The Gist of Japan Part 7

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These men simply obeyed the ethical code of their time and country, and as a reward for their loyalty they have received the enthusiastic praise of their countrymen for two centuries. No other story is so popular to-day, or so stirs the hearts of the people, as this. While we, believing that vengeance belongs to the Lord, cannot indorse this deed, we must admire the loyalty and faithfulness of those ronins, and the perseverance with which they adhered to their purpose. In this true story we see clearly the power of this first principle of j.a.panese morality--loyalty.

The sister principle of loyalty in Confucian ethics is obedience to parents. Unquestioning, absolute, implicit obedience is required of all children. Formerly the child was considered the property of the parents, and could be disposed of at will, even to the taking of its life. To-day the father may sell his daughter to a life of shame, or "lend" her to a private individual for immoral purposes; and, however much she may dislike such a life, obedience to parents requires that she acquiesce in his will, which she does uncomplainingly.

This principle of obedience is the foundation stone of j.a.panese family life. The relation between parents and children is stronger than that between man and wife, and is given a prior place. An only son cannot be forced to leave his mother {117} and become a soldier, but a husband may be forced to leave his wife. Within the family circle, the son's duty to his aged parents always precedes his duty to his wife. Every j.a.panese feels deeply this obligation to his parents, and properly to support and nourish them in old age he holds to be a sacred duty.

Americans could learn much that would be profitable from the reverence and respect shown for parents and teachers by the j.a.panese.

In j.a.pan, however, this principle is carried too far. It continues after death as binding as before, and divine honors are paid to dead ancestors. Periodical visits are made to their tombs, religious candles are kept burning in their honor, and prayers are said to them.

Among the more enlightened to-day there is perhaps nothing in these ceremonies but reverence and respect; yet by the ma.s.ses of the people ancestors are wors.h.i.+ped.

There are two moral maxims that show well the relative importance in which parents, relatives, and wives are held. They are the following: "Thy father and thy mother are like heaven and earth; thy teacher and thy lord are like the sun and the moon." "Other kinsfolk may be likened to the rushes; husbands and wives are but as useless stones."

It is apparent that virtues have differing values in the Confucian and Christian systems. We can {118} appreciate their point of view best, perhaps, as we remember the ethics of an army. Here obedience, loyalty, self-devotion, courage, are supreme. Much is forgiven if these are manifested. The organization is everything, and the individual nothing, save as he is a fraction of the great machine.

Carry that idea into the social community, and think of it as an army, with all, women as well as men, of value only as parts of the greater whole, and we shall understand why and how the j.a.panese may esteem men and women righteous whom we judge debased and even criminal. So would the j.a.panese judge them, were the motive mere pa.s.sion or selfish desire, but not when the controlling power is loyalty or obedience.

Thus the forty-seven ronin were pre-eminently "righteous" when they debauched themselves with every swinish vice.

Of course this view of morality puts great temptation in the way of parents and rulers. Having supreme power, they may use it to the degradation of those whom they control. Confucius, it is true, taught parents and rulers that they too owed duties to the state, and that use of their Heaven-given powers for selfish ends was treason against the supreme law; but, beyond doubt, the duty of submission, of loyalty and unquestioning obedience, was so exaggerated that evils many and great resulted. At the same time {119} a sympathetic view leads one to wonder the rather that the ethical results are so wholesome.

Turning from this general view, one finds in particulars much the same conditions as in other lands. For example, immense quant.i.ties of alcoholic stimulants are consumed annually. There is a native liquor called "sake," made from rice, that is very popular and, in some of its forms, very intoxicating. Its manufacture and sale is one of the most lucrative businesses in the empire. Foreign whiskies, wines, and beers are sold in large quant.i.ties, but they are so costly as to be beyond the reach of all but the wealthy. Outside of the small circle of Christians, there are few people who do not drink. The total abstainer is a rarity. But, while nearly every one drinks, in general the j.a.panese do not drink to such excess as other nations. One seldom sees such beastly drunkenness as is often seen in the West. Drinking is taken as a matter of course, and society does not condemn it. The usual way in which j.a.panese men pa.s.s a dull day is in feasting and drinking. The use of alcoholic stimulants is much more common here than at home.

