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Lafcadio Hearn - Kokoro
ask questions; and when Manyemon asks questions, not to reply is possible for the wicked only.
Sometimes behind that dear innocent old head I think I see the dawning of an aureole, - the aureole of the
Bosatsu.
The pipe-stem seller answered by telling his story. Two months after the birth of their little boy, his wife
had died. In the last hour of her illness she had said: "From what time I die till three full years be past I
pray you to leave the child always united with the Shadow of me: never let him be separated from my
ihai, so that I may continue to care for him and to nurse him - since thou knowest that he should have the
breast for three years. This, my last asking, I entreat thee, do not forget." But the mother being dead, the
father could not labor as he had been wont to do, and also take care of so young a child, requiring
continual attention both night and day; and he was too poor to hire a nurse. So he took to selling
pipe-stems, as he could thus make a little money without leaving the child even for a minute alone. He
could not afford to buy milk; but he had fed the boy for more than a year with rice gruel and ame syrup.
I said that the child looked very strong, and none the worse for lack of milk.
"That," declared Manyemon, in a tone of conviction bordering on reproof, "is because the dead mother
nurses him. How should he want for milk?"
And the boy laughed softly, as if conscious of a ghostly caress.
XIV. SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT ANCESTOR-WORSHIP
"For twelve leagues, Ananda, around the Sala-Grove, there is no spot in size even as the pricking of the
point of the tip of a hair, which is not pervaded by powerful spirits." - The Book Of the Great Decease.
I
The truth that ancestor-worship, in various unobtrusive forms, still survives in some of the most highly
civilized countries of Europe, is not so widely known as to preclude the idea that any non-Aryan race
actually practicing so primitive a cult must necessarily remain in the primitive stage of religious thought.
Critics of Japan have pronounced this hasty judgment; and have professed themselves unable to reconcile
the facts of her scientific progress, and the success of her advanced educational system, with the
continuance of her ancestor-worship. How can the beliefs of Shinto coexist with the knowledge of
modern science? How can the men who win distinction as scientific specialists still respect the household
shrine or do reverence before the Shinto parish-temple? Can all this mean more than the ordered
conservation of forms after the departure of faith? Is it not certain that with the further progress of
education, Shinto, even as ceremonialism, must cease to exist?
Those who put such questions appear to forget that similar questions might be asked about the
continuance of any Western faith, and similar doubts expressed as to the possibility of its survival for
another century. Really the doctrines of Shinto are not in the least degree more irreconcilable with
modern science than are the doctrines of Orthodox Christianity. Examined with perfect impartiality, I
would even venture to say that they are less irreconcilable in more respects than one. They conflict less
with our human ideas of justice; and, like the Buddhist doctrine of karma, they offer some very striking
analogies with the scientific facts of heredity, - analogies which prove Shinto to contain an element of
truth as profound as any single element of truth in any of the world's great religions. Stated in the
simplest possible form, the peculiar element of truth in Shinto is the belief that the world of the living is
directly governed by the world of the dead.
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