Religion in Nara and Heian Japanand the combination of practices and their socio- economic functions. As Mark Teeuwen and
Fabio Rambelli have noted, what sets Grapard apart from Ivan Morris’ earlier references to the
combination of “Shintō” and Buddhism is that Grapard addresses kami worship as integrated into
a larger system, while Morris treated the two traditions as distinct religions that form one
another’s “antitheses.”^33 Pursuant to the section above regarding the usage of the term “Daoism,”
Grapard also adds that the same combinativist approach ought to be used to address the coexist-
ence of Shintō, Buddhism, Daoism, and the Confucian tradition.^34 Within the interaction
between Buddhism, Onmyōdō, and Kami worship, a “symbolic creativity was at its best” and
further analysis of the ritual, institutional, and textual overlap between these categories is indeed
far overdue.^35
Starting from a discussion on Grapard and Kuroda’s findings, Teeuwen and Rambelli noted
in 2003 that the study of “Buddhist forms of kami worship ... has as yet hardly been embarked
upon,” a situation that does not seem to have changed significantly in the past decade.^36 Their
edited volume Buddhas and Kami in Japan discusses honji suijaku or the “original forms of deities
and their local traces” as a means to comprehend premodern Japan’s “Buddhist” kami cults and
concludes that kami were not just simply identified with a certain buddha or bodhisattva. Instead
we find that certain deities or localities were “defined as local, temporary particularizations of
larger, universal entities.”^37
In connection with the application of honji suijaku to sites of worship and demonstrating
how “native deities also dwell in the dharma,” Anna Andreeva analyzed the origin chronicle
“The Karmic Origins of the Great Bright Miwa Deity” (Miwa daimyōjin engi). This medieval
text provided a new significance to Mount Miwa, a site connected with kami worship from as
early as the Kofun period and commonly connected with ryōbu shintō, a tradition that regards
kami as manifestations of the Buddhist Womb and Diamond Mandala. In the context of cor-
rectly understanding premodern Japan’s religiosity, Andreeva points out that the referential
framework of this text is vast and incorporates Hindu, Chinese, and Japanese elements in con-
versation with Buddhist esoteric theories.^38 In addition, the text connects the cultic site Miwa
with other sites of worship such as Ise, Hiei, Tōnomine, and Yoshino, thus constructing a vast
“sacred geography.”
Nara and Heian Buddhism
While many traditions colored the premodern religious landscape, the Buddhist tradition occu-
pied a central position from its official acceptance in the sixth century. Scholarship on Buddhist
developments during the classical and the medieval periods is extensive, and a concise overview
of recent themes is destined to be incomplete.
Buddhist ritual, its institutional implications, and a reassessment of the role of women in Nara
and Heian Buddhism, seem to be the main recent points of interest; and in essence themes such as
female patronage, ritual developments, and monks’ institutional progress are all intrinsically con-
nected. Most important to keep in mind, but unfortunately not sufficiently addressed in scholar-
ship, is that the Buddhism of the center was in fact very eclectic. This is exemplified by monks’
involvement with the onmyōryō office mentioned above, the overlapping roles of nuns and miko
during the Nara period, or the Buddhist community’s reliance on female shamans for various
services.^39
When Fujiwara no Fuhito built the new Nara capital as one whole with the Buddhist temples,
there were six “schools” (nantō rokushū) present in Japan: Kusha, Kegon, Hossō, Jōjitsu, Ritsu,
and Sanron. After Saichō and Kūkai’s return from Tang China in 805 and 806 respectively, the
Shingon and Tendai schools slowly developed, resulting in the “eight schools.” One should,