{"id":99,"date":"2000-07-06T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2000-07-06T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/2000\/07\/06\/ask-john-why-is-there-christian-symbolism-in-anime\/"},"modified":"2000-07-06T10:00:00","modified_gmt":"2000-07-06T14:00:00","slug":"ask-john-why-is-there-christian-symbolism-in-anime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/ask-john-why-is-there-christian-symbolism-in-anime\/","title":{"rendered":"Ask John: Why is there Christian Symbolism in Anime?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Question:<\/strong><br \/>\nSince Japan is a country which is only 10% Christian, how do the Japanese feel about Evangelion and its portrayal of a &#8220;foreign&#8221; religion?  Why did Gainax choose to create a series based on Christianity?  Furthermore, I was curious if you could explain if there is any significance to the appearance of &#8220;angel wings&#8221; on characters in anime.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><strong>Answer:<\/strong><br \/>\nAs far as I know, the reason behind the Christian symbolism that appears commonly in anime is due to the fact that Japan is predominantly non-Christian.  The Asian religions, Bhuddism, Taoism and Shinto all are very minimalistic religions.  Asian religions, largely, simply don&#8217;t have the pageantry and regalia of Christianity: none of the ornate decorations, costumes or rituals.  Because of this, the Japanese find Christianity to be a fascinating spectacle.  Religion and myth have always been a part of anime, from the myth-inspired Horus: Prince of the Sun, to the Norse inspired Ah! My Goddess, Shinto influenced Blue Seed, Greek mythology based Arion, and Christian themed Evangelion, Angel&#8217;s Egg and Tenshi ni Narumon, just to name a few examples.  In all of these shows, religion isn&#8217;t used as a background to anime in order to convert viewers.  Religious background is used in anime almost exclusively in order to provide depth and story.  Religion isn&#8217;t used to prove some point; it&#8217;s used because it makes a show or story more interesting.  The appearance of angels in anime, or girls with angel wings, ranging from Rinoa in Final Fantasy 8 to to male &#8220;angels&#8221; of Earthian and Escaflowne are intended to express a degree of angelic innocence and pureness.  Given the limitations of animation, it&#8217;s much easier to present visual cues of character traits like &#8220;goodness&#8221; than it is to show subtle facial expressions or constantly use music or lighting effects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Question: Since Japan is a country which is only 10% Christian, how do the Japanese feel about Evangelion and its portrayal of a &#8220;foreign&#8221; religion? Why did Gainax choose to create a series based on Christianity? Furthermore, I was curious if you could explain if there is any significance to the appearance of &#8220;angel wings&#8221; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ask-john"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.animenation.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}