Tsutsui W.M. A Companion to japanese histоry

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beginning of the warrior age and the supplanting of the aristocratic age, and the

Muromachi bakufu a continuation of that trend which buried the anomalous rem-

nants of the classical polity. Thus the Kamakura and Muromachi per iods constituted

the medieval era.

A more recent view is that the Kamakura bakufu was an accretion onto rather than a

replacement of the older order, and that the events in the 1330s that brought forth

(in quick succession) the Kenmu regim e and the Muromachi bakufu denote a

repudiation of that older order.

A convincing case thus can be made that medieval

began with the end of the Kamakura period rather than with its beginning, and that

Kamakura is thus a transition era between classical and medieval.

The significant

qualitative shift in the 1330s, which distinguishes the medieval era, is from a ‘‘sys-

tem’’ that relied on the force of authority to one that relied on the authority of force;

that shift is defined and symbolized by the acceptance of military power as a central

element in politics, and by the new phenomenon of ende mic warfare in Japanese

society.

The 1330s, and the fourteenth century more broadly, are thus crucial to any

sense of the medieval.

Having said that, one may also adopt the approach that there were two phases of

the medieval, an early medieval period that had a bloody and irrefutable end point in

1333, and a high or late medieval period commencing in that same year. The

medieval thus may be seen as having two major break points, the 1180s and the

1330s, which revolve around political and military events that lasted for periods of

years. We might note that this perception of these decades (and their dominant

figures, Minamoto Yoritomo, 1147–99, and Emperor Go-Daigo 1288–13 39) as

being epochal had already taken root in Japan by 1400. However, scholarly debate

has revol ved around the significance to be invested in those break points: were they

parts of longer-term processes, adjustments to older systems, or significant structural

alterations that constituted rupture? In general, the older narrative that charted the

rise of the warrior class to prominence has given way to interpretatio ns that acknow-

ledge more nuance regarding the break points and that see the rise of the warriors as

more contingent than inevitable (the longer-term historical recor d wherein that

occurred is not itself in question, however). Whether the warriors were the only

or the major catalyst for broader changes has also been brought under scrutiny.

Finally, lurking in the background is the issue of what may constitute the ‘‘Japan’’

that is under discussion, for it has become apparent that the story of politically and

militarily well-documented regions (eastern Japan) or political centers (Kamakura,

Kyoto) is not automatically that of ‘‘peripheral’’ areas. Let us comment on the

1180s and the 1330s.

The 1180s

An older view that the emergence of something like a bakufu was merely a matter of

time has been replaced by a sense that regional and personal factors, which may have

exploited institution al possibilities, explain events better than do imaginary con-

structs of warrior political ambition or opposition to an aristoc ratic polity. However,

in this decade the traditional aristocratic oligarchy lost the ability to unilaterally

sanction or control the activity of part of the warrior class, and it is this that may

fairly be acknowledged as a significant historical development.

48 ANDREW EDMUND GOBLE

However, the warrior class was not monolithic. Beyond a possible shared ethos as

‘‘warriors,’’ there is no evidence of a nationwide class consciousness or political

ideology, and warri or family groups (the core social organization within that class)

rarely developed broader regional identifications. One exception to this was the

‘‘warrior league’’ phenomenon – partly a community based on physical proxim ity,

partly an imagined one based upon shared but only occasional military exp erience – of

eastern Japan. Even this did not encompass notions of autonomy, or even region-

wide unity. In the 1180s, however, the warrior class of eastern Japan was welded into

a social and military interest group under the leadership of an exiled warrior-aristo-

crat, Minamoto Yoritomo. Those warriors not partial to his approaches were elimin-

ated. His limited goal was to make the east autonomous under his leadership, but the

need to respond to military and political efforts to stymie that goal led to nationwide

campaigning, the elimina tion of warrior rivals from other regions of the country, and

national hegemony. Yet rather than seek independence or total domination, the

Kamakura bakufu elected to legitimize its prerogatives by agreeing – on its terms,

and with the content dictated by it – to an autonomy within the existing political and

legal framework. The bakufu was not an advocate for the warrior class as a whole, held

jurisdiction over only its own followers (except in matters of public order, where it

claimed wider policing powers), and worked deliberately to uphold the old order. No

effort was made to supplant or eliminate the imperial institution, and expansion of

powers was not a policy objective. The result was the creation of a dual polity with

overlapping governing hierarchies, and two urban locations, the old imperial city of

Kyoto and the new bakufu headquarters in Kamakur a (near modern Tokyo).

