Hello and welcome to the History of Japan podcast episode 547, The Five Mountains, Part 1.

The intersection of religion and political power is one of those subjects that's at once both very fraught and deeply important to human history.

Which, I mean, of course it is.

Religion is by very nature dealing with people's closely held beliefs,

and that in turn makes it a valuable political tool.

For religious leaders, meanwhile, it's not hard to see why they might be drawn

towards cooperation with the politically powerful.

The wealth and influence, those with power, can direct towards religion are big incentives towards cooperation with the politically powerful. The wealth and influence, those with power,

can direct towards religion are big incentives towards cooperation, and after all, that money and

influence is helping to expand the faith, and that's good in and of itself, isn't it?

And yet, it's hard not to feel these relationships can cheat religion of its power. They take

deeply personal

notions and turn them into accessories for the powerful to display their own status.

You see that dynamic across human history. I'm currently teaching some of my students about

the French Revolution, and of course the connection between the Catholic Church and the

pre-revolutionary feudal regime in France is essential

to understanding both the lead-up to the revolution and how it unfolded. But there are plenty of

other examples, too. From Wu Zetian, China's only Empress Renian embracing Buddhism as a tool for

legitimacy, to the Russian Tsars embracing the Orthodox Church as a pillar of their regime and beyond.

In Japan, too, there have been many attempts to wed religion and political power.

Today, of course, the best known as the so-called state Shinto, an amalgamation of religious beliefs

pushed by the governments of the imperial years, and especially from the 20s on, to support the

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