Rare days in Japan

by George Trumbull Ladd

“In Eastern skies Something appears; its eight sides raised aloft;

But all of them enveloped thick with mist and smoke, drunk in and out.

Last night, at watch the third, I dreamed it as a mountain lotus-shaped;

And shrouded in black cloud a golden dragon flying high.”

Only a part, however, of the object of this excursion had been accomplished when we had been entertained at the Monastery of Ikegami. I particularly wished to become acquainted with the work of my pupil, Mr. Shibata, who after his return from his studies in this country had succeeded in founding a college for the young priests of the Nichiren sect in such manner as to fit them for usefulness under conditions belonging to the moral and religious development of the “New Japan.” Immediately after the luncheon, accordingly, we begged leave to depart; and this granted, we bade good-bye to the kindly, sincere, and simple-hearted abbot with feelings of respect and affection. The jinrikishas took us to “Nichiren College” over a road, which for much of the way was little more than a foot-path through the fields. The buildings of the college are seated on a hill about a half-mile from the station at Osaki and occupy at present some 3500 tsubo (a tsubo is 6 ft. by 6 ft.) of ground. They are all new and well adapted to their collegiate uses, being constructed in modified Japanese style. Since the advertised hour of the address had already passed, we went to the chapel at once; and here I spoke to about two hundred young priests and theological students on “The Personal Qualifications for a Minister of Religion.” The address was in no important respect different from that which would be suitable on the same subject for an audience of theological students in England or the United States; nor did its reception and appropriation seem any less thorough and sincere.

After inspecting the work in drawing and water-colours of which—so the posted notice read—“An Exhibition is given in honour of ——,” Mrs. Ladd returned to Tokyo; but I remained to carry out my purpose of spending a full day and night among my priestly Buddhist friends. In our many confidential talks while we were in the relations of teacher and pupil, the latter had avowed his life-work to be the moral reform and improved mental culture of the priesthood of his sect. It had then seemed to me a bold, even an audacious undertaking. But seeming audacity was quite characteristic of the youth of all those very men who now, in middle life and old-age, are holding the posts of leadership in Japan in a way to conserve the best results of the earlier period of more rapid change. Besides, I knew well that my pupil had the necessary courage and devotion; for he was not only a priest but also a soldier, and had been decorated for his bravery in the Chino-Japanese war. And again, toward the close of the Russo-Japanese war, when he had been called out with the reserves, he had once more left the position of priestly student and teacher to take his place at arms in the defence of his country.

How wholesome and thoroughly educative of their whole manhood was the training which was being given to these young temple boys, I had abundant reason to know before leaving the Nichiren College at Osaki. After tea and welcome-addresses by one of the teachers and two of the pupils, followed by a response by the guest, an exhibition of one side of this training was given in the large dining-hall of the school. For as it was in ancient Greece, so it is now in Japan; arms and music must not be neglected in the preparation to serve his country of the modern Buddhist priest. Sword-dancing—one of the chants which accompanied the action being Saigo’s celebrated “death song”—and a duet performed upon a flute and a harp constructed by the performer out of split bamboo and strings of silk, followed by banzais for their guest, concluded the entertainment.

Of the nine who sat down to dinner that evening in a private room belonging to another building of the school, four besides the host were priests of the Nichiren sect. They constituted the body of the more strictly religious or theological instructors; the courses in literature and the sciences being taught for the most part by professors from the Imperial University or from the private university founded by Japan’s great teacher of youth, the late Mr. Fukuzawa. Of the priests the most conspicuous and communicative was proud to inform me that he had been the chaplain of General Noghi at the siege of Port Arthur. With reference to the criticisms passed at the time upon that great military leader he said with evident emotion that General Noghi was “as wise as he was undoubtedly brave.” This same priest had also interesting stories to tell of his experiences in China. In speaking of the ignorance of the teachers of religion in that country he declared, that of the hundreds of Tâoist priests he had met, the vast majority could not even read the Chinese ideographs when he wrote them; and none of the numbers he had known could make any pretence to scholarship. They were quite universally ignorant, superstitious, and physically and morally filthy. Among the Buddhist priests in China, however, the case was somewhat better; for perhaps three or four in every ten could make some pretence of education; and there were even a very few who were real scholars. But neither Tâoists nor Buddhists had much influence for good over the people; and “priest, priest,” was a cry of insult with which to follow one. As to their sincerity, at one of the Tâoist temples he had asked for meat and wine, but had been told that none could be had, because they abstained religiously from both. But when he replied that he had no scruples against either, but needed them for his health and wished to pay well for them, both were so quickly produced he knew they could not have come from far away. (I may remark in this connection that if the experiences and habits of the Chinese in Manchuria resemble at all closely the experiences and customs of the Koreans in their own country, the unwillingness to furnish accommodations to travelling strangers is caused rather by the fear of having them requisitioned without pay than to any scruples, religious or otherwise, as to what they themselves eat and drink or furnish to others for such purposes).

The same subject which had been introduced at the priests-house, on occasion of the all-night festival at Ikegami, was now brought forward again. What had been my impressions received from the spectacle witnessed at that time? When to the inquiry I made a similar answer,—namely, that only a portion of the vast crowd seemed to be sincere worshippers, but that with the exception of a few rude young men in the procession, who appeared to have had too much saké, I saw no immoral or grossly objectional features—all the priests expressed agreement with my views. Where the superstitions connected with the celebration were not positively harmful, it was the policy of the reforming and progressive party of the sect to leave them to die away of themselves as the people at large became more enlightened.

After a night of sound sleep, Japanese fashion, on the floor of the study in my pupil’s pretty new home, we rose at six and hastened across the fields to attend the morning religious services in the chapel of the school. Here for a full half-hour, or more, what had every appearance of serious and devout religious worship was held by the assembled teachers and pupils. All were neatly dressed in black gowns; no evidences of having shuffled into unbrushed garments, with toilets only half-done or wholly neglected, were anywhere to be seen, nor was there the vacant stare, the loud whisper, the stolen glance at newspaper or text-book; but all responded to the sutras and intoned the appointed prayers and portions of the Scriptures, while the time was accented by the not too loud beating of a musical gong. Certainly, the orderliness and apparent devotion quite exceeded that of any similar service at “morning prayers” in the average American college or university.