Nonetheless, the establishment of the bakufu betokened a qualitative shift in the

political and social landscape. Its existence made it possible in the following century

and a half for the bakufu to become increa singly involved in national issues (defense,

imperial succession), issues of legal jurisdiction (prope rty disputes, criminal and

peace-keeping activity), and expansion of its authority over a wider number of social

groups. This greater presence, inevitably diminishing the latitude of many others,

cumulatively engendered a backlash, itself underlain by significant tensions propelled

by conflicts (land disputes, inheritance imbroglios) over diminishi ng resources

throughout society.

The 1330s

The 1330s witnessed the bloody extermination of the Kamakura bakufu, the appear-

ance of a national regime headed by Emperor Go-Daigo, the establishment of a

national warrior government by the Ash ikaga family, and the onset of nearly sixty

years of civil war. The civil war was propelled by competing ideological visions of two

factions of the imperial family and their supporters, and within that dynamic a

competition for national pre-eminence between the supporters of Emperor Go-

Daigo and those of the Ashikaga warrior family from eastern Japan. There is little

debate that the decade of the 1330s was a break point, but much debate ever since

over why it was so.

It has not been uncommon to see the conflict as one between an ‘‘imperial vision’’

promoted by Emperor Go-Daigo and a ‘‘warrior vision’’ promoted by the former

Kamakura bakufu general Ashikaga Takauji, with the conflict more broa dly one

MEDIEVAL JAPAN 49

between those opposing the ongoing rise of the warrior class and those rising

naturally to leadership as a result of that same force of history. The guiding assump-

tion that the warrior class was rising and propelled by the force of history infor ms the

perception that the Kamakura bakufu could only have been followed by another

warrior regime, and that the appearance of a unified national regime under a non-

warrior (an emperor) was an anomaly.

However, these assumptions do not account

satisfactorily for the demise of the Kamakura regime, for why an imperial regime

would enjoy any success in the first place, and for the many divisions that we find

within the warrior class. Moreover, the focus on the imagined Kamakura era warrior

class as representative has precluded recognition of the overall militarization of

Japanese society from the early fourteenth century.

The Kenmu era was a sign ificant turning point. The aristocr atic oligarchy was

reshaped by death and by Go-Daigo’s repudiation of it as the main support for the

imperial system. Militarization of society and endemic warfare were significant and

new phenomena. The warriors as a social class did not give automatic preference to

warrior political leadership, which thus calls into question the narrative of the inev-

itable rise of the warrior class. Close examination of the Kenmu administration

suggests that it is best interpreted not as one pursuing anachronistic goals, or less

administratively adept than earlier regimes, bu t as one propelling an era of major

systemic change whose outcome was uncertain.

Close study of a wide range of

contemporary writings on politics and society has made it clear that the questioning

of inherited ideologies that underlay Go-Daigo’s vision was widely shared, and it is

thus accordingly apparent that an earlier scholarly focus on texts such as the Jinno

sho

ki not only revealed but part of the picture, it also misconstrued the nature of

medieval ideological debates on such fundamental issues as the role of the imperial

family.

Finally, the social fragmentation and endemic warfare of the fourteenth

century needs to be regarded as symptom atic of times within which political change

was also occurring.

The Kamakura and Muromachi Regimes

These two warrior-led administrations shared much in common as bureaucratic

organizations, but existed in very different historical circumstances. Both regimes

emerged through warfare, and warfare brought them both to an end. In the Kama-

kura case, it was destroyed by military forces opposed to it in 1333. In contrast, by the

1570s the Muromachi bakufu was a non-threatening and insignificant military actor

in an age of civil war, and passed irrelevantly from the stage. Thus, Kamakura ended

with a bang, Muromachi with a whimper. Both regimes shared authority with other

institutions, and did not aim for unitary hegemony (though they did not wish to be

overshadowed), so should not be regarded as exclusive ‘‘national gov ernments.’’ We

can deli neate institutional evolution for each bakufu, bu t it is useful to consider the

‘‘warrior government’’ connoted by these institutions as falling into three phases: the

Kamakura regim e as one chronological unit with national impact; the Muromachi

bakufu as having national impact through the late fifteenth century; and from the

nin War of the 1470s until its demise the Muromachi bakufu was but one of several

elements trying to survive in the chaotic ‘‘city-state’’ of Kyoto.

