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Books > Humanities > Religion & beliefs > Non-Christian religions > Religions of Indic & Oriental origin > Buddhism
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From Sovereign to Symbol - An Age of Ritual Determinism in Fourteenth Century Japan (Hardcover, New)
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From Sovereign to Symbol - An Age of Ritual Determinism in Fourteenth Century Japan (Hardcover, New)
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Fourteenth-century Japan witnessed a fundamental political and
intellectual conflict about the nature of power and society, a
conflict that was expressed through the rituals and institutions of
two rival courts. Rather than understanding the collapse of Japan's
first warrior government (the Kamakura bakufu) and the onset of a
chaotic period of civil war as the manipulation of rival courts by
powerful warrior factions, this study argues that the crucial
ideological and intellectual conflict of the fourteenth century was
between the conservative forces of ritual precedent and the ritual
determinists steeped in Shingon Buddhism. Members of the monastic
nobility who came to dominate the court used the language of
Buddhist ritual, including incantations (mantras), gestures
(mudras), and "cosmograms" (mandalas projected onto the geography
of Japan) to uphold their bids for power. Sacred places that were
ritual centers became the targets of military capture precisely
because they were ritual centers. Ritual was not simply symbolic;
rather, ritual became the orchestration, or actual dynamic, of
power in itself. This study undermines the conventional wisdom that
Zen ideals linked to the samurai were responsible for the manner in
which power was conceptualized in medieval Japan, and instead
argues that Shingon ritual specialists prolonged the conflict and
enforced the new notion that loyal service trumped the merit of
those who simply requested compensation for their acts. Ultimately,
Shingon mimetic ideals enhanced warrior power and enabled Shogun
Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, rather than the reigning emperor, to assert
sovereign authority in Japan.
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