Views of Japan

Views of Japan you won't find in guide books!

In 2010 I had the pleasure of driving to Kyõto to visit the famous Temple of the Golden Pavilion which exhibits a wonderful example of a paradise garden. Paradise gardens became popular in the Heian period (794-1185) with the introduction of Chinese Pure Land Buddhism (Jōdo bukkyō). This is one of my favourite gardens in Japan, and although the golden pavilion itself is now a Zen temple, (when Yoshimitsu died, the building was converted into a Zen temple by his son according to his wishes) the garden still retains its original paradise garden layout and design. 

The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, Kinkaku-ji, was built in 1397 by the Ashikaga shõgun Yoshimitsu (1358-1408) himself a celebrated traditional garden designer. It was modelled on the Sheri-den at Saihoji (no longer extant). The site of Kinkaku-ji was originally a villa called Kitayama-dai, belonging to a powerful statesman, Saionji Kintsune. Set in an impressive strolling garden (kaiyū-shiki-teien) the grounds were built according to the Buddhist ideals of the Western Paradise of Amitābha Buddha, representing a harmony between heaven and earth. Such a paradise is not merely a concept, but believed to be an actual heavenly realm, a physical reality to believers in the Pure Land Buddhist faith.

Giving Buddhist believers a taste of the bliss that awaited them in the next world, paradise gardens contained pavilions standing among lotus ponds with specially contrived islands and promontories. In such a place it was believed the immortals passed their time in boats drifting among the blossoms to the accompaniment of beautiful music.

The pavilion is situated on a grand mirror pond (Kyōko-chi) which was originally connected to ancillary buildings by long roofed corridors. The pond has stone arrangements representing the nine mountains and eight seas of Chinese Buddhist/Taoist myth, with a small fishing deck (tsuri-dono) attached to the rear of the pavilion originally used for recreational boating.

The three-storey pavilion, mirrored in the large pond, now stands on the shore due to silting up over the centuries. During the Onin war (1467-1477) all of the ancillary buildings in the complex aside from the pavilion were burned down. Early in the morning on July 2nd 1950 the entire pavilion complex was burned to the ground by a 22-year-old monk, Hayashi Yoken, who then attempted suicide on the Daimon-ji hill behind the building. The replica of the pavilion that stands today was constructed in 1955 based on photographs and detailed plans.

The interesting feature to me is that from the pavilion the pond appears to be larger than it really is. This is achieved by some rather clever techniques. When a feeling of spaciousness and distance is sought, ponds are wider near the viewpoint and narrower further away. The presence of islands and land jutting out into the pond from the sides creates layers in a garden that increase its spaciousness. 

As well as elements getting smaller as they recede into the distance, they can also get bigger giving the effect of foreshortening distance. At Kinkaku-ji the grouping of small pines on an island are perceived as full-sized which exaggerates the width of the pond. Likewise, the view from the verandah has an important effect on the judgement of distance. As one looks out from the verandah across the pond, the ground immediately in front and below the verandah is cut off from view. This gives the effect that the pavilion is floating on the pond itself.

The pond is divided into two parts, with the inner part filled with many little rocks and islands providing interest, and the outer part is left empty which is only vaguely perceived in the distance. The division of the two parts is created by a peninsula jutting out from the shore together with a long island planted with pines that are pruned into shaped to provide scale. The shoreline is formed from groupings of fine stones that were similarly chosen for scale. Beyond the island in the outer part of the pond are a number of scattered islands purposely designed to be small to create an illusion of distance from the pavilion.

Most of the islands in the pond are turtle islands. Turtle islands are low in profile with smaller rocks placed to represent legs. One turtle island is partnered with a crane island. The crane island was constructed merely from a group of medium-height rocks with flat tops rather than the usual vertical rock placement of other gardens and ponds. There are four stones that form an almost straight line in the pond quite near the pavilion which represent boats bound for the Isle of Eternal Life in Chinese Buddhist/Taoist mythology.

