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
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
