While watching InuYasha, I've noticed that; while Religion plays a rather important part in the show (Miroku is a Buddhist Monk; Kikyou and Kaede are Shinto Priestesses and Kagome's Grandfather is a Shinto Priest); it is not (or at least doesn't *seem* to be) a bone of contention between any of these characters. (i.e. Miroku doesn't condemn Kaede or Kagome [who is, presumably, a practitioner of Shinto even if not *overtly*so] or try to convert them to Buddhism and vice versa.) While, if this were an American production, the characters (except for the Villains, of course) would most likely be, if not overtly Christian, then at least have certain "Christian" traits to make them palatable to all but the most obtusely fundamentalist audience. (i.e. They'd probably be less willing to use "magic" [spells, sutras] against the "evil" demons, preferring either more straightforward weaponry or a "miracle" [probably in the form of some "Deus ex Machina" plot-device/-twist] to defeat the Villain-of-the-Day; or would use a term other than "demon" to describe Inuyasha and Shippou -- after all; "demons", in Judeo-Christian mythology/lore, are *[i]inherently* "evil" beings; as opposed to Japanese mythology/lore, where they're simply *any* creature of supernatural origin.)

My point is that the show doesn't seem to "push" one Religion over another -- and, in fact, shows that even some of their clerics are flawed. (Miroku's wandering hands and Kikyou's all-too-Human desire for revenge against Inuyasha, for example.) Whereas if, again, the show had originated here Christian "leaders" (i.e. Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and the other Usual Suspects) would most likely be screaming that it's "unfair" and/or "persecution" to show Christians (especially the Hierarchy) in a less-than-favorable light.

This should go in the anime forum. My opinion is that relegion is often abused just to make an anime look more interesting. Evangelion is the perfect example.

What I find interesting is in quite a few animes I've seen (FMA and Scrapped Princess for example) they tend to use Nazi symbolism for the armed soldiers - German style helmets and jackboots, for instance, and in FMA the uniforms are very SS-ish.

Kind of scary that you consider the NAZI's a religion though :think:

By the way, in FMA they also called Bradley the Führer, which is also the name Hitler gave himself (Führer is a German for for leader). If you look at the uniforms I don't think they look like SS uniforms, just the kind of uniforms you'd expect from a country ruled by a military dictator (like NAZI-Germany and the former USSR).

What Angelic said, I don't like how they include religion in order to make it look more interesting.

huhu anime is art...

art is freedom to do anything...

strange ive never realized about this relegion thingy on animes... maybe bcoz theres too many of them already..

Hmm . . in Trigun, there was that priest who didn't mind using a gun. Although I don't remember how he justified his beliefs, and I don't remember if he killed people or not.

Is that what you meant by religion in anime? If not, then sorry . .

Originally posted by hope@Oct 29 2004, 08:30 AM
art is freedom to do anything...

Art is expression given form.

Doing whatever you want is noise.

noise is art for some people. look at those impressionists.

you know...it is a way to be creative and develop an idea on religion with anime. Evangelion - it was the dead sea scrolls; with inuyasha - buddhist beliefs; shaman king - deer...hard one -_-

but yeah it's just a way to be creative and make a storyline.

Originally posted by Angelic@Oct 29 2004, 10:25 PM
Kind of scary that you consider the NAZI's a religion though :think:

By the way, in FMA they also called Bradley the Führer, which is also the name Hitler gave himself (Führer is a German for for leader). If you look at the uniforms I don't think they look like SS uniforms, just the kind of uniforms you'd expect from a country ruled by a military dictator (like NAZI-Germany and the former USSR).
Yeah, I didn't mention that because I thought it might've just been the subs in the version I have and maybe they used a different name elsewhere :) I don't think Nazism is a religion - just the thread made me think about the FMA uniforms and stuff - though the Nazis did try to introduce a type of Nazi faith to replace the Christian churches, but a lot of people rebelled against it and it didn't really take off. Fair point about the dictator personalities forming the uniforms, though the FMA officers e.g. Hawkeye, Mustang etc have costumes that are really similar to this guy:

http://www.achtungpanzer.bos.ru/images/becker1.jpg

Give it white piping and it'd be pretty close! ;)

Okay, Edwin's informed me that this guy above is in fact a Wehrmacht Feldwebel from the tank corps rather than the SS- serves me right for getting the photo from a page that was all in German so I couldn't read the captions X_X My sincere apologies for mixing that up!

