Contextualizing Corporeality: New Perspectives on The Body in Japanese Religions

From Cartesian dualism to a Foucauldian subversion, the mind and the body are traditionally positioned as two separate entities, with the mind regarded as the source of humans’ rationality and reason, and the body linked to biological drives and instinctual passions. However, recent scholarship has moved toward a more integrated view, recognizing the body as part of a mind-body continuum where sometimes bodily integrity takes precedence over the spirit. Scholarship on Asian religions, in particular, has demonstrated more diverse ways to theorize the body without necessarily relegating it to the inferior opposite of the mind. This article explores these alternative perspectives on the body, offering a thorough discussion on how bodies were understood and conceptualized in medieval Japan. It argues that any discussion of the religious body in Japan requires an “emic”
approach, that is, one that grounds the body within its specific religious and cultural context.