disputed presidency

The regular October meeting of Jinja Honchō’s Oversight Council was held on October 20th, and reported in the October 30th issue of Jinja Shinpō. It seems that “lively exchanges of views” continued. The most important focus of debate was still the dispute over the presidency, but this issue did not go anywhere. That should not be surprising to anyone who has read my previous posts on this problem (click on the “disputed presidency” tag to see those earlier posts if you are interested). While many of the same arguments are… Read More »October 2023 Oversight Council

On June 14th, the Tokyo High Court handed down its decision in the appeal from the District Court in the case over the presidency of Jinja Honchō. The result was reported in the June 26th issue of Jinja Shinpō. The appeal was rejected, so the High Court agreed that Revd Ashihara is not the new president. Jinja Honchō was, of course, delighted by this. They sent out an announcement to all the Jinjachō saying that it was now clear that Revd Tanaka was the president, and that the chairman should… Read More »Appeal Decision

The “tl:dr” is the title. If you want to read more about the internal dispute in Jinja Honchō over the presidency, the rest of the article is here for you. If you think it is a largely trivial distraction from more important issues facing the Shinto community, then I’m not going to tell you that you’re wrong. Still, it is a major topic within the Shinto community at the moment, so I do feel the need to cover it. As I have mentioned before, Jinja Honchō holds a series of… Read More »Unproductive Oversight Council Meeting

Arguments in the appeal in the court case disputing the presidency of Jinja Honchō were heard on May 1st, and reported in the May 15th issue of Jinja Shinpō. To recap, briefly, there was a dispute within the Board of Directors over who should be the president of Jinja Honchō. A majority of the directors voted for Revd Tanaka, the previous president, but the chairman, supported by a minority of the members, appointed Revd Ashihara. The dispute is over which, if either, of those appointments is legally effective. For now,… Read More »Arguments at Appeal

The February 20th issue of Jinja Shinpō included a long article on a meeting of the Board of Directors of Jinja Honchō, held on the 9th of February. While some ordinary business was conducted, and there was a discussion of the new law about donations (which will get its own blog post soon), the main event seems to have been a big fight over who was the president. A “big fight” is a slight exaggeration, as they do not appear to have come to blows, but the article explicitly refers… Read More »Fractious Board Meeting