Originally posted by Edwin@Oct 29 2004, 10:25 AM
While watching InuYasha, I've noticed that; while Religion plays a rather important part in the show (Miroku is a Buddhist Monk; Kikyou and Kaede are Shinto Priestesses and Kagome's Grandfather is a Shinto Priest); it is not (or at least doesn't *seem* to be) a bone of contention between any of these characters. (i.e. Miroku doesn't condemn Kaede or Kagome [who is, presumably, a practitioner of Shinto even if not *overtly*so] or try to convert them to Buddhism and vice versa.) While, if this were an American production, the characters (except for the Villains, of course) would most likely be, if not overtly Christian, then at least have certain "Christian" traits to make them palatable to all but the most obtusely fundamentalist audience. (i.e. They'd probably be less willing to use "magic" [spells, sutras] against the "evil" demons, preferring either more straightforward weaponry or a "miracle" [probably in the form of some "Deus ex Machina" plot-device/-twist] to defeat the Villain-of-the-Day; or would use a term other than "demon" to describe Inuyasha and Shippou -- after all; "demons", in Judeo-Christian mythology/lore, are *[i]inherently* "evil" beings; as opposed to Japanese mythology/lore, where they're simply *any* creature of supernatural origin.)

My point is that the show doesn't seem to "push" one Religion over another -- and, in fact, shows that even some of their clerics are flawed. (Miroku's wandering hands and Kikyou's all-too-Human desire for revenge against Inuyasha, for example.) Whereas if, again, the show had originated here Christian "leaders" (i.e. Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and the other Usual Suspects) would most likely be screaming that it's "unfair" and/or "persecution" to show Christians (especially the Hierarchy) in a less-than-favorable light.
I doubt Christians would be prancing around in feudal japan fighting demons and such along side a girl from the future and a sword weilding half human/half dog demon. -_-

Originally posted by Khalli@Oct 30 2004, 11:08 PM
I doubt Christians would be prancing around in feudal japan fighting demons and such along side a girl from the future and a sword weilding half human/half dog demon. -_-
I'm simply pointing out that InuYasha is (was) made for a *very* different audience which comes from a very different culture that has very different (i.e. more tolerant) views on Religion than we do. (Can you imagine a Christian girl allying herself with a half-demon [and having a romantic relationship with him, at that!], a cleric of a different religion, and a full demon -- remembering what I pointed out about Christian mythology/lore in my original article -- and the Conservative/Fundamentalist community *not* hitting the roof?)

Remember also that the time/dimensional travel-adventure genre isn't limited to Eastern cultures. No less an author (and Christian) than C.S. Lewis wrote a series of books about children "prancing" in a "foreign" land, allied with anthropomorphic and half-human characters (a talking white Lion, a faun, etc.) battling demonic forces. (The Chronicles of Narnia.) While it's true that a number of Conservative/Fundamentalist so-called "authorities" have condemned the books, they were still made into an animated movie ("The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079474/)" -- and sponsored by the media arm of the Anglican Church, no less!), and two television series. (One dating from the 1960s (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0224907/), and the better known 1988 BBC production. (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/series/-/890/dvd//ref=pd_ser_bind/102-8452869-5628136) But there would probably be somewhat less controversy if an American movie studio tried to make a big-screen version of "Lion" (possibly about the same as that which the three "Harry Potter" films have met) then if they tried to make a big-screen version of "InuYasha", but left the religious aspects intact. (Of course there would, no doubt, be numerous die-hard InuYasha otaku ready to join the Conservative/Fundamentalist protesters on the picket lines if the movie turned into another Batman and Robin... ^_^)

Originally posted by Sinbios Zefiris Ark@Oct 29 2004, 05:05 PM
noise is art for some people. look at those impressionists.
Yeah, like Faure, Debussy, and Monet. What are you talking about? I can see that you want to sound smart by citing an art period, but Impressionism doesn't work. Maybe Cubism is what you're shooting for, but I don't want to argue your bad case for you.

the only anime I've found that had sort of religion/symbolism stuff in it that didn't seem like it was put in the just to be "cool" was Haibane Renmei. I personally think Haibane Renmei is nothing short of a masterpiece.

Personally, I don't see Inuyasha as that "religious". There are much better examples of true religious symbolism.

EDIT: gah..Edwin's post is annoying me so badly, I have to rant and rave some more. Do they even mention religion in Inuyasha? Just because there are priests, that doesn't they're religious-like priests. I think you're reading way too far into it. Most of that there is just to make it look cool. I don't like Inuyasha one bit. Could you tell?

Well I havent seem it but Saiyuki sounds like a prime candidate for including here as its based on Journey to the West and involves a Buddhist monk and his disciples, though tripitaka never had a weapon in the more commonly known telling of the story, would that count for throwin in here