In business and commercial morality there is much to be desired. The merchants do not sell according to the worth of an article, but according to what they can make the purchaser pay. They are great bargainers. Recently I wanted to buy {120} two large wall-pictures.

The dealer asked me $21 for them, but finally sold them for $5. It is a very common thing to buy articles for less than half the price first asked. In matters of veracity and in the fulfilment of contracts j.a.panese merchants are not generally to be trusted. The average man is famous for lying, and the merchants and tradesmen seem to have acquired an extra share of this general characteristic. A j.a.panese trader will do all in his power to avoid the fulfilment of a contract if it entails a loss. This lack of commercial honor is recognized by the foreign firms doing business here, and it has hindered not a little the growth and development of trade.

The moral sense of the people in regard to taking one's own life is very different from that of Christendom. From ancient times, suicide has been thought to be a praiseworthy act, and has been extensively practised. Formerly it was encouraged, and sometimes required, by the government; but now it has no official sanction whatever. Still, the custom exists, and some authorities place the annual number of suicides as high as 10,000. The people laugh at our Western idea that it is wrong to take one's own life. On the contrary, they hold that when misfortunes and calamities make this life unattractive it is the part of wisdom to end it. Even the feelings of young j.a.panese, {121} who have been educated somewhat into our own way of thinking, do not seem to have changed on this point; they still adhere to the old Roman view that self-destruction is permissible and often meritorious. The Western fiction that all suicides are the result of some form of insanity is not countenanced here. The various causes leading to self-destruction are coolly and carefully tabulated, and very few are attributed to insanity. Contrariwise, long and careful study of the subject has shown that self-destruction is gone about with as much coolness, precision, and judgment as any act of daily life.

The above are in brief the leading moral ideas and principles that govern the j.a.panese people. For their loyalty and obedience we have only admiration. But both of these principles are given an undue importance and are carried to extremes. The chief defect of j.a.panese morality is the minor place it gives to the individual. The moral need of the nation is a Christian morality--not just the morality of the West, but a morality founded on the ethical principles inculcated in the Bible. This would exalt truth and chast.i.ty, would soften and temper the great duties of loyalty and obedience, and would make of j.a.pan an honest, temperate nation.

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VII

RELIGIONS OF j.a.pAN

The j.a.panese are by nature a religious people. In the earliest times a conglomerate ma.s.s of superst.i.tions and mythological ideas was made to do service as a religion. Fetis.h.i.+sm, phallicism, animism, and tree- and serpent-wors.h.i.+p were very common. The line of distinction between the Creator and the creature was not clearly marked; G.o.ds and men mingled and intermingled, and were hardly known apart. But it is not our purpose here to trace the ancient religious ideas of j.a.pan, but rather to give a short account of contemporary religions. Therefore we cannot dwell on these unwritten mythological-religious systems.

The religions of contemporary j.a.pan are four--s.h.i.+nto, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Tenrikyo. s.h.i.+nto and Tenrikyo are indigenous; Buddhism and Confucianism have been imported from China and Korea.

Tenrikyo is of recent origin and has {123} not yet the influence and standing of the others. s.h.i.+nto, Buddhism, and Confucianism have existed here side by side for centuries. There is no great antagonism between them, as there is between Christianity and the ethnic religions. Many of the people are disciples of all three at the same time, taking their theology from s.h.i.+nto, their soteriology and eschatology from Buddhism, and their moral and economic ideas from Confucianism. No inconsistency is felt in thus believing all three religions and wors.h.i.+ping at their shrines. Indeed, these three faiths have so commingled, the ideas and practices of one have so filtered into the others, that it is hard now to distinguish the pure teachings of each. In the minds of the ma.s.ses they are not distinguished in detail. And yet as regards origin, history, and teachings they are separate and distinct faiths.

