The Confucianism Effect on Chushingura Paper Example

Introduction

Chushingura also referred to as the Treasury of Royal retainers is the dramatised account related to the incident when the forty-seven ronin conducted an attack with the aim of avenging for the death of their Lord, Asano Nanganori. Chusingura is among the most narrated histories that ever happened in Japan. Chusingura is a narration of the Ako incident which occurred starting from 1701 and ending in 1703. Starting on the fourteenth day of the third month in April 1701 when one of the Daimyo of Ako from Harima region, Asano Takumi rose up to attack the Bakufu leader of the ceremony, Kira Kozuke using a word. Following the event, a large group of Asano retainers attacked Kira from his mansion in Edo. The two events comprise the Ako incident which has received widespread recognition and imagination to the present. The attackers gained favourable public opinion as the public believed that were chushin gishi referring to a righteous and loyal samurai. This paper addresses the critical Confucianism beliefs surrounding the incidence including the religious nuances connected to acting by the requirements of being chushi gishi to create an understanding of the intentions and the aims of the forty-six ronin. Importantly, this paper not only looks at the religious nuances but also reveals their political implications which the Asano restrainers might have figured out before committing the attack. Importantly, Confucianism had a profound effect on the manner in which the public understood the event during its era, the political implications and localisation of the prominence of the incident in China and Japan.

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Confucianism Beliefs as Contributing to the Attacks Involved in Chishungura

Confucianism has a strong emphasis on social order, and it provides for the existence of a proper fight. It was the same grounds that Asano conducted his initial attack on Kira. The issues surrounding Asano attack on Kirwa make the attack qualified as a proper fight. A fair fight demanded the application of the traditional notion of 'kenka ryoseibai'. The common principle held that the parties to an argument that are involved physical violence would get the same punishment despite the argument about the individual who was in fault. The conflict between Asano sometimes began before the event, and the attack on Kira by Asano was an act of revenge. The eyewitness to the incident revealed that when Asano commanded a servant to struck Kira from behind, he shouted 'do you remember my grudge from these past days'. Before the attack, Asano had refused to offer a proper bribe to Kira had responded by humiliating him and giving him misinformation. The attack in response in vengeance to an ill committed to an individual like Asano rose in revenge for a wrong committed against him, and it constitutes a proper fight.

The Japanese Confucians placed a high value on righteousness, and they held that, and an act can still receive recognition as righteous although it was against the law. According to the Confucianism teachings, an action cannot be a moral duty and a crime at the same time. To the Confucianism believers, revenge and its associated sequel are judged from the moral imperatives that should govern the society. The entire Ako incident involved actions comprising of a contradiction between the demands of law and morality. The disagreement had existed in the Confucianism religion since the beginning. In religious terms, it was referred as the conflict between 'rituals' (rei) or righteousness (gi) on the one hand, and 'law' (ho) or punishment (kei) on the other hand (Mc Mullen, 2003, p.294). The writings of the leading participants in the Ako revenge including Horibe Yasubei in the message to Oishi Yoshio and Otaka Gengo explanations of the death of his mother reveal that the forty-six samurai were staunch Confusions and that they believed in their moral responsibility of acting in loyalism to their masters or in filial piety to parents.

The Effect of Confucianism on the Favorable Public Option Accorded to the Forty-Six Samurai

The Confucians look more into the motive behind an action rather than its consequences. Dishonour had been committed against the Lord to the forty-six samurai, and they would not tolerate a dishonour to their Lord since it amounted to a personal shame to them. Following the death of their Lord, the retainers made their avenge plans for a whole year. The forty-six servants began by restoring their Lord's house before committing the attack. Though the group did not come to a consensus on the best course of action, they eventually concluded that it was a must for them to avenge for the ill committed against their Lord. Some of the retainers did not participate in the vendetta which was conducted on the 30th of January 1703 by the forty-six retainers who killed Kira as well as a large portion of the members of the household.

The forty-six ronin received recognition for upholding royalism, a highly valued virtue among the Confucians. The Japanese Confucians regarded loyalty as instrumental for state building and indispensable for the maintenance of Japanese structure of legitimacy. The legitimacy structures that served to support the preservation of commitment among the Japanese include the imperial mythology, the imperial regalia, the biological source of kingship; the Ise Shrine (Tucker, 1999). The characteristic of reliability is most common among the Japanese. Loyalty among the Japanese is so apparent such that it seems like a genetic characteristic among them. The most common types of identifiable loyalty are that of Samurai to his Lord based on the Bushido code and that of Japanese worker to his company. Devotion to maintaining the will of one's Lord formed the Samurai code of ethics, and it was among the fundamental principle that every Japanese soldier should possess. The notions of loyalty are evident in the Prince Shotoku Seventeen Article Constitution of 603.

