Encyclopedia of Buddhism Volume One A -L Robert E. Buswell

J APANESE R OYAL F AMILY AND B UDDHISM
The aesthetics of mono no aware lead us to the related
ideal of “mystery and depth” (yu gen), of major
importance to the poetry of the Shinkokinshu (New
Collection of Ancient and Modern Times, ca. 1206) and
the Muromachi Noh theater. The phrase first appears
in a Chinese Buddhist commentary, and the comments
of Kamo no Chomei (1153–1216), the author of Ho jo ki
(Essays in Idleness), point to the emotional ideal while
reminding us of Buddhism’s understanding of the limitations
of reason:
On an autumn evening, for example, there is no color
in the sky nor any sound, yet although we cannot give
any definite reason for it, we are somehow moved to
tears. . . . It should be evident that this is a matter impossible
for people of little sensibility to understand. . . .
How can such things be easily learned or expressed precisely
in words?
How, for example, can we explain why the following
poem by Shunzei (1114–1204) moves us? And why
should we try?
As evening falls,
autumn wind across
the moors
blows chill into
the heart,
and a quail seems to
be crying
in the deep grass
of Fukakusa.
yu sareba
nobe no akikaze
mi ni shimite
uzura naku nari
Fukakusa no sato
But Japanese and English literature, however their
fruits may compare or contrast, nevertheless shared a
common chronological timeline. The bards of the Old
English epic poem Beowulf were contemporaries of the
guild of reciters (kataribe) that produced the Record of
Ancient Matters.
See also: Chinese, Buddhist Influences on Vernacular
Literature in; Cosmology; Entertainment and Performance;
Ikkyu; Poetry and Buddhism; Ryokan; Shinto
(Honji Suijaku) and Buddhism
Bibliography
deBary, William Theodore; Keene, Donald; Tanabe, George;
and Varley, Paul, eds. Sources of Japanese Tradition, 2nd edition.
Vol. 1: From Earliest Times to 1600. New York: Columbia
University Press, 2001.
Keene, Donald. Essays in Idleness: The Tsurezuregusa of Kenko .
New York and London: Columbia University Press, 1967.
Keene, Donald. Seeds in the Heart: Japanese Literature from Earliest
Times to the Late Sixteenth Century. New York: Henry
Holt, 1993.
LaFleur, William R. The Karma of Words: Buddhism and the Literary
Arts in Medieval Japan. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University
of California Press, 1983.
Miner, Earl; Hiroko Odagiri; and Morrell, Robert E., eds. The
Princeton Companion to Classical Japanese Literature. Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985.
Tanabe, George J., Jr., ed. Religions of Japan in Practice. Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999.
ROBERT E. MORRELL
Without minimizing the profound influences of
Shinto and Confucianism on traditional Japanese
thought and feeling, we must recognize the preeminence
of Buddhism in shaping the nation’s artistic
production, providing much of its imagery and aesthetic
direction. The impermanence (mujo ) behind the
ideal of “sensitivity to things” and “mystery and
depth,” the consciousness of moral retribution between
existences (sukuse, karma), and myriad halfsensed
feelings and images from an antique past
inform a rich literature of some five centuries of histories,
poetry (waka, renga, haiku, . . . ), novels (monogatari),
“essays” (zuihitsu), anecdotal “tale literature”
(setsuwa), theater (Noh, joruri, kabuki, and their modern
successors), memoirs (nikki), and travel diaries
(kiko ).
JAPANESE ROYAL FAMILY
AND BUDDHISM
Although the royal family of Japan, headed by the
tenno (heavenly monarch), has since 1868 been identified
by the Japanese media and government with
Shinto, it long led a religious life dominated by Buddhism.
It was, indeed, the prince-regent SHO TOKU
(574–622) who was identified as having the greatest
impact on the early history of Buddhism in Japan, in
emphatically supporting Buddhism in early proclamations,
in supporting the construction of major temples
such as Shitennoji in O saka, and in writing—or,
more likely, sponsoring—one or more of the commentaries
on Buddhist scriptures that have been attributed
to him.
398 E NCYCLOPEDIA OF B UDDHISM