2-Sources of Japanese Philosophy
Japanese philosophers have historically interacted intensively with a multitude of philosophies outside their native boundaries - most prominently Chinese, Indian, Korean, and Western. So they have benefited from a rich wealth of ideas and theories on which to draw in developing their own distinctive philosophical perspectives. Due to those circumstances, Japanese philosophers acquired skill in analyzing foreign ideas by examining the presuppositions behind them to determine their potential implications if they were to be adopted into their own culture.
According to Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam,
Two preoccupations stand out prominently in the history of Japanese philosophy. The first concerns moral and political issues, and here Confucianism has provided a fertile system of ideas to be adapted to the realities of Japanese society. The second, again an abiding preoccupation, is the desire to find an intellectual accommodation between what is seen as the objective, logical and analytic nature of Western philosophy, with its scientific and technological context, and the more subjective and human-centered emphasis of traditional Japanese thought. This latter preoccupation can be seen as a contemporary manifestation of the perennial task of finding a fit between science and religion. (Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.640)
From another side, Brian Bocking highlights the current extensive interaction of Japanese scholars with other traditions as follows,
Nowadays, Japanese intellectuals are to be found actively involved in every branch of learning, including most schools of Western and Eastern philosophy. Such full involvement in modern international academic life developed rapidly after the Meiji restoration (or coup) of 1867/8, in which the feudal Tokugawa government was overthrown and Japan was opened to international exchange. Since the 1860s Japanese academics have routinely studied abroad, and all kinds of philosophical works published in English, French, German, Russian and other important Western languages, as well as modern Asian writings, have been made available in Japanese translation. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.641)
As a result, he continues, Japanese thinkers have had access - both through primary sources and in their own language - to a range of contrasting philosophical views and sources of inspiration far wider than that normally available within the Eurocentric world of Western philosophy. Japanese thinkers have been able to draw upon a variety of authoritative traditions from different parts of the world (initially Chinese and Indian Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism and Japanese Shinto, and later Western thought), for in Japan no single religious or intellectual tradition has ever predominated for long. Early on, the plethora of authoritative yet apparently inconsistent sources of knowledge available to the Japanese had the effect of relativizing views about ultimate matters such as the nature of God(s), the origin of the world or the source of evil and suffering, matters (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.641)
Stressing on the Japanese Philosophical Pluralism Brian Bocking continues,
Japanese philosophy arises out of the problem of the human condition, a problem as acute in Japan as anywhere else in the world, and one which continually presents itself in new forms despite our best attempts to plumb its depths. When we ask about the 'origins' of Japanese philosophy we are really asking why problems about the nature and meaning of human existence have arisen and been answered in particular ways in Japan. Japanese thinkers who based their arguments on a Confucian text, Buddhist scripture, Shinto chronicle or Western treatise were always acutely aware that other different, independent and authoritative sources of knowledge existed. In such circumstances, several strategies may be adopted to make sense of apparently conflicting truths. Certain sources may be accepted as authoritative and others rejected, which is a political choice; a philosopher may adopt a 'phenomenological' approach, seeking to understand and describe meanings rather than judge what is Truth; or perhaps a synthetic approach, seeking to develop a system of thought which unifies apparently conflicting claims. There are Japanese philosophers who have consciously selected one or more sources of knowledge within the Japanese tradition as authoritative and rejected others. Typically, these philosophers reject one or another tradition (such as Buddhism, or Christianity, or Western thought) on the grounds that it is foreign to Japan. Particularly from the 1700s onwards proponents of 'National Learning' such as Hirata Atsutane (1776-1843) adopted such an approach in asserting the primacy of the indigenous Shinto tradition over foreign imports. This approach originates in the notion of Japan as a special place, different in kind from other countries of the world, a view legitimated by Shinto creation myths which concern Japan, the Japanese deities, the imperial family and the Japanese people alone and make no significant reference to the wider world or cosmos within which the islands of Japan exist. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.655-656)
We first make a short review of the three traditional sources of Japanese philosophy.
a- Confucianism
Historically, Confucianism entered the country as a literary tradition from China and Korea beginning around the sixth and seventh centuries.