On the hillside to one side of the pavilion is a Dragon Gate cascade with the famous carp stone at its base which was constructed in the 13th century. As the tale goes, the stone is beginning its ascent to dragonhood.

The swords and spears of the Buddha #4

In 1013 the risshi (teacher) monk named Kaiju from the Enryaku temple, high on Mount Hiei overlooking Kyõto, led a band of fifty heavily armed monks into the grounds of another compound also on Mount Hiei. 

Dressed in full armour and armed with bows and arrows, swords and glaives, Kaiju and his band of monks destroyed thousands of Tendai sutras that had been imported from China along with several Buddhist statues. After chasing out Henkyu and his monks they set fire to his temple hall, burning it to the ground. Kaiju and his band of warrior monks then set up a perimeter around Henkyu’s compound, placing bonfires at all the corners to eliminate the advantage of darkness, and when Henkyu’s monks returned they were shot at and driven from the mountain. 

The reason for this attack? 

Kaiju claimed that Henkyu, an ajari (master), was performing curses against him! Kaiju had an inkling that curses were being used against him when he fell ill during a magical incantation to call upon Dainichi Nyorai (Mahāvairocana, the celestial Buddha). 

Henkyu was a master genjutsushi or master of genjutsu. Genjutsu is magic based on the teachings of Mikkyõ (secret, hidden magical Buddhism). Henkyu had earlier that year shown a vision to the monks of a man in hell being gruesomely tortured! 

Kaiju was convinced that Henkyu had a grudge against him and had put a magical spell on him. He swore to use force against any monk who dared use the methods of genjutsu against him.

Buddhaspeak of the Japanese Buddhist priests pt. one

When Japanese Buddhist priests talk among themselves in a situation which could be easily overheard, they use a coded slang system peppered with religious terms and boisterous x-rated slang that the uninitiated would have no idea of the meaning of. As it turns out, the slang of the Japanese clergy is the oldest form of slang spoken in Japan today.

I found Buddhist slang to be the liveliest of the systems of Japanese slang in Japan, even more so than that used by the Yakuza.

Full of cryptic religious metaphors and classical naughty puns, even experts of Japanese slang are left scratching their heads. Many terms are centuries old and taken from ancient Buddhist texts, designed to also have a religious meaning.

It came as something of a shock to me when I started out in Japanese Buddhism that the various respected Buddhist sects have their own highly developed slang designed to disguise their materialistic ways. As Buddhists we were expected to renounce worldly ways and shun the pleasures of the world. Not so the Japanese!

Everything from women and sex, to money and whoring. There are secret terms and codes for it all!

Some of the more common slang terms I came across were:

kishiko (place of truth) for toilet,

moku (eyes) for money,

ryõgyaku (spiritual globes) for testicles,

nazu (caressing) for bondage,

kotsuen hokki (sudden enlightenment) for erection,

bodai no gokui (ultimate stage of enlightenment) for ejaculation,

hibutsu (hidden Buddhas) for vagina,

bonnon (Brahma’s voice) for screaming out during sex,

koan (Buddhist riddles) for kissing,

jõgyõ (pure practice) for sexual relations with only the one same male partner,

and geten (non-Buddhist texts) for pornography. 

The Japanese priests penchant for little boys has a highly developed system of slang surrounding it too. I think there are probably more terms relating to sexual interactions with young boys than any other subject. Zennanshi (nice young boy) is the most common slang term for a Buddhist priest’s young male lover. A sexually active priest is called a zokubutsu (worldly Buddha) and he might take part in nembutsu, or chanting to the Buddha, (masterbation) with his young boys. A young boys penis wet with sperm is called a nurebotoke (wet Buddha). Jõdõ (entering the priests hall for a meal) means oral sex with a young boy. Then there is sandõ (three roads of transmigration) for oral, anal and masterbation with a young boy.

The best one of all is when a priest is termed a bakebotoke (transformed Buddha). I used to think it had a true religious meaning until I learned that it mean’t a priest who wears women’s underwear under his robes or dresses in drag during his breaks!

