united-with-nature paganism feels very different from the abstract truth of the abrahamic monotheism
i am not particularly religious and neither am i knowledgeable about them but i feel like the notion of the god(s) being immanent and kinda with you (perhaps in you) is different and more appealing to me than the idea of the transcendent god
though from the looks of it, the mass-oriented religion just wins as the strong uniting power which knows no bounds really
>>19549eliminating local priest lineages is kinda a big deal (i didn't know that) imo
basically one could say that today's shinto isn't real shinto to some extent, and there has been a real disruption in the tradition
politically, it also means that local religious practices have likely been replaced or hijacked, depriving people of their cultural autonomy to an extent
overall i think it's kinda a good and a bad thing. on one hand, it is some nasty imperialism (japan is an empire officially btw) and a lot of peoples within japan have likely suffered a bit of an identity loss to the tokyo's dominance. on the other hand, japan is united and whatever they have done seems to work well or at least decent - probably beats warring feudal states each protecting their own gods in any case