The words “Shintoism” and “Shintoist” can be found in English texts about Shinto, but they can give a misleading impression of what Shinto is.
The ending “-ism” often suggests an ideology, or a religion based on a fixed set of teachings and doctrines. However, unlike Buddhism, Christianity, and other religions, Shinto has no holy texts and no individual founder.
Shinto is a way of living and a way of understanding our relationship with the world, based on respect for nature, living things, the Kami, and our ancestors.
For the same reason, the word “Shintoist” can also be misleading, as it may suggest that a person follows a defined belief system in the same way one follows an ideology.
Instead, we use terms such as “Shinto believer”, “Shinto practitioner”, or the Japanese word Shinja (信者), meaning “believer”.
While the words “Shintoism” and “Shintoist” can be understood, we prefer “Shinto” and “Shinto believer” or “Shinja” because these terms better reflect the nature of the tradition and how it is understood by practitioners.
You might also like:
What is Shinto?
I’m new to Shinto. How can I get started?
