modern concepts of and emperor worship, various Japanese philosophers tried to revive or purify national beliefs (kokugaku) by removing imported foreign ideas, borrowed primarily from Chinese philosophy. This "Restoration Shintōist Movement" began with Motoori Norinaga in the 18th century. Motoori Norinaga, and later Hirata Atsutane, based their research on the Kojiki and other classic Shintō texts which teach the superiority of the Sun Goddess Amaterasu. This formed the basis for State Shinto, as the Japanese emperor claimed direct descent from Amaterasu. The emperor himself was therefore sacred, and all proclamations of the emperor had thus a religious significance. After the Meiji Restoration, the new imperial government needed to rapidly modernize the polity and economy of Japan, and the Meiji oligarchy felt that those goals could only be accomplished through a strong sense of national unity and cultural identity, with State Shinto as an essential counterweight to the imported Buddhism of the past, the Christianity and other Western philosophies of the present. In 1890, the Imperial Rescript on Education was issued, and students were required to ritually recite its oath to "offer yourselves courageously to the State" as well as protect the Imperial family. The practice of emperor worship was further spread by distributing imperial portraits for esoteric veneration. All of these practices used to fortify national solidarity through patriotic centralized observance at shrines are said to have given pre-war Japanese nationalism a tint of mysticism and cultural introversion. The philosophy became popular during the Second Sino-Japanese War. This came to be regarded by militarists as a doctrine that the emperor was the center of the phenomenal world, lending religious impetus to ideas of Japanese territorial expansion. Education The principal educational emphasis from the Meiji period was on the great importance of traditional national political values, religion, and morality. The Imperial Rescript on Education of 1890 promoted a return to traditional Confucian values in the hierarchal nature of human relations, with the State superior to the Individual, and the Emperor superior to the State. The Japanese state modernized organizationally but preserved its national idiosyncrasies. The attitude reinforced from 1905 was that Japan was to be a powerful nation, equal at least to the Western powers. During the Shōwa period, the educational system was used for supporting the militarized state and preparing future soldiers. The government published official textbooks for all levels of students and reinforced that with cultural activities, seminars, etc.