_s.h.i.+nto_

s.h.i.+nto may be called the national cult of j.a.pan. The word "s.h.i.+nto"

means "the way of the G.o.ds." This system hardly deserves the name religion. It has no moral code, no dogmas, no sacred books.

Originally it consisted chiefly of ancestor- and nature-wors.h.i.+p, and of certain mythological ideas. A chief feature of it still is the wors.h.i.+p of ancestors, who are exalted to a high pedestal in thought {124} and wors.h.i.+ped as G.o.ds. The divine origin of the imperial family, and the obligation to wors.h.i.+p and obey it, was a prominent teaching of s.h.i.+nto.

The ancestors of the imperial family were to be held in supreme reverence and were the objects of especial wors.h.i.+p.

According to the s.h.i.+nto of this period, there was neither heaven nor h.e.l.l, but only an intermediate Hades. There was a sort of priesthood, but its duty was to watch over particular local G.o.ds, not to preach to the people. Pure s.h.i.+nto taught that a man's whole duty lay in absolute obedience to the mikado and in following the natural promptings of his own heart.

s.h.i.+nto was very much affected by the introduction of Buddhism, about the middle of the sixth century, and its further growth was checked.

Buddhism adopted and largely absorbed it. s.h.i.+nto G.o.ds were given a place in the Buddhist pantheon, and many of the s.h.i.+nto ceremonies were adopted. But s.h.i.+nto was completely overshadowed by Buddhism, and lay in a dormant state from the year 550 to 1700, a night of more than a thousand years.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A s.h.i.+nto Temple.]

Since the beginning of the eighteenth century a revival of s.h.i.+nto has sprung up. Native scholars tried to call up the past, to find out what pure s.h.i.+nto was before its corruption by Buddhism, and to teach it as the national faith. In this effort {125} they were partially successful. The old Buddhistic accretions were largely thrown off, and many of the temples, stripped of their Buddhist ornaments, were handed over to the s.h.i.+nto priests. Buddhism was disestablished, and s.h.i.+nto again became the religion of the state. A s.h.i.+nto "Council for Spiritual Affairs" was appointed, which had equal rank with the Council of State. This, however, was reduced gradually to the rank of a department, then to a bureau, later to a sub-bureau. At present s.h.i.+nto is the state religion, in so far as there can be said to be any state religion; but in reality there is no established religion. The connection of the government with s.h.i.+nto extends no further than the maintenance of certain temples and the attendance of certain officials on some ceremonies. s.h.i.+nto enjoys a large amount of popularity because it is indigenous, while Buddhism and Confucianism labor under the disadvantage of being of foreign origin. The majority of the upper cla.s.ses in j.a.pan who to-day have any religion at all are s.h.i.+ntoists.

_Buddhism_

The religion founded by Buddha in India is six centuries older than Christianity. Its nominal adherents comprise almost one third of the human race. Its philosophical precepts are deep {126} and profound, while its ethical teachings are, for the most part, lofty and enn.o.bling. This religion is worthy the careful study of any man who has the time and inclination.

We cannot attempt to give a full exposition of it, but will have to content ourselves with a bare mention of its more prominent teachings.

Certain resemblances to Catholicism in ritual, ceremony, and ornamentation strike one very forcibly in observing Buddhist rites.

The candles, the incense, the images and processions, all resemble Rome. But this resemblance extends no further than ritual and ceremony. In point of doctrine Buddhism is widely separated from every form of Christianity. In Buddhism the condition on which grace is received is not faith, but knowledge and enlightenment. Salvation is accomplished, not by the vicarious sufferings of a Redeemer, but by self-perfection through self-denial and discipline.

