10-2013, 10:52 AM   #38
bkedelen
 
bkedelen's Avatar
Dojo: Boulder Aikikai
Join Date: Sep 2004
Posts: 450
United_States
Offline
Re: Religion....No Competition.

Quote:
Christopher Li wrote: View Post
My point was not to argue over which of the ever-changing interpretations of scripture are "correct", but to point out that a single example (and I'm not even sure that you're not misunderstanding where they're coming from) can hardly characterize a religion as "inclusive", "exclusive, or anything else. Especially in Japan, where there is little uniformity of belief or practice.
Religion is exclusive by definition, and often violently so. Saying otherwise is as convincing as claiming vegetarianism to be inclusive. This is instinctively understood, since religions that make attempts at inclusivity quickly make everyone uncomfortable.

Japan is a reasonable (and utterly unique) exclusion from the above, however. Japanese culture is so laissez-faire and capricious about religion that, with a few notable outliers, when compared with fundamentalism they barely qualify. Furthermore Shintoism's status as a religion is quite debatable, and most of the folks I know who identify as Shinto do not think of it as such.

Last edited by bkedelen : 07-10-2013 at 11:00 AM.
  Reply With Quote