50 ANDREW EDMUND GOBLE

Kamakura bakufu

The Kamakura bakufu was founded by a warrior. Its constituency was the warrior

class of eastern Japan. Its primary administrative activity involved supervising its

followers for guard duty, confirming title to and alienations of rights in land of

its followers, and providing the legal mechanisms and venues whereby warriors, as

plaintiffs or defendants, might defend their interests in civil litigation. The bakufu was

staffed by professional and largely hereditary civil bureaucrats only rarely of warrior

background. Policy organs, whose duties also included judgment of legal suits, were

staffed by a combination of professional bureaucrats and warriors; over time, sup-

porters of the Ho

family of shogunal regents dominated the warrior group. The

‘‘head of state’’ position, denoted by the title sho

gun, was, after the extinction of

Yoritomo’s direct line in 1219, occupied by young aristoc rats or young imperial

princes serving their term at the pleasure of the Ho

. The ‘‘head of government’’

position (shogunal regent) was, after 1221, held by a member of the Ho

family;

initially that figure was concurrently head of the Ho

family, but later in the period

the two were distinct, with supreme power de facto lying in the hands of the house

head. The Ho

represent the first significant instance of social mobility in the warrior

class.

Reflecting the goals of its founder, the Kamakura bakufu was devoted to system

maintenance and the avoidance of military activity. Its primary public activities

became focused on dispute resolution, acti ng as arbitrator in civil litigation between

its warriors and between its warriors and any other third party. The bakufu developed

a sophisticated judicial system – laws and regulations, regional branches, detailed

procedures, rights of appeal – designed to encourage disputants to reach informal

resolution which the bakufu might then acknowledge. Befitting its role as arbitrator,

it was not judicially activist, and gave great weight to customary practice.

Muromachi bakufu

The Muromachi bakufu

under the Ashikaga family was forced to locate itself in the

capital of Kyoto in order to control the imperial family and the political legitimacy

that it conferred. The Ashikaga leadership thus removed itself from its traditional

landholdings, at a time when income from distant holdings was unreliable and when a

devolution of ownership to the local level was eroding the system of absentee

landownership upon which Heian era government had been built. Accordingly, as

had Go-Daigo, it sought to promote commerce and benefit from taxat ion of eco-

nomic activity, mainly within the city of Kyoto. Throughout the fourteenth century

the Ashikaga struggled to exercise national hegemony, and overcome regional warrior

opponents. While it maintained some strong regional outposts during that time it

became dependent for military support on newly emerged regional warrior leaders.

However, only the Ashikaga had ambitions at the national level; the result was a

central–local consensus that recognized the Ashikaga position in return for acknow-

ledgment of provincial and regional autonomy. Regional figures enhanced their own

local claims by harnessing the prestige and legitimacy deriving from ‘‘appointments’’

from the Muromachi bakufu. The Ashikaga in turn derived some of their political

legitimacy by a similar mechanism, namely their claimed appointment from the

MEDIEVAL JAPAN 51

imperial throne. The Muromachi bakufu gained additional legitimacy by its involve-

ment in formal relations with China and Korea : not only did it acquire a monopoly

over such matters, but the needs of diplomatic protocol enabled it to acquire (not

without some internal controversy) for the sho

gun the new title of ‘‘King of Japan.’’

Bureaucratically the Muromachi bakufu closely resembled the Kamakura bakufu,

and even inherited a large number of that organ’s former bureaucrats. It established a

functional administration, with authority over judicial and other bureaucratic matters,

and progressively arrogated to itself rights to rule-making and police enforcement

within the vicinity of Kyoto.

It did not cont rol large numbers of troops, but its

retainer corps was always reliable (like its master, it had no real power base outside the

city), and it held a preponderance of local power. The growth of commercial activity

and increased monetization of the economy introduced new areas of civil contention,

and new sources of ready wealth. In an environment where goodwill was scarce and

gift-giving an integral part of social life, it is easy to have the impression that the

Muromachi bakufu’s city administration was akin to a protection racket. However, it

was a powerful protector and patron, and it creatively har nessed Zen institutions to

provide financial and personnel support for a new area of government activity, foreign

relations (see below).

