Knowledge Bank

On the morning of March 20th, 1995 Aum Shinrikyo would commit the deadliest act of domestic terror in Japanese history. The doomsday cult released several packages of sarin gas across five popular Tokyo subway lines. The gas killed fourteen people and injured over 5000 commuters. Sarin gas is a nerve agent that was developed by the Nazis and is more deadly than cyanide. If it had been produced in its pure form by Aum Shinrikyo's scientists, it could have killed hundreds of thousands. The group's attack on the Tokyo train lines marked the first time ever that any terrorist organization attempted to utilize weapons of mass-destruction to ravage a population. Notably, this attack was just the beginning of Aum's ambitions. The religion's prophet and founder, Shoko Asahara, had long prophesied an impending Armageddon. The utilization of apocalyptic prophecy was of course not uncommon among other New Age religious leaders. What made Asahara so "special" was that he believed it was his religion's job to initiate the apocalypse. Throughout the early 1990s, Shoko and his inner circle, which was mostly populated by highly educated men with scientific backgrounds, attempted to produce not just sarin gas, but also biological weapons such as anthrax. Shoko's followers even ventured to procure uranium for the development of a nuclear bomb. Shoko saw his organization's role as both the harbingers and the survivors of Armageddon, which they intended to spur by initiating conflict between the United States and Japan. Asahara's WIII was to end in complete nuclear desolation from which the organization would rise and become the new rulers of Japan. Aum's preoccupation with the apocalypse was not unique. In fact, Apocalypticism had been dominating the Japanese subconscious since the end of WWII. With this acknowledgement in mind, it is this essay's intention to demonstrate that Aum Shinrikyo was the comprehensible result of the cultural and intellectual powder keg that was post-war Japan. Japan was the only nation to live through nuclear Armageddon, twice—to have witnessed the end of the world, or at least what it felt like. In the span of 100 years, Japanese feudal society was dismantled during the Meiji restoration in favor of a stronger, imperial state. After 1945, the country again entered another period of rapid dismantling and reconstruction. The emperor held his position, but the country's government collapsed, and two prior prime ministers as well as six military leaders were executed for their crimes. The complete destruction and reconstruction of Japanese civilization preceding and following WWII created deep and haphazard fault lines across society that went largely unaddressed. Japan was a country that had artificially created and then lost its identity within a century. It had built an empire only to be occupied a few decades later, and Japanese citizens had the unique experience of witnessing nuclear holocaust. All of this cultural baggage created the perfect, as prominent Japanese historian Ian Reader puts it, Poisonous Cocktail from which Aum Shinrikyo emerged. Aum Shrinkyo is endlessly complex. It is like a rabbit hole, the closer one gets to the fundamental intricacies behind its ideology and genesis, the more they are sucked into its chaotic frenzy. Aum Shinrikyo's lore is extensive and cannot be truly understood from a simple chronological narrative. Like any good cocktail, or poisonous gas for that matter, there are essential ingredients in concocting an expansive and comprehensive picture of Aum. Leaving out any information will leave the drink weak and the gas innocuous. In order to not do a disservice to this truly fascinating topic, this essay will be exploratory in nature and written in sections of piece-by piece analysis. Often times the foundations of Aum and the cultural context from which it emerged will take precedence over details of its exact history. Topics that will be explored include: an introduction to Asahara and his life before Aum; an explanation of the era of Japanese new religions; conformity culture and WWII's effect on State-religion; Aum's media literacy and its use of religious syncretism; the concept of a guru, pseudoscience, and the Sakamoto affair; Aum's public rejection and its resulting embracement of Poa and nuclearism; and finally, its average members.