The Japanese and the afterlife. Casually called shigo no sekai (the world after death) or more commonly Yomi no kuni (the land of darkness) the Japanese believed from early times that there is a place where the “souls” of the dead dwell. Floating around in a kind of limbo. The traditional Shintõ belief is that “souls” of the dead float about and gradually lose their individuality and then, after the 33rd anniversary of their death, they merge completely with the “souls” of their ancestors in the death realm. These souls are then able to keep watch over living people, and they are believed to be able to visit their descendants on earth over the New Year holiday season and also during the Obon period when a link is opened between this world and world of the dead. Traditional Buddhism taught the idea of reincarnation/rebirth and the Japanese adapted this to fit in with their belief in “souls.” Buddhism introduced the idea that a person may be reborn into one of many possible realms, and this is held by some Buddhist sects. The predominant Japanese Buddhist belief though is that various hell realms exist, not unlike the Christian/Greek notion, and that in contrast a heavenly realm known as the Buddha’s Pure Land also exists.  Most Japanese believe that during the 49 days after a person has died, known as the “Period of Intermediate Existence” (not unlike the Christian idea of purgatory), the “souls” of the dead pass through mountains and then cross a river (Sanza no kawa) before being judged by the Buddhist god Emma (in the photo above) and assigned to a new realm for their next life. 

The Japanese and the afterlife.

Casually called shigo no sekai (the world after death) or more commonly Yomi no kuni (the land of darkness) the Japanese believed from early times that there is a place where the “souls” of the dead dwell. Floating around in a kind of limbo.

The traditional Shintõ belief is that “souls” of the dead float about and gradually lose their individuality and then, after the 33rd anniversary of their death, they merge completely with the “souls” of their ancestors in the death realm.

These souls are then able to keep watch over living people, and they are believed to be able to visit their descendants on earth over the New Year holiday season and also during the Obon period when a link is opened between this world and world of the dead.

Traditional Buddhism taught the idea of reincarnation/rebirth and the Japanese adapted this to fit in with their belief in “souls.” Buddhism introduced the idea that a person may be reborn into one of many possible realms, and this is held by some Buddhist sects.

The predominant Japanese Buddhist belief though is that various hell realms exist, not unlike the Christian/Greek notion, and that in contrast a heavenly realm known as the Buddha’s Pure Land also exists. 

Most Japanese believe that during the 49 days after a person has died, known as the “Period of Intermediate Existence” (not unlike the Christian idea of purgatory), the “souls” of the dead pass through mountains and then cross a river (Sanza no kawa) before being judged by the Buddhist god Emma (in the photo above) and assigned to a new realm for their next life. 

Buddhist monk = death

If the first person you meet after you wake up in the morning is a Buddhist monk, you can expect a death in the family very soon. This is a common Japanese belief based on the fact that Buddhism is a cult of death and Buddhist monks only officiate at funerals. 

As a monk, I remember when I went to the hospital for the birth of our second son in my robes, I was side-stepped by many at the hospital. I was asked by several nurses which death I was attending at the hospital and a doctor asked me if my son had died.

I even once saw elderly people hide their thumbs when I passed! Apparently one should hide their thumbs when a monk goes by or a hearse passes - lest a parent die! 

Buddhism is associated only with death in Japan. Probably why you’ll rarely see a monk smiling. Unless of course he has just won at pachinko or been paid for a funeral service.

Starting a new religion

My Thai neighbour just said to me, “It’s so easy to start a new religion here in Japan and get thousands of followers! All you need is a funky statue, some white clothes, and a garden spouting water! The Japanese will believe anything you tell them without asking a single question! The more complex it is, with rituals and magical incantations, the more they’ll buy into it.” And she is right. There are hundreds of crazy religious groups here in Japan with all manner of weird beliefs. Many are just a new take on older Buddhist cults, some are mixtures of new-age crystal crap. The freedom of religion act means that anyone can start a new religion and get tax exemption easily.