Exhibition of Obaku Calligraphy at St. Louis Art Museum

I am so glad meeting Philip Hu on Facebook. He pointed to me an exhibition of Obaku calligraphy at St. Louis Art Museum which he is curating. It will be there until Feb. 22, 2015. Go to see it. Here is the weblink to the exhibition and a few shots Philip sent to me. 

Calligraphy in Chinese and Japanese Art

September 12, 2014–February 22, 2015

Gallery 225

Meeting my editor

I am so glad to meet my editor Marcela Maxfield at AAR. Great job!

Yinyuan and Chinese Music in Edo Japan

A few weeks ago, Prof. Yang Kuei-hsiang 楊桂香 from Taiwan kindly shared with me her published  paper on Weishi yuepu魏氏樂譜, which was a collection of music notes by the Wei (Gi) family in Japan, commonly known as Mr. Gi's music book in the West. (See Britten Dean's article "Mr Gi's Music Book: An Annotated Translation of Gi Shimei's Gi-shi Gakufu.").

One theory is that this collection represented the repertoire of late Ming literati music sung by students in Confucian Academies, as stipulated by Wang Yangming 王阳明 and his followers when they revived the tradition of Confucian education. In her article, Prof. Yang argues that it represents the best of Chinese court music and has overlaps with Zhu Xi and Zhu Zhaiyu's works. The music was brought to Japan because the Wei family was closely connected to the Southern Ming court in exile. Prof. Yang's paper is entitled 魏双侯は日本に齎した中国の宮廷音楽を再考察:
―『魏氏楽譜』六巻本と朱載堉『楽律全書』と朱熹『儀礼経伝通解』との関連を踏まえて, which is published in Obaku bunka 黄檗文化, 2014.

This reminds me about Yinyuan's connection with Chinese music in Japan. In Yinyuan's poems, there are many allusions to music. Of course, he did not play music. However, because of his connection with the Wei family, he must have opportunities to attend one of Wei's concerts. I briefly discussed the Wei family's connection to music in page 107 in my book.

Because of this connection, couple years ago, we tried to revive some of the music preserved in Weishi yuepu. We picked Xin Qiji's 辛弃疾 Green Jade Cup (Qingyuan 青玉案) for trial. It was not a great performance. But this is truly the late Ming music of elegance and we love it.

Zheng Chenggong Cult in Japan (1)

Because the connection between Yinyuan and Zheng Chenggong, I went to Hirado last summer to visit Zheng's birth place. Unfortunately I missed a major festival honoring Zheng. However, I was lucky that a new memorial museum just opened to the public a few months before. There appears to be a strong interest in the local area.

Zheng Chenggong festival in Hirado, photo by Jiang Wu

Statue of Zheng Chenggong and his Japanese mother in front of Zheng Chenggong memorial museum, photo by Jiang Wu

Yinyuan's Secret Mission to Japan

Was Yinyuan a secret envoy to Japan on behalf of Zheng Chenggong to request military aid? Chapter Four of my book seems to be a crucial because I tried to offer a new explanation of his role in Sino-Japanese relation. I wrote a short abstract for this chapter.

This chapter offers a new interpretation of Yinyuan’s success in Japan by situating his arrival into the bakufu’s agenda of establishing a Japan-centered world order. The first part of the chapter analyzes the coincidental meeting between Yinyuan and the 1655 Korean embassy at Osaka and the relation between his audience with the shogun and the rejection of Zheng Chenggong’s request for military aid in 1658. Highlighting a series of measures the bakufu took to promote Manpukuji, such as requesting Chinese abbots’ regular audiences with the shogun, this chapter argues that Yinyuan and his Manpukuji had been institutionalized as representing the role of China in a Japan-centered world order.


 I first published this chapter in Journal of East Asian History as "Taikun's Zen Master from China: Yinyuan, the Tokugawa Bakufu, and the Founding of Manpukuji in 1661", which is downloadable from the journal's website. This paper is also translated into Chinese and will be incorporated in a conference volume based on a meeting at Fudan University in 2013. Recently, I presented this chapter in the summer of 2014 at Institute of World History of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Prof. Xu Jianxin 徐建新 is so nice to write a report for it. (He is an expert of Gwanggaeto Stele 好太王碑.) The original report can be accessed from the following link. But I pasted the Chinese text below for those who can read Chinese.

