. shint and esoteric buddhism 839
Buddhism”) or Shingon Shintō. It is important to understand that this
was not a sectarian movement, but rather a widespread discourse car-
ried out by various people (Buddhist practitioners and kami specialists
alike) in a number of cult centers (mainly Shingon and Tendai, but
also at the Ise Shrine and other temple-shrine complexes) from
the twelfth until the mid-nineteenth centuries.
Toward the end of the Heian period (794–1185), the Nakatomi
no harae kunge , one of the earliest texts in which eso-
teric Buddhism was explicitly used to develop a new discourse about
the Japanese kami, set forth a Buddhist typology of kami that became
widely accepted. It divided the kami into three groups according to
their degree of enlightenment: kami of original enlightenment (hon-
gakushin ), kami in the process of attaining enlightenment
(shigakushin ), and kami of non-enlightenment ( fukakushin
). The first group was later redefined by the Shintō priest and
theoretician Yoshida Kanetomo (1435–1511) as ryōbu shūgō
no shintō (“the form of Shintō that associates the two
[fundamental mandalas of esoteric Buddhism with the two shrines of
Ise]”) (see Grapard 1992). During the Edo period (1603–1868),
authors began to use the term Ryōbu Shintō to refer to Shingon-
related discourses about the kami, an interpretation that is still com-
mon today.
The kami of original enlightenment is a category that comprises only
the two main deities worshiped at the Great Shrines of Ise, Amaterasu
and Toyouke , understood as embodiments of the essence
of the principle of Buddha Dainichi (rishō ). It is important to
emphasize that, unlike other Japanese deities, the kami of Ise were
not simply “manifested traces” (suijaku)—mere provisional mani-
festations of specific Buddhist divinities—but were considered direct
emanations of Dainichi’s essence and embodiments of the two man-
dalas, which, according to the teachings of esoteric Buddhism, are the
structure of the universe. It interesting to note that Japanese kami in
general, including Sannō , Kumano , Hachiman , and
Kasuga , each of which claimed primacy over Japan, never went
beyond their status as manifestations of buddhas or bodhisattvas. A
notable exception is the Miwa ( ) deity, associated with the
Womb Mandala, together with Amaterasu, who emanated instead
from the Vajra Mandala (Vajradhātu Maṇḍala; Kongōkai Mandara
).