Tokugawa Ieyasu Religion

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The start of the Edo period brought about the final transition from courtier rule to warrior rule. Tokugawa Ieyasu created a new system of government, the bakufu and was appointed to be the shogun (highest military general). The shogun either ruled directly through the Tokugawa family or through military bureaucrats known as the daimyo. Even though the imperial family was not eliminated, the emperor did not have real political power and was only a figurehead and symbol of national unity. During the Edo period, the 4 major religions that came to rise were Buddhism, Neo-Confucianism, Christianity and Shintoism. During the early Edo period, the main religion was Buddhism. As mentioned by Graham, Tokugawa Ieyasu emerged from the same milieu as his forerunners and thus shared the same views as Nobunaga and Hideyoshi towards Buddhism: Buddhism schools should not be given any political power. However, he went further ahead than his predecessors and harnessed the power of Buddhist schools to help implement his political agenda. The temples were brought under the subjugation of the …show more content…
In a way, the bakufu used the temples for their own political agenda. In addition to rooting out Christianity which they felt was a threat to the Tokugawa rule, they were able to monitor the movements of the population through the temples. Thus, the temples served as an influential public symbol that proclaimed the warrior’s authority over the religious sphere of the state. The suppression of the Buddhist temples were a result of the efforts made by the bakufu as they did not want to give undue economic and political power to the temples. They were afraid that with the temples’ rise in power, the Tokugawa family’s power and status would be undermined like during the Muromachi
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