Shinbutsu-shūgō
Beginning in 1868, the new Meiji government approved a series of laws that separated Japanese native kami worship, on one side, from Buddhism which had assimilated it, on the other.
[5] The term "Shinto" itself was coined in the 6th century to differentiate the previously disparate local religious practices from imported Buddhism.
[9] During the same era, Kokugaku theorists like Motoori Norinaga tried to separate it intellectually from Buddhism, preparing the ground for the final schism of the Meiji Restoration.
By the time it entered Japan, it was already syncretic, having adapted to and amalgamated with other religions and cultures in India, China, and the Korean Peninsula.
[13] When it arrived in Japan, it already had a disposition towards producing the combinatory gods that the Japanese would call syncretic deities (習合神, shūgōshin).
[14] Buddhist claims of superiority encountered resistance, and monks tried to overcome them by deliberately integrating kami into their belief system.
[12] Accordingly, one of the first efforts to reconcile Shinto and Buddhism was made in the 8th century during the Nara period founding so-called jingū-ji (神宮寺), that is shrine-temples, complexes comprising both a shrine and a temple.
[15] Shrines for him started to be built at temples (the so-called "temple-shrines"), marking an important step ahead in the process of amalgamation of kami and Buddhism.
[15] When the great buddha at Tōdai-ji in Nara was built, there was also erected within the temple grounds a shrine for Hachiman – according to the legend because of a wish expressed by the kami himself.
[15] The third and final stage of the fusion took place in the 9th century with the development of the honji suijaku (本地垂迹) theory according to which Japanese kami are emanations of buddhas, bodhisattvas or devas who mingle with human beings to lead them to the Buddhist Way.
Because of it, most kami changed from potentially dangerous spirits to be improved through contact with the Buddhist law to local emanations of buddhas and bodhisattvas which possess wisdom of their own.
At one extreme one was Shingon Buddhism's Ryōbu Shintō thinkers, who considered kami and buddhas equivalent in power and dignity.
Even these unholy and inferior "true kami" however attracted the attention of Ryōbu Shinto thinkers, which resulted in theories which declared them to be manifestations of Vairocana and Amaterasu.
[18] On the other hand, Jōdo Shinshū, the primary Pure Land sect in Japan, was somewhat different because it at first renounced kami-worship due to the notion that kami were inferior to the buddhas.
[18] However, the two other Pure Land schools of Jōdo-shū and Ji-shu still encouraged the worship of kami despite the fact that the nembutsu and trust in Amida Buddha should be the primary practices.
Furthermore, under the influence of Rennyo and other leaders, Jōdo Shinshū would later accept the mainstream honji suijaku beliefs and the spiritual relationship between kami and the buddhas and bodhisattvas.
One of the islands in the right-side pond of Tsurugaoka Hachimangū in Kamakura hosts a sub shrine dedicated to goddess Benzaiten, a form of Saraswati.
Scholar Karen Smyers comments, "The surprise of many of my informants regarding the existence of Buddhist Inari temples shows the success of the government's attempt to create separate conceptual categories regarding sites and certain identities, although practice remains multiple and nonexclusive".