Politically, the Muromachi bakufu differed slightly from the Kamakura bakufu, in

that it utilized a number of hereditary retainer families in important organizati onal

positions, including that of deputy sho

gun. In time the rivalries between the deputy

families and within the Ashikaga family itself were to undercut the political strength of

the shogunal institution . Those dynamics were additionally propelled and compli-

cated by the partisan involvement of regional warlords. Thus the family fortunes of

actors at several levels, and at the center and in local areas, became increasingly

intertwined, and matters of appointments and successions became highly politicized.

The destabilizing aspects of this started to become apparent in the 1440s, but it was

not until the late 1460s with the outbreak of the decade-long O

nin civil war

–

which devastated the city of Kyoto and prompted substantial realignments at the local

level – that the structure collapsed.

Post-1470s Kyoto ‘‘city-state’’

After the O

nin War the city of Kyoto remained an important center economically, and

retained the aura of being the si te of ultimate political legitimating power.

But it is

otherwise helpful, in understanding ‘‘bakufu,’’ to regard it as but one population

center among many. Indeed, one might see it as an anarchic city-state, and the bakufu

as a vestigial city administration occupied primarily with its own survival.

However,

the Muromachi bakufu was not overtly threatened with elimination and, like the

imperial family, remained in the city (albeit there was no where else it could go).

The city of Kyoto was a chur ning urban site, and its morphology altered substan-

tially throughout the medieval era. Its physical shape, and the lives of its inhabitants,

were radically affected by the O

nin War, which basically destroyed its structures.

While Kyoto lost its political raison d’e

tre, its role as a financia l and commercial hub

survived and flourished. Kyoto thus made a longer-term transition from being a

political city dominated by a hereditary civil elite, to a one with a mixed elite of

which one component was warrior, to one in which its neighborhood associations

52 ANDREW EDMUND GOBLE

and merchant guilds were the prominent representatives of what we might call local

government. Alternately, we might point to a strong sense of local community

developed by the urban population that helped it survive the ravages and impositions

of both occasional warlords and religious movements such as the Lotus Leagues.

Amid the political chaos Kyoto retained, and even actively expanded , its role at the

center of an increasingly monetized economy, as the provider of a wide range of

logistical and financial services, and as a center of specialty manufacturing. Kyoto, and

its guilds and trade associations, provided new means of creating wealth, generated

urban revenues, and gave rise to an entrepreneurial merchant class most visibly

symbolized by its moneylenders.

A significant by-product of the new wealth was

the emergence of a distinct, sophisticated Kyoto urban culture that, working through

salons and building upon business networks, nurtured the art of the tea ceremony,

kept alive traditions of poetry, and was well known for its connoisseurship of pottery

and pain ting. The urban culture also encouraged experimentation, a certain colorful

gaudiness, and big ambitions.

Religion and Culture

Two named religious traditions commingled in medieval Japan. The first was the

indigenous animistic faith of Shinto

(the way of the gods). The second was the

Buddhist tradition which was initially introduced into Japan via the Korean peninsula

in the sixth century; additional ‘‘waves’’ of Buddhism that exercised a significant

influence on Japanese culture were brought in from China in the ninth century

(esoteric schools) and in the thirteent h and fourteenth centuries (Zen). This section

will focus on the Buddhist traditio n. We wil l cover three areas: the institutional and

monastic traditions, the notions of salvation which underlay a distinctly medieval

responses to the human condition, and some developments in the study of medieval

religion.

Institutional and monastic traditions

Institutional Buddhism was of two types. That of the esoteric schools and religious

establishments that had emerged in the early ninth century, and that of the enlight-

enment-oriented Zen enterprise which became established in the thirteenth and

fourteenth centuries. The religious focus of these enterprises was to comprehend

the underlying truths of the cosmos, and both emphasized ritual practice and rigor-

ous training in a monastic environment.

From the classical Heian era and continuing through the medie val period, Bud-

dhist monasteries (and nunneries) and temple complexes were an integral component

of the aristocratic and oligarchic polity.

