The Religions of Japan Part 34

[Footnote 39: Dixon's j.a.pan, p. 41; S. and H., j.a.pan, _pa.s.sim_; Rein's j.a.pan; Story of the Nations, j.a.pan, by David Murray, p. 201, note; Dening's life of Toyotomi Hideyoshi; M.E., Chapters XV., XVI., XX., XXIII., XXIV.; Gazetteer of Echizen; Shiga's History of Nations, T[=o]ki[=o], 1888, pp. 115, 118; T.A.S.J., Vol. VIII., pp. 94, 134, 143.]

[Footnote 40: T.A.S.J., Vol. VIII., Hideyoshi and the Satsuma Clan in the Sixteenth Century, by J.H. Gubbins; The Times of Taik[=o], by R.

Brinkley, in _The j.a.pan Times_.]

[Footnote 41: The Copy of the Buddhist Tripitaka, or Northern Collection, made by order of the Emperor, Wan-Li, in the sixteenth century, when the Chinese capital (King) was changed from the South (Nan) to the North (Pe), was reproduced in j.a.pan in 1679 and again in 1681-83, and in over two thousand volumes, making a pile a hundred feet high, was presented by the j.a.panese Government, through the Junior Prime Minister, Mr. Tomomi Iwakura, to the Library of the India Office. See Samuel Beal's The Buddhist Tripitaka, as it is known in China and j.a.pan, A Catalogue and Compendious Report, London, 1876. The library has been rearranged by Mr. Bunyin Nanjio, who has published the result of his labors, with Sanskrit equivalents of the t.i.tles and with notes of the highest value.]

[Footnote 42: "Neither country (China or j.a.pan) has had the independence and mental force to produce a literature of its own, and to add anything but a chapter of decay to the history of this religion."--Professor William D. Whitney, in review of Anecdota Oxoniensia, Buddhist Texts from j.a.pan, in _The Nation_, No. 875.]

[Footnote 43: Education in j.a.pan, A series of papers by the writer, printed in _The j.a.pan Mail_ of 1873-74, and reprinted in the educational journals of the United Status. A digest of these papers is given in the appendix of F.O. Adams's History of j.a.pan; Life of Sir Harry Parkes, Vol. II., pp. 305, 306.]

[Footnote 44: j.a.pan: in Literature, Folk-Lore, and Art, p. 77.]

[Footnote 45: j.a.panese Education at the Philadelphia Exposition, New York, 1876.]

[Footnote 46: See j.a.panese Literature, by E.M. Satow, in The American Cyclopaedia.]

[Footnote 47: The word bonze (j.a.panese _bon-so_ or _bozu_, Chinese _fan-sung_) means an ordinary member of the congregation, just as the j.a.panese term _bon-yo_ or _bon-zuko_ means common people or the ordinary folks. The word came into European use from the Portuguese missionaries, who heard the j.a.panese thus p.r.o.nounce the Chinese term _fan_, which, as _bon_, is applied to anything in the ma.s.s not out of the common.]

[Footnote 48: See On the Early History of Printing in j.a.pan, by E.M.

Satow, T.A.S.J., Vol. X., Part L, p. 48; Part II., p. 252.]

[Footnote 49: j.a.panese mediaeval monastery life has been ably pictured in English fiction by a scholar of imagination and literary power, withal a military critic and a veteran in j.a.panese lore. "The Times of Taik[=o]," in the defunct j.a.panese Times (1878), deserves reprint as a book, being founded on j.a.panese historical and descriptive works. In Mr.

Edward's Greey's A Captive of Love, Boston, 1880, the idea of ingwa (the effects in this life of the actions in a former state of existence), is ill.u.s.trated. See also S. and H., p. 29; T.J., p. 360.]

[Footnote 50: It is curious that while the anti-Christian polemics of the j.a.panese Buddhists have used the words of Jesus, "I came to send not peace but a sword," Matt, x. 34, and "If any man ... hate not his father and mother," etc., Luke xiv. 26, as a branding iron with which to stamp the religion of Jesus as gross immorality and dangerous to the state, they justify Gautama in his "renunciation" of marital and paternal duties.]

[Footnote 51: See Public Charity in j.a.pan, j.a.pan Mail, 1893; and The Annual (Appleton's) Cyclopaedia for 1893.]

[Footnote 52: I have some good reasons for making this suggestion. Yokoi Heishiro had dwelt for some time in f.u.kui, a few rods away from the house in which I lived, and the ideas he promulgated among the Echizen clansmen in his lectures on Confucianism, were not only Christian in spirit but, by their own statement, these ideas could not be found in the texts of the Chinese sage or of his commentators. Although the volume (edited by his son, Rev. J.F. Yokoi) of his Life and Letters shows him to have been an intense and at times almost bigoted Confucianist, he, in one of his later letters, prophesied that when Christianity should be taught by the missionaries, it would win the hearts of the young men of j.a.pan. See also Satow's Kinse Shiriaku, p.

