Читать книгу The Making of Modern Japan - John Harington Gubbins - Страница 5

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There is much speculation, but no certainty, regarding the origin of the Japanese people. It is, however, generally held that the Japanese race is made up of two main elements—one Mongolian, which came to Japan from Northern Asia by way of Korea, and the other Malayan; a third strain being possibly supplied to some small extent by the Ainu aborigines, whom the invaders found in occupation of the country. The prevailing type of feature is Mongolian, though scientific research claims to have discovered traces of the physical characteristics of other Asiatic races.

If the earliest Japanese records provide little trustworthy material for the historian, they show how the legendary heroes of oral tradition became in the hands of successive chroniclers the deified ancestors of the reigning dynasty, and indicate the process of transition by which the feelings of respect and admiration they inspired developed into a popular belief in the quasi-divinity of Japanese Sovereigns. It is in this no-man’s-land, where no clear boundaries divide fable from history, that we are from the first confronted with the primitive native religion, and realize its weakness as a civilizing influence. From these same records, nevertheless, as well as from scanty Chinese sources, we glean certain general facts bearing on the early development of Japan. Chinese culture is seen trickling in at a very early date; we hear of the adoption at some time in the fifth century of Chinese ideographs, the Japanese following in this respect the example of their Korean neighbours, who, like themselves, had originally no written language of their own; and we learn of the introduction of Buddhism a century later. The advent of Buddhism was a notable factor in Japan’s progress. Its missionaries assisted the spread of the Chinese written language, and thus paved the way for the introduction in A.D. 645 of what is known as the Great Reform.

The Great Reform gave its name to the first year-period of Japanese chronology, and to Japanese history its first certain date. It was the outcome of a movement having for its object the repair of the authority of the Throne, which had been weakened by the separatist tendencies of the Sōga family. The new form of government then established, in imitation of changes made under the T’ang dynasty in China, was a centralized bureaucracy. The supreme control of affairs was vested in the Council of State. In this Council the Prime Minister presided, and with him were associated the two assistant Ministers of State and the President of the Privy Council. Of the eight Boards, or Departments of State, five dealt mainly, but by no means exclusively, with matters relating to Ceremonial, Religion, the Army, Finance and Taxation respectively; the other three having the direction of business connected more immediately with the Imperial Court. There seems, however, to have been no very clear-cut division of business, Court interests being apparently mixed up with the affairs of every department. This change in the form of government was only one of many results caused by the inrush of Chinese ideas at this time. The influence of the wave of Chinese culture which swept over the country permeated every part of the national fabric, remodelling the social system, and laying the foundations of Japanese law, education, industries and art.

Later on provision was made for the establishment of a regency during the minority of a reigning Sovereign, the regent (Sesshō) by virtue of his office ranking at the head of the official hierarchy. When the regency expired, the ex-regent assumed the title of Kwambaku (or Sesshō-Kwambaku), retaining his official precedence. The two posts were subsequently separated, and, like all other Court offices, became, as the authority of the Court declined, mere honorary titles. Both posts and honorary titles were hereditary in certain branches of the Fujiwara family, the only exception to this rule occurring in the sixteenth century.

It was not till the eighth century that the Japanese elaborated a written language of their own. The Koreans had done so already, but the two written languages thus superadded to what was borrowed from China have nothing in common. That of the Japanese consists of two different scripts, each adapted from Chinese characters. The Korean script bears no resemblance to Chinese. Both countries have good reason to regard as a very doubtful blessing the possession of two spoken and two written languages.

At this early stage in Japanese history three things stand out prominently: the welcome given to foreign ideas; the duality of religion and language; and the curious atmosphere of divinity surrounding the Throne, which by an easy process of transition came to be regarded by the people as a natural attribute of their country and of themselves. It is not surprising, therefore, to find in the development of Japan two opposite tendencies constantly at work—the assimilation of new ideas from abroad, and reaction in favour of native institutions. Together with the readiness to adopt foreign ideas, to which the seventh century bears such striking witness, there existed an intense national pride—a belief in the superiority of Japan, “the country of the Gods,” to all other lands. The existence of these two contrary currents of popular feeling, in which religion, politics and language all play their part, may be traced through the whole course of Japanese history.

The strengthening of the Throne’s authority, which was effected by the Great Reform, lasted but a short time, the ruling power soon passing again into the hands of another powerful family, the House of Fujiwara. But the centralized bureaucratic form of government borrowed from China survived, and with it the fiction of direct Imperial rule.

During the long ascendancy, covering more than three centuries, of the House of Fujiwara the Sovereigns, despite their assumption of the recognized titles of Chinese Emperors, sank into the position of mere puppets, removable at the will of the patrician rulers. It is important to note, however, that neither the nominal authority of the occupant of the Throne nor the power of the de facto Government during this period, and for many years after, extended much beyond the centre of Japan. The loyalty of district governors in the south and west was regulated by their distance from the seat of administration. To the north and east, again, the country was in the possession of the Ainu aborigines, with whom a desultory warfare was carried on until their eventual expulsion to the northern island of Yezo.

Early in the twelfth century the Fujiwara régime came to an end. The succeeding administrators were members of the Taira family, which had gradually risen to importance, and wielded the predominant influence in the country. Fifty years later their position was successfully challenged by the rival House of Minamoto, which, like its two predecessors, could claim royal descent. The long struggle between these two houses ended in the final overthrow of the Taira family in the sea battle of Dan-no-Ura (A.D. 1155) and the establishment of the feudal system, in other words, of a military government.