Dr. Griffis, a man who has written much and well on j.a.pan, has p.r.o.nounced the princ.i.p.al features of Buddhism to be atheism, metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls, and absence of caste.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Buddhist Priest.]

Buddhism knows nothing of the existence of a supreme G.o.d who created the world. It inherited ideas of certain G.o.ds from Brahmanism, but these are made secondary to the _hotoke_, or buddhas, {127} who are simply men who have finally reached the calm of perfect holiness after toiling through endless ages and countless existences. It teaches that existence itself is the chief of all evils. Instead of longing for eternal life, the Buddhist longs for annihilation. Happy, well-fed Western people, to whom existence is a delight, can hardly understand how any one can really desire its cessation. But the life of the lower cla.s.ses in many countries of the East is one daily struggle for bread, so full of sorrow and misery that it is not unnatural they should desire to end it.

This religion teaches that the evil of existence springs from the double root of ignorance and human pa.s.sions, and is to be overcome by knowledge and self-discipline. The heaven it offers is absorption in the Nirvana--the loss of personal ident.i.ty and practical annihilation.

Buddhism numbers more devotees and exerts a greater influence than any of the other religions of j.a.pan. It was received from Korea about the middle of the sixth century. After it had been transplanted and had grown into popular favor, many j.a.panese were sent to Korea and China to study its doctrines more fully; and they brought back with them not only Buddhism, but also Chinese literature and civilization. At first Buddhism encountered fierce opposition, but it was fortunate in securing court patronage, and {128} very soon the opposition entirely ceased, so that in two or three centuries it spread itself throughout the whole empire. If ever a nation was ripe for the introduction of a foreign religion, that nation was j.a.pan at that time. The national cult was silent, or almost so, in regard to the destiny of man and many other questions which religion is expected to answer. The religious nature of the people was a.s.serting itself, and they were longing for more light on the great questions of life--its _whence_, _why_, and _whither_. Buddhism gave this light, and therefore was warmly welcomed. It had the whole field to itself, and took complete possession of it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Buddhist Cemetery.]

From the time of its introduction into j.a.pan down to the present, Buddhism has enjoyed a wide popularity and exerted a powerful influence. It is not too much to say that Buddhism has largely formed j.a.panese civilization and national life. In the words of Professor Chamberlain, "All education was for centuries in Buddhist hands.

Buddhism introduced art and medicine, molded the folk-lore of the country, created its dramatic poetry, deeply influenced politics and every sphere of social and intellectual activity. In a word, Buddhism was the teacher under whose instruction the j.a.panese nation grew up."

Buddhism has by no means lost its hold in j.a.pan. It still has great life and power. Some {129} writers have said that they have never seen a new temple in j.a.pan--only old ones falling into decay. Their experience must have been limited. I see plenty of new temples, some of which are very costly.

Buddhist temples are numerous, and many are of imposing architecture.

Being generally surrounded by tall trees, they have a lonely, mournful appearance. Hideous beasts, dragons, and serpents are carved upon them, and large, fierce-looking stone lions guard them, the effect being to awe and terrify the beholder. Some are furnished with gorgeous altars covered with beautiful flowers, images, and statues.

Besides the temples there are everywhere little shrines. The religious spirit of the people prompts them to dedicate the most beautiful spots and nooks to the G.o.ds, and there to erect shrines and idols.

Buddhist priests dress in robes not very unlike the official robes of the Episcopal clergy. Their heads are always close-shaven, a mark by which they are easily distinguished. Forbidden to marry, they are expected to lead lives of purity and chast.i.ty. They have greatly degenerated, a large per cent. being illiterate and immoral. Their lives will not bear comparison with those of the Christian evangelists.

That nearly all the cemeteries of j.a.pan are in their hands gives them great influence.

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j.a.panese Buddhism is divided into numerous sects, chief of which are the Tendai, s.h.i.+ngon, Jodo, and Zen, of Chinese origin, and the s.h.i.+n and Nichiren, of native origin. The latter two are most prosperous.