183; Adams's History of j.a.pan; and in fiction, see Honda The Samurai, p.

242, and succeeding chapters.]

[Footnote 53: In the colorless and unsentimental language of government publications, the j.a.panese edict of emanc.i.p.ation, issued to the local authorities in October, 1871, ran as follows: "The designations of eta and hinin are abolished. Those who bore them are to be added to the general registers of the population and their social position and methods of gaining a livelihood are to be identical with the rest of the people. As they have been ent.i.tled to immunity from the land tax and other burdens of immemorial custom, you will inquire how this may be reformed and report to the Board of Finance." (Signed) Council of State.]

[Footnote 54: In English fiction, see The Eta Maiden and the Hatamoto, in Mitford's Tales of Old j.a.pan, Vol. I., pp. 210-245. Discussions as to the origin of the Eta are to be found in Adams's History of j.a.pan, Vol.

I, p. 77; M.E., index; T.J., p. 147; S. and H., p. 36; Honda the Samurai, pp. 246, 247; Mitford's Tales of Old j.a.pan, Vol. I., pp.

210-245. The literature concerning the Ainos is already voluminous. See Chamberlain's Aino Studies, with bibliography; and Rev. John Batchelor's Ainu Grammar, published by The Imperial University of T[=o]ki[=o]; T.A.S.J., Vols. X., XL, XVI., XVIII., XX.; The Ainu of j.a.pan, New York, 1892, by J. Batchelor (who has also translated the Book of Common Prayer, and portions of the Bible into the Ainu tongue); M. E., Chap.

II.; T.A.S.J., Vol. X., and following volumes; Unbeaten Tracks in j.a.pan, Vol. II.; Life with Trans-Siberian Savages, London, 1895.]

[Footnote 55: "Then the venerable S[=a]riputra said to that daughter of Sagara, the N[=a]ga-king: 'Thou hast conceived the idea of enlightenment, young lady of good family, without sliding back, and art gifted with immense wisdom, but supreme, perfect enlightenment is not easily won. It may happen, sister, that a woman displays an unflagging energy, performs good works for many thousands of Aeons, and fulfils the six perfect virtues (P[=a]ramit[=a]s), but as yet there is no example of her having reached Buddhaship, and that because a woman cannot occupy the five ranks, viz., 1, the rank of Brahma; 2, the rank of Indra; 3, the rank of a chief guardian of the four quarters; 4, the rank of Kakravartin; 5, the rank of a Bodhisattva incapable of sliding back,"

Saddharma Pundarika, Kern's Translation, p. 252.]

[Footnote 56: Chi[=u]-j[=o]-hime was the first j.a.panese nun, and the only woman who is commemorated by an idol. "She extracted the fibres of the lotus root, and wove them with silk to make tapestry for altars."

Fuso Mimi Bukuro, p. 128. Her romantic and marvellous story is given in S. and H., p. 397. "The practice of giving ranks to women was commenced by Jito Tenn[=o] (an empress, 690-705)." Many women shaved their heads and became nuns "on becoming widows, as well as on being forsaken by, or after leaving their husbands. Others were orphans." One of the most famous nuns (on account of her rank) was the Nii no Ama, widow of Kiyomori and grandmother of the Emperor Antoku, who were both drowned near Shimono-seki, in the great naval battle of 1185 A.D. Adams's History of j.a.pan, Vol. I., p. 37; M.E., p. 137.]

[Footnote 57: M.E., p. 213; j.a.panese Women, World's Columbian Exhibition, Chicago, 1893, Chap. III.]

[Footnote 58: There is no pa.s.sage in the original Greek texts, or in the Revised Version of the New Testament which ascribes wings to the _aggelos_, or angel. In Rev. xii. 14, a woman is "given two wings of a great eagle."]

[Footnote 59: j.a.panese Women in Politics, Chap. I., j.a.panese Women, Chicago, 1893; j.a.panese Girls and Women, Chapters VI. and VII.]

[Footnote 60: Bakin's novels are dominated by this idea, while also preaching in fiction strict Confucianism. See A Captive of Love, by Edward Greey.]

[Footnote 61: "Fate is one of the great words of the East. _j.a.pan's language is loaded and overloaded with it._ Parents are forever saying before their children, 'There's no help for it.' I once remarked to a school-teacher, 'Of course you love to teach children.' His quick reply was, 'Of course I don't. I do it merely because there is no help for it.' Moralists here deplore the prosperity of the houses of ill-fame and then add with a sigh, 'There's no help for it.' All society reverberates with this phrase with reference to questions that need the application of moral power, will power."--J.H. De Forest.