Yoritomo, the Minamoto leader, who then rose to power, received from the Court the title of Shōgun (or General), a contraction of the fuller appellation Sei-i-Tai-Shōgun. This may be rendered Barbarian-quelling Generalissimo, and was the term originally applied to generals employed in fighting the Ainu aborigines in the North-Eastern marches. With the assumption of this title the term itself developed a new meaning, for it was not as the general of an army that he thenceforth figured, but as the virtual ruler of Japan. His advent to power marks a new phase in Japanese history, the inception of a dual system of government based on feudalism, which lasted, except for a short period in the sixteenth century, until modern times.

With the establishment of a military government the classification of society was changed. Thenceforth there were three recognized divisions of the people—the Kugé, or Court aristocracy, constituting the former official hierarchy, which, becoming more and more impoverished as the connection of its members with the land ceased, gradually sank into the position of a negligible factor in the nation; the Buké, or military class, which included both daimiōs and their retainers, and out of which the new official hierarchy was formed; and the Minké, or general public, which comprised farmers, artizans and tradesmen, or merchants, ranking in the order named.

Feudalism was no sudden apparition. It was no mushroom growth of a night. The importance of the military class had been growing steadily during the prolonged civil strife from which the Minamoto family had emerged victorious. This and the increasing weakness of the Government had brought about a change in provincial administration. Civil governors, dependent on the Capital, had gradually given place to military officials, with hereditary rights, who looked elsewhere for orders; manorial estates were expanding into territories with castles to protect them; and local revenues no longer flowed with regularity into State coffers. Thus in more than one manner the way had been prepared for feudalism.

The same may be said of the dual system of administration, though here the question is less simple. From all that history tells us, and from its even more eloquent silence, there is good reason to question the existence at any time of direct Imperial rule. We hear of no Mikado ever leading an army in the field, making laws or dispensing justice, or fulfilling, in fact, any of the various functions associated with sovereignty, save those connected with public worship. This absence of personal rule, this tendency to act by proxy, is in keeping with the atmosphere of impersonality which pervades everything Japanese, and is reflected in the language of the people. Everything tends to confirm the impression that the prestige of sovereignty in Japan thus lay rather in the institution itself than in the personality of the rulers. The casual manner in which succession was regulated; the appearance on the Throne of Empresses in a country where little deference was paid to women; the preference repeatedly shown for the reign of minors; the laisser-aller methods of adoption and abdication; the easy philosophy which saw nothing unusual in the association of three abdicated, or cloistered, monarchs with a reigning sovereign; and the general indifference of the public to the misfortunes which from time to time befel the occupant of the Throne, all point in the same direction—the withdrawal of the Sovereign at an early date from all active participation in the work of government. In so far, therefore, as the personal rule of the Sovereign was concerned it seems not unreasonable to regard the dual system of government established at this time as the formal recognition of what already existed. Its association with feudalism, however, brought about an entirely new departure. Kiōto, indeed, continued to be the national capital. There the former Ministers of State remained with all the empty paraphernalia of an officialdom which had ceased to govern. But a new seat of administration was set up at Kamakura, to which all men of ability were gradually attracted. Thenceforth the country was administered by a military government directed by the Shōgun at Kamakura, while the Sovereign lived in seclusion in the Capital, surrounded by a phantom Court, and an idle official hierarchy.

In this question of government there is still something further to be explained. It should be understood that the Shōgun did not personally rule any more than the Mikado. What for want of a better name may be termed the figure-head system of government is noticeable throughout the whole course of Japanese history. Real and nominal power are rarely seen combined either socially or politically. The family, which is the unit of society, is nominally controlled by the individual who is its head. But practically the latter is in most cases a figure-head, the real power being vested in the group of relatives who form the family council. The same principle applied to the administration of feudal territories. These were not administered by the feudal proprietors themselves. The control was entrusted to a special class of hereditary retainers. Here again, however, the authority was more nominal than real, the direction of affairs being left, as a rule, to the more active intelligence of retainers of inferior rank. Similarly the Shōgun was usually a mere puppet in the hands of his Council, the members of which were in turn controlled by subordinate office-holders. This predilection for rule by proxy was encouraged by the customs of adoption and abdication, the effects of which, as regards Mikado and Shōgun alike, were seen in shortness of reign, or administration, and the frequency of the rule of minors.

The highly artificial and, indeed, contradictory character which distinguished all Japanese administration had certain advantages. Abdication was found to be not incompatible in practice with an active, though unacknowledged, supervision of affairs. It also provided a convenient method of getting rid of persons whose presence in office was for any reason inconvenient. In a society, too, where adoption was the rule rather than the exception the failure of a direct heir to the Throne, or Shōgunate, presented little difficulty. It was a thing to be arranged by the Council of State, just as in less exalted spheres such matters were referred to the family council. Questions of succession were thus greatly simplified. In this contradiction, moreover, between appearance and reality, in the retention of the shadow without the substance of power, lay the strength of both monarchy and Shōgunate. It was, in fact, the secret of their stability, and explains the unbroken continuity of the dynasty on which the nation prides itself. Under such a system the weakness or incompetence of nominal rulers produced no violent convulsions in the body politic. The machinery of government worked smoothly on, unaffected by the personality of those theoretically responsible for its control; and as time went by the tendency of office to divorce itself from the discharge of the duties nominally associated with it increased everywhere, with the result that in the last days of the Shōgunate administrative policy was largely inspired at the seat of government by subordinate officials, and in the clans by retainers of inferior standing.

The question of dual government, which has led to this long digression, was more or less of a puzzle to foreigners from the time when Jesuit missionaries first mistook Shōguns for Mikados; and it was not until after the negotiation of the first treaties with Western Powers that it was discovered that the title of Tycoon given to the Japanese ruler in these documents had been adopted for the occasion, in accordance with a precedent created many years before, in order to conceal the fact that the Shōgun, though ruler, was not the Sovereign.