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Paper short abstract:

The paper explores the impact of commercial events held inside religious institutions on Buddhist temples struggling to survive in contemporary Japan. Connection (goen) is also discussed to shed light on the religious dimension of commercial events and temple management (jiin keiei) in general.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores the impact of commercial events held regularly inside religious institutions on Buddhist temples struggling to survive in contemporary Japan. Buddhism is suffering from weakened connections with local communities and declining influence in the fields such as funerals that it traditionally dominated. Therefore, as a part of temple management (jiin keiei), in recent decades some temples have started lending local organizations their space to hold a specific type of commercial event called “tezukuri market”, where only vendors who handmake their own products are allowed. This paper aims to depict the influence of such commercial events on Buddhist temples through a case study of the first tezukuri market ever established, held monthly in Chionji, Kyoto. Based on participant observation and interviews with people working in the temple and the market, this paper highlights the difficulties faced by urban Buddhist temples that are not popular tourist attractions, the strategies temples are employing to overcome the difficulties, and the new connections formed with people both inside and outside local communities through the tezukuri market.

The notion of “connection” (goen, kizuna, tsunagari, etc.) is a recurrent theme in the study of Japanese religions, such as the importance of human relationship to non-religious people’s participation in rituals and festivals, and the creation and maintenance of connections with deities through ritual actions. However, many studies focus on the ritual aspect of the activities forming connections. This paper puts emphasis on non-religious commercial events that do not require visitors’ attendance in any kind of religious ritual, while connections built between the visitors and the temple during the events give religious meanings to them. “Connection” (goen) is an essential aspect of the tezukuri market and temple management in general. By building new connections, temples are more likely to maintain financial stability, make their name well known, and convince people to take part in religious activities. Therefore, this paper provides insights into Buddhist temples’ attempts to reach out to the public without focusing on their religious characteristics or fully commercializing their strategies to attract visitors.