"I do not say there is no will power in the East, for there is. Nor do I say there is no weak yielding to fate in lands that have the doctrine of the Creator, for there is. But, putting the East and West side by side, one need not hesitate to affirm that the reason the will power of the East is weak cannot be fully explained by any mere doctrine of environment, but must also have some vital connection with the fact that the idea of a personal almighty Creator has for long ages been wanting.

And one reason why western nations have an aggressive character that ventures bold things and tends to defy difficulties cannot be wholly laid to environment but must have something to do with the fact that leads millions daily reverently to say 'I believe in the Almighty Father, Maker of Heaven and Earth.'"--J.H. De Forest.]

STATISTICS OF BUDDHISM IN j.a.pAN.

(From The official "Resume Statistique de l'Empire du j.a.pon,"

T[=o]ki[=o], 1894.)

In 1891 there were 71,859 temples within city or town limits, and 35,959 in the rural districts, or 117,718 in all, under the charges of 51,791 princ.i.p.al priests and 720 princ.i.p.al priestesses, or 52,511 in all.

The number of temples, cla.s.sified by sects, were as follows: Tendai, with 3 sub-sects, 4,808; Shingon, with 2 sub-sects, 12,821, of which 45 belonged to the Hoss[=o] shu; J[=o]-do, with 2 sub-sects, 8,323, of which 21 were of the Ke-gon shu; Zen, with 3 sub-sects, 20,882, of which 6,146 were of the Rin-Zai shu; 14,072 of the S[=o]-d[=o] shu, and 604 of the O-bakushu; Shin, with 10 sub-sects, 19,146; Nichiren, with 7 sub-sects, 5,066; Ji shu, 515; Yu-dz[=u]; Nembutsu, 358; total, 38 sects and 71,859 temples.

The official reports required by the government from the various sects, show that there are 38 administrative heads of sects; 52,638 priest-preachers and 44,123 ordinary priests or monks; and 8,668 male and 328 female, or a total of 8,996, students for the grade of monk or nun. In comparison with 1886, the number of priest-preachers was 39,261, ordinary priests 38,189: male students, 21,966; female students, 642.

CHAPTER XI

ROMAN CHRISTIANITY IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

[Footnote 1: See for a fine example of this, Mr. C. Meriwether's Life of Date Masamune, T.A.S.J., Vol. XXI., pp. 3-106. See also The Christianity of Early j.a.pan, by Koji Inaba, in The j.a.pan Evangelist, Yokohama, 1893-94; Mr. E. Satow's papers in T.A.S.J.]

[Footnote 2: See M.E., p. 280; Rein's j.a.pan, p. 312; Shigetaka Shiga's History of Nations, p. 139, quoting from M.E. (p. 258).]

[Footnote 3: M.E., 195.]

[Footnote 4: The j.a.pan Mail of April and May, 1894, contains a translation from the j.a.panese, with but little new matter, however, of a work ent.i.tled Paul Anjiro.]

[Footnote 5: The "Firando" of the old books. See c.o.c.k's Diary. It is difficult at first to recognize the j.a.panese originals of some of the names which figure in the writings of Charlevoix, Leon Pages, and the European missionaries, owing to their use of local p.r.o.nunciation, and their spelling, which seems peculiar. One of the brilliant identifications of Mr. Ernest Satow, now H.B.M. Minister at Tangier, is that of Kuroda in the "Kondera"' of the Jesuits.]

[Footnote 6: See Mr. E.M. Matow's Vicissitudes of the Church at Yamaguchi. T.A.S.J., Vol. VII., pp. 131-156.]

[Footnote 7: n.o.bunaga was Nai Dai Jin, Inner (Junior) Prime Minister, one in the triple premiership, peculiar to Korea and Old j.a.pan, but was never Sh[=o]gun, as some foreign writers have supposed.]

[Footnote 8: See The Jesuit Mission Press in j.a.pan, by E. Satow, 1591-1610 (privately printed, London, 1888). Review of the same by B.H.

Chamberlain, T.A.S.J., Vol. XVII., p. 91.]

[Footnote 9: Histoire de l'eglise, Vol. I, p. 490; Rein, p. 277.

Takayama is spoken of in the Jesuit Records as Justo Ucondono. A curious book ent.i.tled Justo Ucondono, Prince of j.a.pan, in which the writer, who is "less attentive to points of style than to matters of faith," labors to show that "the Bible alone" is "found wanting," and only the "Teaching Church" is worthy of trust, was published in Baltimore, in 1854.]

[Footnote 10: How Hideyoshi made use of the Shin sect of Buddhists to betray the Satsuma clansmen is graphically told in Mr. J.H. Gubbin's paper, Hideyoshi and the Satsuma Clan, T.A.S.J., Vol. VIII, pp. 124-128, 143.]