Drawing a modernist distinction between

‘‘secular’’ and ‘‘religious’’ is not particularly meaningful for the premodern era as a

whole, and can distract from the understanding of the integrated nature of lives

individual and institutional, but we may note that religion was consciously and

inextricably interwoven into national life. In general terms, one might understand

this institutional Buddhism as one of the two wheels of the vehicle of state (as

exemplified in the trope o

buppo

, law of the monarch and law of the Buddha).

MEDIEVAL JAPAN 53

That was also the understanding of warrior leaders when they came to power, until in

the late sixteenth century the unifier warlord Oda Nobunaga violently repudiated the

idea that religious institutions had any business being involved in secular politics (this

thus being one of the clear marke rs of the end of the medieval).

Two religious centers were actively involved in political matters: the Tendai esoteric

complex of Mt. Hiei outside Kyoto (destroyed by Nobunaga in 1571), and the

religious city of Nara in whi ch Ko

fukuji and To

daiji were dominant. A third center,

the Shingon esoteric center in the mountain fastness of Mt. Ko

ya, avoided political

controversy. There were of course many other temples throughout the country,

generally affiliated through a web of hierarchical and patronage relat ionships to

temples located in the capital and its immediate vicinity. Some individual temples,

such as To

ji in Kyoto, enjoyed a special position as protectors of the state, with direct

links to the imperial family itself.

Most temples enjoyed the support of families, including the imperial, within the

oligarchy; aristoctratic offspring not destined for public life were often placed in

temples and many of those offspring tended to rise to the top leadership positions

within temples. Temples enjoyed a wide array of tax exemptions, and held significant

rights in land – in trust or outright – throughout the country, to support their

endeavors. While there were a number of sects and teaching traditions represented

within Buddhism in Japan, and Buddhism as a whole was central to faith and practice ,

the esoteric schools of Tendai

and Shingon

were particularly well represented in

ritual practices and observances on behalf of state and aristocracy, and in attending to

a wide variety of spiritual and psychological needs. These esoteric schools were

understood as having the most powerful understandings of, conne ctions with, and

ability to harness the forces which underlay the cosmos. That Mt. Hiei and Mt. Ko

were dynamic centers of learning and interpretation reinforced that perception. It

may also be said that they enjoyed unparalle led respect fo r the depth, range, and

creativity of their intellectual output.

The second form of institutional ized Buddhism that focused upon the monastic life

was that of Zen Buddhism.

Zen stressed meditation and the quest for enlighten-

ment, and was essentially a thirteenth-century import from China – specifically, from

coastal south China and from the Yangtze River hinterland as far west as Sichuan

province.

Two Zen schools existed in the medieval era. The So

school, founded in Japan by

gen after his return from study in China, focused its activities at a provincial

headquarters, Eiheiji. The Rinzai school, which began its rise to national prominence

subsequent to the patr onage extended by the warrior leader Ho

Tokiyori to the

Chinese monk Lanxi Daolong, was both cosmopolitan and metropolitan. It exerted

an enormous cultural influence, and the ‘‘Zen culture’’ that is broadly associated with

Japanese tradition is a Rinzai product.

Rinzai monks traveled to China for study, Chinese monks emigrated to Japan, and

Rinzai monks in general made a concerted effort to imbibe and transmit a wide range

of contemporary Chinese culture. They introduced new styles in monastic architec-

ture, poetry, portrait painting, landscape and still-life painting, aesthetic engagement

and appreciation of Song-style Chinese pottery, forms of vegetarian cuisine, distinct-

ive dry gardens of pebble and rock, and laid the foundation fo r the emergence of the

art of the tea ceremony. All were considered integral to the religious life, and the arts

54 ANDREW EDMUND GOBLE

in particular were considered ways by which religious understanding might be

expressed. As a monastic enterprise, Rinzai was able to flourish because it enjoyed

widespread support among the political elite of all persuasions. That support was

solidified by the adoption of a Gozan or ‘‘Five Mountains’’ system by the Ashikaga

bakufu, which gave them official recognition and under which most Zen temples

were subsumed.