Following Bodart-Bailey,
while there is a strong possibility that migrants from Korea and south China introduced knowledge of Confucianism into Japan in the fourth century, reliable historical material exists only for the fifth century, when Japanese inscriptions and a reference in the Chinese classics (The History of the Liu Sung Dynasty referring to a memorial sent by 'the King of Japan' to the Wei emperor in 478) indicate that Confucian terminology had been absorbed in Japan together with the Chinese writing system. For centuries to come literacy was attained through a study of Confucian primers, and the relatively small number of people who were literate presumably had a basic knowledge of Confucianism.
This scholarly knowledge, which is conventionally called Confucian and matured in China during the Han Dynasties, contained much more than the moral philosophy of Confucius. It was a synthesis of various Chinese traditional beliefs and political theories with the sayings attributed to Confucius, furnishing an all-embracing system explaining the universe and man’s position in it. It gave legitimacy to the ruler, but also set out his duties towards his subjects and provided detailed regulations on how he must govern the empire in accordance with 'the Will of Heaven'.
Of importance in this world order was the yin-yang and Five Elements theory (Japanese in yo go gyo). In the simplest terms yin and yang were viewed as the opposing forces of negative and positive, passive and active, dark and light, which by their interaction produce and control events; in order to avoid calamities, both must at all times be kept in harmony. The Five Elements wood, fire, earth, metal, water-not elements in the Greek sense but dynamic concepts- make up the cosmological world order and control the rhythm of life. (B.M.Bodart-Bailey, 'Confucianism in Japan', p.661.)
From the time of their introduction into Japan, Confucian political, social, and ethical ideals quickly transformed the structure of Japanese society. For the most part, Confucianism brought to proto-Shinto a new set of detailed ideas about how to organize a harmonious hierarchical society in which roles of respect directed to those above were reciprocated by roles of caring directed to those below. According to Brian Bocking,
Confucius was the perfect man. This presupposition of Confucianism identifies Confucian thought as optimistic (human perfection is possible in the world), humanistic (perfection is to be achieved within human relationships rather than in an afterlife) and nostalgic (perfection was once achieved at the time and through the personality of Confucius—our task is at best to reconstruct his achievement in today's degenerated conditions). Confucius was no recluse: he conducted himself in an exemplary way in a variety of social roles, and from his example are derived normative rules about social conduct, that is to say, what characterizes the perfect ruler, servant, father, son, spouse, friend, philosopher and so on. Confucians perceive a link between the individual, the social and the cosmic realms, to the extent that selfish (anti-social) behavior is seen as a cause not only of social upheaval but also of upheaval in the natural world and the cosmic
order.
The Confucian problem, he continues, is how the integration of individual will and social role or duty is to be achieved, not whether it should be. This raises the question (paralleled in Mahayana Buddhism) of whether human perfection is innate, waiting to be revealed, or something external to the self that must be obtained by strenuous and gradual effort, possibly involving suppression of evil tendencies. Self-cultivation is in either case seen as essential, and the enormously high value placed on education and disciplined conduct throughout East Asia today is testament to the power of Confucius' example. In Neo-Confucianism, which developed later in China as a blend of Buddhist and Confucian thought and was introduced to Japan by Zen monks, contemplative and meditational techniques were seen as an effective means to achieve this integration. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy, p.645-646)
b- Buddhism
Buddhist philosophy originated in India and dates back to the fifth century BCE. In the same way as Confucianism, Buddhism entered Japan via Korea and China in the sixth and seventh centuries. However, Japanese schools of Buddhism soon developed and became the dominant philosophical tradition till the appearance of the new Confucianism by the late seventeenth century. According to Brian Bocking,
Buddhism has been seen by most Japanese not as an Indian religion, but simply as one of the 'three religions' of Shinto, Buddhism and Confucianism, corresponding to the three religions of Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism in China. Chinese and Japanese forms of Buddhism are overwhelmingly Mahayanist in content and approach. They regard the Buddha as a cosmic, eternal entity or principle and adopt as their religious role-model the bodhisattva who vows to save all beings before himself entering perfect supreme enlightenment. Mahayana Buddhist thought developed in India and thereafter in two broad streams or tendencies, Yogacara and Madhyamika. Yogacara is a form of Buddhist idealism which presents a model of the realms or levels of consciousness to explain why and how Buddhist practice operates as a vehicle of liberation from ignorance, craving and delusion. According to Yogacara (known in China and Japan as 'Mind-only' philosophy), perfect unconditioned enlightenment is inherent within us, but is obscured by the layers of the unenlightened mind. Enlightenment will manifest spontaneously through all the spheres of consciousness once unenlightened mental impulses are transmuted through Buddhist practice. Yogacara conscientiously preserves the Buddha's psychological approach to the objective world, seeing the 'objective' cosmos as the reflection or projection of consciousness. Yogacara-type Buddhist philosophies have profoundly influenced Japanese thought, both directly through schools of Buddhist philosophy popular in Japan (Tendai, Pure Land and Zen in particular) and indirectly through the legitimacy this philosophical school bestows on views of the world which emphasize the illusory, subjective and hence transient nature of 'objective' reality. The Madhyamika line of approach is somewhat different from Yogacara in that it identifies unenlightenment with attachment to concepts, however orthodox, exalted and meaningful these concepts may be.