Confucians believe in the fulfilment of responsibilities, and the forty-six samurai is praised for their actions which show selfless desire to act by their duty to their master. The Samurai were aware that their crime of drawing a weapon against Kira and his entire household would attract a punishment of seppuku, the authorities order for a criminal to commit suicide. The Samurai awareness about the gross consequences for their actions is evident since after killing Kira, they went ahead to place his head on the tomb at Sengakuji temple and they later gave themselves up to the authorities. After length deliberations, the government concluded that the ronin were to receive the same sentencing as their master Asano had earlier on received. Out of the forty-seven samurai who attacked Kira only forty-six of them admittedly received the punishment. One of the retainers by the name of Terasaka Kichiemon did not receive the sentence of Seppuku since he either fled or he got dismissed by the others as they delivered themselves to the authorities.

The forty-six samurai was immediately horrified among the public for their excellent show of the ideals of warrior honour. The retainers acted following the demands of a warrior of fame at the last stages of samurai group existence. The forty-six samurai received great recognition among the people of all classes for their demonstration of boldness and belief in the samurai ideals of loyalty at a period where such beliefs seemed forgotten. The action of the retainers brought the peace after a hundred years of the fading of the samurai ideals, and their efforts came as a heartening reminder to every individual about what being a samurai means. Therefore, people are not keen at the consequences of the actions including the killing. Instead, they are concerned that the Samurai offered themselves as martyrs and ambassadors to others by encouraging them that the core Confucians beliefs still exists in the hearts of some people.

The worship of the forty-six samurai has received considerable debates among the religious interpreters due to the entire effect of the punishment for the actions in introducing a change in the judgment of cases and to showing that samurai ethics are paramount in the instances where there is a contradiction between religious and political concerns. The political decision-makers condemned the ronin as criminals by subjecting them to the punishment of seppuku, but the cruel punishment became a basis for their honour. The enshrinement of the forty-six ronin leaves an implication that the Bakufu judges made a mistake in their verdict. It is argued that the judges avoided honouring the samurai since they thought that the apotheosis of the ronin might raise embarrassing questions about the earlier judicial decisions made during the Tokugawa regime.

The forty-six ronin are remembered today because their actions served to show the Confucians emphasis on social order. The forty-six ronin accepted the honourable death since through it they would become heroes. Though there were arguments that tolerating the worship of the ronin might have introduced grounds for a religious sanction for the proponents of Bakufu justice, the acceptance of the ronin as chushin gishi did not have the implications of showing that the Confucians were in opposition to Bakufu justice. Instead, it was a foundation of for the emphasis of Bakufu legitimacy as founded on personal bonds that are defined by Samurai ethics and consequently the notions of duty and loyalty as opposed to mere legalistic relations.

The loyal retainers in the Samurai incident received favourable public opinion for acting by the ancient Confucian teaching which demands that one should not live in the same heaven with a killer of his father. The Assano motives when he attacked Kira have considered moral whether it was in accordance or against the law. Therefore, the perpetrators did what their religious teachings required them to do by executing the Lord's murderer (Death). Importantly, such an action received great sympathy among the public when it resulted in the suicide of the loyal samurai as it happened during the Ako Incident. The people including Hayashi Nobuatsu and Muro Kyuso approved of the intentions of the restrainers due to the results of the action and the motive behind the same.

The retainers had blind loyalty towards their master, and their actions were from strict recognition that their masters, Asano was a staunch Confucians and that they would only show devotion to him by being more severe in implementing Confucianism beliefs. The retainers applied the Chinese philosophy stating that the great ministers are the ones that morally served their masters.

Some of the Confucian scholars argued that the Ako retainers should have carried out revenge against Lord Kira immediately without having to think about the consequences. Tsunetomo, for example, claims that immediate vendetta served the purpose of the shinigurui type of bushido (Death). The same scholar had critical about the Soga brothers who had waited for seventeen years before carrying out the vendetta against their father murderer.

Even though the forty-six ronin did not follow the rule regarding registering vendettas, their actions were not by the political laws but in line with the Confucian text and the masses try as much as possible to judge the samurai in that regard. The private vendettas would be officially absolved from responsibility if they report the intentions to revenge to the authorities who then grant the permission to proceed. However, the samurai in Ako revenge felt that their attempt to communicate the matter would make their targeted person to hide or to surround himself with armed soldiers thus preventing their missions (death). The Ako side violated several laws; Lord Asano acted ag...