The focus of Zen training was the quest for enlightenment, and thus the ability to

see the true reality of all things. Enligh tenment and underst anding was the product

of individual effort, and it was as sumed that all humans were capable of discovering

their ‘‘Buddha nature.’’ Training stressed a rigorous course of meditation and bodily

denial, and was conducted under the (often direct) supervision of teachers who had

been recognized as having become enlightened. It was a basic assumption that an

individual’s enlightenment – an intangible and inexpressible phenomenon – could

be recognized only by one already in that state, and this understanding was encap-

sulated in the notion of ‘‘mind to mind’’ transmission of the truth. One notable

technique designe d to jolt seekers out of their accustomed mental framework into a

perception of the reality underlying all was the mental puzzle known as the ko

an,

which could be a brief ‘‘brain teaser’’ or a seemingly non-sequitur question about a

longer story.

Notions of salvation

One of the hallmarks of medieval religion is the appearance of teachings, directed

towards the general population , that stressed the notion of salvation.

The basic goal of Buddhism is to end the suffering entailed by the cycle of birth and

rebirth ( samsara) that is conditioned by the workings of karma (the notion that one’s

present condition is the consequence of prior acts, and that actions in the present will

have effects in the future, in this and in successive lives).

The monastic tradition of

Buddhism which provided the framework for the quest for enlightenment (attain-

ment of which connoted entry into the state of nirvana) that would break that cycle

of birth and rebirth implicitly assumed that the lay person would not reach enlight-

enment in this life. However, the development of the notion of the bodhisattva – a

being who had attained enlightenment but who chose to remain ‘‘in the world’’ to

assist humans – introduced the concept of salvation into Buddhism. Bodhisattvas, and

belief in their vows to assist people, thus offered an alternative to enlightenment in

the quest to escape samsara. In medieval Japan emphasis came to be placed upon two

component aspects of salvation: belief that one could be saved, and faith in an object

that would do the saving. The most widespread focus of belief was in the saving grace

of the Buddha of the Western Pure Land (Ami da Buddha),

but another influential

belief was in the text known as the Lotus Sutra (Hokekyo

Three factors lay behind

the growth of salvation-oriented religion.

First, the unattractive (for humans) possibilities of rebirth. The human was only

one of several realms of existence into which one could be reborn. Others included

that of hungry ghosts (destined to feed off human body products), animals, demons,

and a wide variety of hells whose punishments were interminable and graphically

explicated. People were enjoined to avoid behavior that might amass karma sufficient

to be reborn into such realms; there the suffering was liable to be even greater than

MEDIEVAL JAPAN 55

that which accompanied an existence as a human being. However, insofar as people

remained unenlightened, rebirth was definite; the future life could thus be frighten-

ing (even though in that future life one would have no memory of an earlier life).

Second, the dev elopment of the eschatological concept of the final ages (masse,

mappo

). While this concept became something of a trope in medieval culture, and

appears to have been given no credence by pursuers of Zen, it was powerfully

grounded. It was held that human ability to understand the truths of Buddhism,

and even understand that there were truths in Buddhism, had progressively declined

since the age of the historical Buddha Sakyamuni (Gautama). There were three stages

to this decline, which would end only when the Future Buddha would appear in the

world. People now lived in the final and most dismal stage of decline, and were

incapable of achieving their own enli ghtenment, and escaping the cycle of birth and

rebirth. Evidence to support the claim was adduced in such factors as the rise of the

warrior class in the form of the Kamakura bakufu, plagues and natural disasters, and

(it seems) in such things as the erosion of taxation and property systems, and the

increase in numbers of the visibly marginal in society (‘‘lepers,’’ beggars).

Third, powerful articulations of hope – important in a final age when otherwise

there was none – for lay people, put forward by a number of charismatic figures (such

being fairly unusual in Japanese history), whose messages were sufficiently appealing

that they evolved into lasting organized sects. Of these the Amidist sects springing

from Ho

nen and Shinran,

and the Lotus Sect springing from Nichiren,

are most

well known. Two elements of doctrine ar e noteworthy.

All three figures stressed that faith in the saving power of their respective focus of

belief was essential for salvation, but there was much debate over the extent to which

the ‘‘quality’’ of belief played a part in being saved. Ho

nen recommended constant

expression of belief since it was not known how much was enough to be saved;

Shinran argued that since the saving was done by Amid a and was granted to all the

individual’s efforts were not relevant – one utterance of belief should be enough

(others suggested that carrying a talisman of belief was suf ficient); Nichiren stressed

constant and conscious awareness of the power of the Lotus Sutra to save, and so

strength of belief was important. The reward for belief was that upon death the

believer would be conveyed to a heaven, a place beyond birth and rebirth where there

was no suffering and perpetual happin ess surrounded by one’s loved ones.