Japanese Buddhists have inherited both Yogacara and Madhyamika approaches to Buddhist philosophy and commonly regard them as complementary. Yogacara-type philosophies try to explain how things are, emphasizing that things are not what they seem (nor are they otherwise, adds Zen), while Madhyamika reminds the philosopher that all such explanations belong in the realm of conventional truth and that not too much importance should be attached to them. The doctrine of two levels of truth casts suspicion on all verbal formulations, since it can be applied to any mental constructs, whether Buddhist or not. While Japanese philosophers have traditionally been, unlike their post-Enlightenment Western counterparts, respectful towards rather than skeptical of received truths, a flavor of wry skepticism about any conceptual formulation has pervaded Japanese thought. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.647-648)
c- Daoism
According to Charles Wei-hsun Fu,
Taken together, Daoism and Confucianism share the distinction of being the philosophical grounding forces of Chinese culture. In a sense, they may be considered respectively as the yin and yang of Chinese thought-Daoism being primarily concerned with helping us to accommodate the Way of Humanity to the Way of Nature, while Confucianism's focus emphasizes the cultivation of the Way of Human Morality. Hence, although many in the West tend to assume that the two schools are ideological rivals, their division of philosophical territory makes them complementary more often than competitive. For more than two thousand years, the traditional Chinese have managed to perform a delicate balancing act that allows them to be simultaneously Confucian and Daoist (with the later addition of Buddhist thought) as appropriate to changing situations. (Charles Wei-hsun Fu, 'Daoism in Chinese Philosophy', p.497.)
Given this picture, according to Brian Bocking,
Daoism is a collective term for practices and beliefs sometimes subdivided into philosophical, religious and popular Daoism, although it is in practice difficult to separate such strata within Daoism or even distinguish Daoism from Buddhism or Confucianism in China and Shinto in Japan. Daoist books explaining the complex interactions of yin and yang were available in Japan from the earliest period of Chinese influence, and elements of Daoism quickly spread throughout the country phenomena. Daoist thought has contributed to Japanese philosophy a view of the world which eschews any kind of mechanical determinism and celebrates the unusual and the particular, while recognizing that there are recurring patterns in nature and human affairs. Daoist beliefs and practices also reinforce the notion that the objective world is not to be taken for granted, that there is a coherent power behind and within events regulated by the interplay of yin and yang, a power which can be resisted at our cost or intuited and accepted to our benefit. This power is not normally conceived of as personal; although there are Daoist divinities, their conduct conforms to the Dao. To merge with the operation of Dao through spiritual practice is to internalize the irresistible tide of nature itself, to achieve immortality through union with the deathless flow of events. In Japan, practical 'ways' (Chinese dao; Japanese to or do), spiritualized techniques and roles including sado, the way of tea, and bushido, the way of the warrior, became popular in the Tokugawa period, where they represented- in a Confucian context - paths to transcendence of self and spiritual perfection within one's narrowly defined social role. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy', p.649-650).