Lecture at Institute of World History of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

‘大君外交’下的中国禅僧”学术报告会

2014年09月22日 14:07 来源：中国世界史研究网 作者：徐建新

2014年8月21日，世界历史研究所古代中世纪史研究室举办学术报告会，主讲人为美国亚利桑那大学东亚系的吴疆副教授，他报告的题目是“‘大君外交’下的中国禅僧：隐元、德川幕府以及1661年万福寺的成立”。吴疆在报告中指出，十七世纪的东亚地区经历了深刻的文化和社会变革。以往国际学术界对这一历史过程已有深入的研究。但是迄今为止，很少有人探讨中国明清时期的佛教在这个过程中所起的作用。报告以中国赴日禅僧隱元隆琦(1592–1673年)的活动为线索，论述了隐元隆琦及其弟子东渡日本，他们所创造的黄檗宗和具有浓郁中国特色的黄檗文化对江户时代的日本乃至整个东亚地区产生的重要影响。

　　吴疆指出，隐元于1654年到达长崎。仅仅一年之后，他便被邀请到现在大阪附近的普門寺。这一举动明显违反幕府将华人限制在长崎的法令。在普门寺几年后，也就是1658年的冬天，隐元被请到江户（东京），受到第四代将军德川家纲和大老酒井忠胜的接见，成为德川幕府建立以来正式接见的第一位中国人。两年以后，也就是1660年, 在酒井忠胜的斡旋下，幕府允许隐元常驻日本，并在京都宇治太和山赐地建立萬福寺。从此以后，中国僧人担任萬福寺住持成为惯例。他们与当时朝鲜通信史和琉球使节一样，在将军即位时奉令到江户觐见祝贺。

　　吴疆认为，不应把隱元的角色局限在禅学佛教世界，而应将他置于一个更为宽广的政治和国际的环境背景中来加以观察。为了解释隱元非凡的成功, 必须要仔细地探討早期德川幕府官僚政治的转变和以“日本为中心的世界秩序”的形成。

　　在十七世纪，“日本型华夷意识”的新心态开始在日本的政治家和知识份子之間显現, 这种意识以排斥中国为中心的朝贡体系的统治为特征。这个新世界的秩序 主要是以日本和朝鮮的外交关系为主，其次是以和琉球虚构的“外国”关系为基础。为了这个目的, 在对邻近国家所有的外交文件中, 幕府创造了一个新的外交名词来称呼将军: 那就是“大君”。这个“大君外交”的意识形态基础是僭夺了中國“华夷之辩”的论述话语并將中国中心主义的意涵剥离，而代之以 “神國”的日本民族主义理念。在这种形势下, 在幕府的眼中, 隱元不单单只是一个有成就的禅師，同時也是一个来自中国的代表, 如果考虑到自从16世紀中期以後, 中日之間已經沒有正式的外交关系的事实, 他的存在對日本来說是象征性的寓意。可以看出，中国在幕府的潛意识中佔有非常重要的地位，日本在它所想要建立的新世界的秩序中需要有中國的存在和參與。

　　吴疆指出，隐元在日本的活动揭示出他在日本所产生的影响已经远远超出了宗教上的意义。他的到来正值江户幕府大力推行“大君外交”之时。在这样的国际背景下，隐元具有了特殊的身份。他不但是宗教领袖，还在某种程度上扮演者来自大陆的使者的身份，他和朝鲜通信史一样，满足了日本脱离中原王朝朝贡体系并建立以日本为中心的东亚秩序的迷思。但是这一新体系的构想是建筑在从东亚传统华夷思想基础上产生的日本型华夷意识之上的。

　　在吴疆的报告之后，与会者围绕江户时代的中日关系、日本的“大君外交”、江户时代日本佛教的研究方法等问题进行了热烈的讨论。

报告会由刘健研究员主持，古代中世纪史研究室的全体科研人员和部分所内外科研人员参加了报告会。

Portrait of Buddhist Monks of the Obaku Sect at Cleveland Art Museum

Portrait of Yueshan Daozong

Recently, Prof. Susan Huang at Rice University pointed to me an interesting group portrait of Obaku patriarchs in the collection of Cleveland Art Museum. I immediately examined the image posted on their website and ordered a print for study. According to the website, this group portrait was acquired in 2003. The inscription has the painter's name Nanyue Yueshan 南嶽悅山  and two seals: Yueshan 悅山 and Daozong 道宗. It is clear that this work was painted by the Chinese monk Yueshan Daozong (1629-1709), who was the seventh abbot of Manpukuji and a dharma heir of Mu'an Xingtao 木庵性瑫. He was known as a good calligrapher. But it is rarely known that he was good at portrait painting as well. It is still not clear who were these monks, Chinese, Japanese, or mixed? I have to wait until I receive a better image of this interesting picture. His name was mentioned in my book but only in a passing way.

Portrait of Buddhist Monks of Obaku Sect

Portrait of Buddhist Monks of Obaku Sect from Cleveland Art Museum

The New Release day of my book is Nov. 15

Today, the project manager at Newgen KnowledgeWorks informed me that my book Leaving for the Rising Sun now goes to production and the new release day is Nov. 15, a month earlier than the projected release day. A few months ago, the promotion department at Oxford University Press had told me that the book is going to come out earlier and will be available at AAR. This turns out to be true. I must say I now have a very positive view about outsourcing publishing works to companies such as Newgen KnowledgeWorks, which is very professional, punctual, and transparent. The author was informed in the beginning about the publication plan which had been followed exactly. This is not the experience I had with other university presses. I only wished they could have hired a copyeditor who knows more about East Asia.