The fading of Ryōbu Shintō can be traced to a convergence of political, intellectual, and institutional shifts that gradually undermined its syncretic vision of kami and buddhas. Long before its formal dismantling, currents of thought were already turning against religious blending: nativist scholars of the Kokugaku movement, for example, sought to recover a “pure” Shinto, untainted by Buddhist or other foreign elements. This intellectual climate prepared the ground for later policies by casting syncretism as a distortion rather than a fulfillment of Japan’s spiritual heritage. As notions of cultural authenticity hardened, Ryōbu Shintō came to be seen less as a creative integration and more as an obstacle to a clarified national identity.

The decisive blow, however, came with the political transformations associated with the Meiji Restoration. New leaders sought to consolidate the state around imperial authority and a redefined Shinto that could serve as a unifying ideological core. Through the Shinbutsu Bunri edicts, the government legally enforced the separation of kami and buddhas, ordering the dismantling of shrine–temple complexes and the removal of Buddhist icons and rituals from shrines. This was not merely a theological adjustment but a systematic reorganization of religious space and practice, striking at the very heart of Ryōbu Shintō’s institutional and ritual life.

Alongside these policies arose the Haibutsu Kishaku movement, a wave of anti-Buddhist sentiment that led to the destruction of temples, statues, and texts, and the persecution or secularization of monks. Because Ryōbu Shintō depended heavily on Buddhist institutions and clergy to interpret the kami through esoteric Buddhist frameworks, this movement eroded its social and doctrinal foundations. As Buddhist elements were purged from sites and communities where syncretic worship had been the norm, what remained could no longer sustain the intricate web of correspondences that had once linked kami and buddhas.

The emergence of State Shinto and the broader processes of modernization further deepened this decline. Shinto shrines were reorganized into a centralized system under state control, assigned civic and ritual functions that left little room for overt Buddhist collaboration, while Buddhism was increasingly treated as a separate, private religion. At the same time, new educational and cultural policies promoted a narrative of “pure” Shinto mythology and history, casting syncretic traditions as corruptions or misunderstandings. As Western-inspired ideas of rationality, religious categorization, and progress spread, complex syncretic cosmologies such as Ryōbu Shintō came to be regarded as outdated, even as traces of their vision continued to live on quietly in popular practice.