Another important aspect of doctrine was the positive confirmation that people of

any and every background could be reborn in heaven. That articulation was in

contrast to the idea that those in celibate holy orders had best, if not sole, claim to

achieving escape from samsara. It was also a direct repudiation of the well-entrenched

ideology that birth as a female carried its own karmic hindrances (the ‘‘five hin-

drances’’; a ‘‘deep and heavy evil karma’’; as carriers of life, women were more

attached to it), and that females needed a further rebirth in male form in order to

have best chance of escape. A further point was that people of any social station or

karmic background might be saved, and thus the more privileged in life enjoyed no

superior claim to salvation. Needless to say, these inclusive standpoints, which ad-

dressed the needs of and offered hope to any person, were well received. Though

doctrines argued that people would be saved irrespective of their social station, of

their existing karma, or even if they had committed acts of a negative karmic nature,

the message that ‘‘even the wicked will be saved’’ was not intended a s sanction for

56 ANDREW EDMUND GOBLE

anti-social behavior. Shinran’s analogy was that, just because one has an antidote, that

is not a reason to drink poison, and believers were encouraged to strive to act well.

In short, the salvation teachings powerfully addressed existential needs. They

emphasized as well the importance of communities of belief – whether generalized

or actual physical communities – that would provide positive support in an uncertain

world. The social collapse (or ferment) and warfare that marked the medieval era

enhanced the appeal of these sects, and indeed in the sixteenth century some religious

communities emerged as autonomous and powerful actors on the national political

stage. However, they too were dealt with by Nobunaga and his cont emporaries.

Some trends in research

The fundamental core of Buddhism is expressed in the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths.

Beyond that, there is no standard text of the kind that, for example, defines the God-

based monotheism of the Abrahamic religions. The Buddhist canon, a body of

literature produced in many countries and languages over a period of at least 2,000

years, and comprising well over 70,000 treatises, is immense. It represents a vibrant

intellectual engagement of doctrinal issues and doctrinal responses to social and

political is sues, is emblematic of the decentered nature of ‘‘Buddhism,’’ and reflects

(notably in Jap an) a tendency to eclecticism and fissuring. Scholarship on Buddhism

reflects this multiplicity, and so the following is meant as a general guide to three

approaches rather than as a comprehensive statement.

One area of research has focused on texts and matters of doctrine emerging from

those texts, and is usefully seen as study of Buddhist philosophy. Some texts, such as

those produced in India and available in Chinese translation, tended to be regarded as

important to the broader Buddhist tradition and not specific to Buddhism in Japan,

though by the sa me token they exercised a profound influence on the development of

Buddhism in Japan. Scholarly attention to these types of texts not only facilitated

engagement of Buddhist thought and philosophy, but, in an earlier era when the idea

of ‘‘philosophy’’ was equated with European traditions, and only the belief that

privileged a monotheistic God was considered to be ‘‘religion,’’ helped to establish

Buddhism as intellectually legitimate. In addition to study of works such as the

Lankavatara Sutra, Lotus Sutra, Blue Cliff Record, and the Pure Land Sutras, atten-

tion has been given to the works of foundational figures in Japanese schools, such as

Kukai, Saicho

, and Ho

nen. In a different vein, the writings of the Zen thinker Do

gen

have come to enjoy greater attention as profound philosophical reflections, even

though historically they were available to a comparatively small circle. We also note

engagement of broader ideas that were central to debate throughout the medieval

era, su ch as the eschatological notion of the ‘‘latter days’’ (mappo

), or the idea of

original enlightenment (hon gaku).

Another research approach has been to look at the development of schools,

teaching traditions, and at the spread of Buddhist teaching throughout the general

population (some of this was noted in the preceding section). Since the Kamakura

sects articulated new doctrinal interpretations, particularly relating to the ele ments of

lived religious life, they have often been regarded as the ‘‘new’’ Buddhism in contrast

to the ‘‘old’’ Buddhism, and in earlier scholarship their appearance was some-

times seen analogously as a ‘‘reformation’’ movement. Earlier study of the ‘‘new’’

MEDIEVAL JAPAN 57