Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 18, 2001, Page 40
solicitation tactics are problematic. Throughout Japan, ―Return Our Youth‖ lawsuits were
filed and are pending in courts in Sapporo, Hamamatsu, Nagoya, Kobe, and Okayama.
Also, in August 1999, three former Unification Church members filed a lawsuit in Tokyo,
claiming that the methods of recruitment employed by the Church were unlawful. These
three plaintiffs alleged that the recruiting methods involved using threat and fraud to
compel young people to devote their lives to the Church. Accordingly, such recruiting
methods deviate from the permissible domain of recruiting activities heretofore recognized
by religious organizations in general, and are, thus, unlawful.
The Aum Shinrikyo Problem
Why was Aum Shinrikyo Able to Perpetrate such Grievous Incidents in Japan?
The reasons need to be addressed relative to the slaying of Attorney Sakamoto, his wife,
and his infant, the Matsumoto Sarin Incident, and the Sarin gassing of the Tokyo
Metropolitan Subway System in March 1995 before the compulsory investigation was
initiated.
First, the parties most responsible for such grievous incidents are police, specifically the
police of Kanagawa and Shizuoka prefectures. When Attorney Sakamoto was suddenly
taken from his home, a Prusha (the badge known to be worn only by Aum Shinrikyo
believers) was found in a room of the attorney‘s home. Some of the Aum Shinrikyo
believers living at a Satiyan (a building constructed by Aum Shinrikyo where its members
live in communion and work together) in Kamikuishiki village approached residents in the
area trying to seek help. Signs of abnormality were present and clear: Aum Shinrikyo
members suffered physical damage that could be caused only by Sarin and other poisonous
gases, and vegetation in the vicinity withered. Given these signs, it is important to question
why the Prefectural Police did not cooperate and make arrests.
Second, the tax authorities also bear extensive responsibility. This has been an ongoing
problem since 1995. Why didn‘t the National Tax Administration Agency conduct a more
strict investigation into the income and expenditures of Aum Shinrikyo and the corporations
it orchestrates? It is doubtful that the Agency sought cooperation from the Police and other
relevant State bodies. It is unlikely that the Agency exchanged information regarding the
results of investigations conducted with the Police. In The United States and in France, for
example, members of the Unification Church were arrested for tax evasion. This had a large
impact. Reverend Moon spent more than one year in prison for a conviction of tax evasion.
In the Republic of Korea as well last year, the national tax bureau conducted a probe into
the corporations connected with the Unification Church. In another example, the U.S.
Internal Revenue Service did not recognize the Scientology religion as a tax-exempt
religious organization. As a result, Scientology‘s lawsuit to fight such a ruling lasted more
than 10 years in U.S. courts. Some argue that tax systems vary from country to country,
and therefore the Japanese tax system may proceed in its own way. However, the tax
authorities in Japan do not act in a way that appears equal, just, uniform, or reasonable.
The weakness of Japanese tax authorities in dealing with religious organizations is
surprising. Even today because the problem of monetary collections by religious
organizations has become a major social issue, the Japanese National Tax Administration
Agency has gradually begun to initiate investigations, negotiate with religious organizations,
and force them to pay back several hundreds of millions of yen in taxes. Nevertheless, while
corporations or individuals undergo criminal prosecution mutatis mutandis for malicious and
large-scale tax evasion, similar prosecutions of religious organizations are lacking. The
responsibility of tax authorities is not only to collect taxes. Their role is also to ensure that
corporations and individuals are treated equally with regard to tax collection and to ensure
administrative effectiveness by exchanging information with relevant administrative
government bodies, including the police.

Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 18, 2001, Page 41
Third, local governments of areas where Aum Shinrikyo maintained facilities and the
relevant government administrations bear considerable responsibility. The Labor Safety and
Hygiene Law and the Labor Standards Law, for example, should have been applied with
respect to illegal constructions built inside the Aum Shinrikyo facilities and to the sect‘s
organizational work to manufacture pharmaceutical products including Sarin gas. However,
authorities of the local Labor Standards Bureaus have failed to take any action to date. Also,
children living within the Aum Shinrikyo facilities who were of mandatory school age were
not allowed by the cult to attend public schools and were continuously taught the sect‘s
teachings every day for years. The environment in which they lived may be described as
poor and unfitting for children. The local Teachers‘ Council and Child Welfare Office, the
Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Health and Welfare did not act to address these
situations until after the Tokyo Subway Sarin Incident. Within its facilities, Aum Shinrikyo
has constructed buildings, one after another, that violate the Construction Standards Law. It
built a structure that clearly violated the Fire Prevention and Safety Law. The competent
government administration authorities were aware of these violations yet failed to take any
action against them.
Fourth, religious scholars bear much responsibility. One characteristic of cults is that the
public statements of their leaders and the affirmations appearing in their publications differ
markedly from what they are actually doing. No matter how beautifully they present
themselves to the outside world, in dealing with cults weight must be placed on exactly
what the cults direct their believers to do inside the cult. Nevertheless, based only on their
short conversations with Aum Shinrikyo leader Asahara Shoko (at the request of the media)
and their reading of the sect‘s publications for external use, scholars of religion positively
evaluated the aptitude of Asahara and the teachings and activities of Aum Shinrikyo. As a
result, many young people who listened to and believed these scholars‘ high evaluations
approached Aum Shinrikyo to become members. These scholars should have made greater
attempts to actually visit the Aum Shinrikyo facilities and interview in detail the people
living in communes at such sites. While the study of religion should include research into the
activities and practices actually performed by religious organizations, with regard to Aum
Shinrikyo in Japan such a scholarly study was obviously lacking.
Fifth, the mass media was also largely responsible. In Japan, the weekly publication
―Sunday Mainichi‖ was the first news magazine to broach the Aum Shinrikyo issue. Aum
Shinrikyo opposed the news coverage by suing ―Sunday Mainichi‖ and distributing
slanderous paper handouts against it. Nevertheless, ―Sunday Mainichi‖ endured these
attacks, gained the cooperation of Attorney Sakamoto and, in doing so, rang the alarm to
wake Japanese society to the Aum Shinrikyo problem. TBS (a large Japanese television
broadcasting network) then produced a documentary on the cult. Before airing the
documentary, some people at the TBS headquarters, unfortunately, showed the complete
taped reportage to the Aum Shinrikyo headquarters. On one hand, a very talented TBS
journalist worked on this story. He collected a great deal of information regarding the cult
by fearlessly going to the cult facilities and the surrounding vicinities. However, there were
also a number of journalists who reported on Aum Shinrikyo activities merely out of popular
interest. To the public, they aired reports that evaluated the cult, but without the expertise
of religious scholars. In doing so, these journalists actually magnified the power and
influence of Aum Shinrikyo.
Finally, religious members and established religious organizations (particularly those
esoteric Buddhist organizations and Buddhism itself, with which Aum Shinrikyo should have
interacted) failed, by and large, to act or speak against the cult. At the end of March 1995,
there was a concentrated outpouring of reporting about Aum Shinrikyo in the Japanese
mass media—television, newspapers, magazines, etc. However, this reporting lacked the
very objective and rational explanations of religious members as to why Aum Shinrikyo