d- Shinto
The last traditional source of Japanese philosophy is Shinto. According to Brian Bocking,
Shinto (Shin-to, 'the way of the gods') is the Japanese religious tradition which reflects most obviously the native outlook of the Japanese, but it would be naive to assume that Shinto constitutes some kind of unchanging substrate within Japanese culture. Shinto has undergone profound changes over its long history, and particularly since the Meiji restoration of 1868. Even a brief examination of Shinto ideas reveals that changes in the political and social sphere have meant changes in the meaning of Shinto itself. Early Shinto consisted of the imperial family cult and the worship of other local deities (kami) attached either to a clan (uji) or to a locality, which might be an unusual or impressive feature of the landscape such as a mountain or waterfall. The early eighth- century imperial chronicles which contain the Shinto creation myths are essentially political documents which retail in a way favorable to the Yamato court the story of the descent of the imperial family, the land and the people of Japan from the gods (kami). Prominent among these, kami is the sun goddess Amaterasu ('Heaven-Shining'). A shrine to Amaterasu at Ise in central Japan was, and remains, the private imperial household shrine. Such a clear and close correlation between myth, deity and location of shrine is rather rare in Shinto, whose religious teachings have been well described as 'inherently vague'. The term 'kami' does not necessarily imply a named deity, since the primary meaning of kami is 'sacred'—a numinous, ambivalent and energetic quality which may attach to or inhere in a variety of objects and entities, including on occasion living or dead human beings. Shinto is local and shrine-based, rather than rooted in a doctrinal tradition. As an inherited oral tradition, strong in ritual and closely enmeshed in Japanese daily life but lacking any sophisticated system of thought, Shinto survived as a strong partner to the new philosophies and imported rituals of Buddhism and Confucianism from the sixth century onwards. Throughout Japanese history, Shinto has provided ritual and ceremonial support to governments, clans and communities whose ethical ideals and many of whose religious beliefs were actually derived from Confucianism and Buddhism. 'Shinto' is therefore a collective term rather like 'Hinduism'. It refers to a great variety of local cults, attitudes and beliefs changing over time rather than to any centralized religious or philosophical system. Certain ideas characteristic of (but not exclusive to) Shinto have influenced Japanese philosophy; such ideas include the elusive concept of kami itself, and a strong emphasis on ritual purification and cyclic renewal. But Shinto has never - except in the case of State Shinto - claimed to be a complete system of thought, and has readily incorporated ethical and metaphysical elements from Confucianism and Buddhism. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy',p.650-651).
e- Western Philosophy
Following Brian Bocking,
Marxism has had a considerable influence in the twentieth century amongst Japanese academics, often displacing respect for traditional Japanese cosmologies and values which are identified with an earlier social phase. Japanese thinkers who have adopted what might be called a 'phenomenological' approach to conflicting truths, an approach which is comfortable with relativism, have typically been influenced by the logic and metaphysics of Mahayana Buddhism, which spread through China, Korea and Japan partly by dint of its ability to respect, absorb and syncretize with existing beliefs and practices, offering a reinterpretation of them at one level without denying their value and efficacy at another. The Buddhist attitude to propositional truths is inherently relativistic, for Mahayana Buddhists typically see the objective world as a projection of consciousness, and propositions about the objective world are therefore only ever 'true' at a phenomenal level. Even the Buddha's teachings are seen as a temporary device for a particular purpose - the key teaching of non-self, it is widely acknowledged within Buddhism, could be a teaching of self in different circumstances. Finally, there are Japanese philosophers who have attempted to unify in a comprehensive synthesis at least the 'three teachings' of Buddhism, Confucianism and Shinto, or more recently Japanese and Western theoretical perspectives. Theories which aim to synthesize diverse traditions, once elaborated, are bound to involve interpreting one tradition through the eyes of another. (Brian Bocking, 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy' p.657-658)
works Cited
- Carr, B and Mahalingam, I. 1977. 'The Origins of Japanese Philosophy' in. Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam (eds.) Companion encyclopedia of Asian philosophy.
- Bocking, Brian. 1977. 'the Origins of Japanese Philosophy' in. Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam (eds.) "Companion encyclopedia of Asian philosophy", p.641-659.
- Bodart-Bailey, B.M. 1977. 'Confucianism in Japan' in. Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam (eds.) "Companion encyclopedia of Asian philosophy", p.660-674.
- Wei-hsun Fu, Charles. 1977. 'Daoism in Chinese Philosophy', in Brian Carr and Indira Mahalingam (eds.) "Companion encyclopedia of Asian philosophy", p.497-519.
Internet Resources
The International Association of Japanese Philosophy
European Network of Japanese Philosophy
Readings
Phenomenology in Japan - KEIICHI NOE
Edited By: Samir Abuzaid
