Page:A handbook of modern Japan (IA handbookofmodern01clem).pdf/333

Rh has often been a source of great embarrassment to Christians, who were frequently compelled to bury their dead under Buddhist auspices. But there have lately been cases where no objection was made to the burial of Christians with Christian rites in a Buddhist graveyard.

This is, perhaps, the most suitable place to devote just a few words to those sects which are comparatively modern in their origin, and are so composite in their doctrine that they cannot be classed under either Shintō or Buddhism. Indeed, they even show traces, though perhaps slight, of Christian teaching; and they all agree in the one doctrine of faith healing. These are Remmon-kyō (Doctrine of the Lotus-Gate), Kurozumi-kyō (Doctrine of Kurozumi, name of founder), and Tenrikyō (Doctrine of Heavenly Reason). The first and the last were founded by ignorant peasant women, and win adherents mostly among the lowest classes. The first seems more Buddhist than Shintō; the second seems more Shintō than Buddhist; while the third is the one which shows most plainly traces of Christian influence. In Kurozumi-kyō, the Sun-goddess is the chief object of devotion, because the founder was healed by worshipping the rising sun. Tenrikyō is growing rapidly, and is exclusive and intolerant.