Japan

1. Japan A Civilisation and a Religion

2. Japanese Syncretism (‘cultural blending of distinct religions’.) BUDDHISM SHINTO: ‘Way of the Gods'

3. Japanese Syncretism, con’t. BUDDHISM SHINTO

4. Cultural Exclusivity Thesis • Give every civilisation and religion the benefit of its own assumptions • Civilisation and religious chauvinism to assume that your civilisation has the One True universal understanding • Approach other civilisations, cultures, religions from the assumption that their fundamental values and understanding of the world is different from your own.

5. Western Civilisation Values • All civilisations and religions are fully explainable from Western premises and methods. • Western science is the universally-valid method of study. • All civilisations perceive the world—configure phenomena—identically, and in away that Western science can explain

6. Japanese Civilisation Assumptions • Intensely subjective • Context creates meaning • “demons chuckle when they hear us talk about next year.” • Passivity a virtue when connected with reflection • Æsthetics are more important than Logical systems. • Death is æstheticised in seppuku • Only slight exaggeration to say that Japan is an æsthetic. Japanese relations to each other—formalities, hierarchies, rituals—and to nature are æsthetic, • Japan’s æsthetic is their Religion

7. Japanese cultural assumptions: examples. • Western concept of symbolism: one thing signifies another type of thing. Platonic Forms; Judæo-Christian type-archetype; Freudian conscious-subconscious • Japan: this thing is associated with that experience or aspect. Non symbolic. • A lonely old tree is associated with—invokes—thoughts of age and loneliness. The meaning is in the person, not the object: an æsthetic approach to the world.

8. Japanese civilisation assumptions: examples con’t. • Western Art—the fuller the mind of the perceiver the better the Art is appreciated • Renaissance: Giorgione The Tempest • The painting is full of small and large details, and the viewer must have a mind filled will those details in order to understand it. • Japan—emptier & passive mind will better understand a painting. • Classical Japan: Hokusai, Under a Wave Off Kanagawa. • The painting gets its meaning from what is not there as much as from what is.

9. Western Painting: Giorgione, The Tempest

10. The Presence of Absence Hokusai: 神奈川沖浪裏 (Under a Wave Off Kanagawa)

11. Japan: mushin—’no-mind’ • Mushin is an intellectual, æsthetic & martial concept: • remove the conscious mind from getting in the way of understanding, appreciation and response. • Zen 禅那 : from zenna = a practice of meditation • Zen koan emphasise meditation on nothing (‘mu’) • Japanese martial arts work toward mushin as highest warrior state

12. mushin: 無心This zen state of mind is necessary for martial applications, such as tamashiwari—breaking wood or, as shown here, concrete.

13. Japan—Silence Complementing the value of absence, the Japanese also give high value in language & art to silence • Iwanu ga hana. Not-speaking is the flower (“Silence is golden.”) • “Silence” (1) • Chinmoku: kanji=“sink (down)” + “no-word.” • “Silence” (2) • Seijaku: “quietude” + “loneliness-sabiness” • (see ‘wabi-sabi’)