The Noh Plays of Japan (4 page)

†
See note on Buddhism, p. 250.

*
The piece to be used as an introduction. Modern performances are not confined to full Noh. Sometimes actors in plain dress recite without the aid of instrumental music, sitting in a row. Or one actor may recite the piece, with music (this is called
Hayashi
); or the piece may mimed without music (this is called
Shimai
).

*
An old shiroto, i.e. person not engaged in trade.

*
This, shows that, in seami's hands, the device of making an apparition the hero of the play was simply a dramatic convention

†
This, too, is the only aspect of them that I can here discuss; no other kind of criticism being possible without quotation of the actual words used by the poet.

The Buddhism of the Noh Plays is of the kind called the "Greater Vehicle," which prevails in China, Japan, and Tibet. Primitive Buddhism (the "Lesser Velicle"), which survives in Ceylon and Burma, centres round the person of Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha, and uses Pali as its sacred lnguage. The "Greater Vehicle," which came into being about the same time as Christianity and sprang from the same religious impulses, to a large extent replaces Shakyamuni by a timeless, ideal Buddha named Amida, "Lord of Boundless Light," perhaps originally a sun-god, like Ormuzd of the Zoroastrians. Primitive Buddhism had taught that the souls of the faithful are absorbed into Nirvana, in other words into Buddha. The "Greater Vehicle" promised to its adherents an after-life in Amida's Western Paradise. It produced scriptures in the Sanskrit language, in which Shakyamuni himself describes this Western Land and recommends the worship of Amida; it inculcated too the worship of the Bodhisattvas, half-Buddhas, intermediaries between Buddha and man. These Bodhisattvas are beings who, though fit to receive Buddhahood, have of their own free will renounced it, that they may better alleviate the miseries of mankind.

Chief among them is Kwaanon, called in India Avalokitesh-vara, who appears in the world both in male and female form, but it is chiefly thought of as a woman in China and Japan; Goddess of Mercy, to whom men pray in war, storm, sickness, or travail.

The doctrine of Karma and of the transmigration of souls was common both to the earlier and later forms of Buddhism. Man is born to an endless chain of reincarnations, each one of which is, as it were, the fruit of seed sown in that which precedes.

The only escape from this "Wheel of Life and Death" lies in
satori,
"Enlightenment," the realization that material phenomena are thoughts, not facts.

Each of the four chief sects which existed in medieval Japan had its own method of achieving this Enlightenment.

(1) The Amidists sought to gain
satori
by the study of the
Hokke Ky
ō
,
called in Sanskrit
Saddharma Pundarika S
Å«
tra
or "Scripture of the Lotus of the True Law," or even by the mere repetition of its complete title Myoho Renge Hokke Kyo. Others of them maintained that the repetition of the formula "Praise to Amida Buddha"
(Namu Amida Butsu)
was in itself a sufficient means of salvation.

(2) Once when Shäkyamuni was preaching before a great multitude, he picked up a flower and twisted it in his fingers. The rest of his hearers saw no significance in the act and made no response; but the disciple Käshyapa smiled.

In this brief moment a perception of transcendental truth had flashed from Buddha's mind to the mind of his disciple. Thus Käshyapa became the patriarch of the Zen Buddhists, who believe that Truth cannot be communicated by speech or writing, but that it lies hidden in the heart of each one of us and can be discovered by "Zen" or contemplative introspection.

At first sight there would not appear to be any possibility of reconciling the religion of the Zen Buddhists with that of the Amidists. Yet many Zen masters strove to combine the two faiths, teaching that Amida and his Western Paradise exist, not in time or space, but mystically enshrined in men's hearts.

Zen denied the existence of Good and Evil, and was sometimes regarded as a dangerous sophistry by pious Buddhists of other sects, as, for example, in the story of Shunkwan (see p. 207) and in
The H
ō
ka Priests
(see p. 143), where the murderer's interest in Zen doctrines is, I think, definitely regarded as a discreditable weakness and is represented as the cause of his undoing.

The only other play, among those I have here translated, which deals much with Zen tenets, is
Sotoba Komachi.
Here the priests represent the
Shingon Sh
Å«
or Mystic Sect, while Komachi, as becomes a poetess, defends the doctrines of Zen. For Zen was the religion of artists; it had inspired the painters and poets of the Sung dynasty in China; it was the religion of the great art-patrons who ruled Japan in the fifteenth century.
*

It was in the language of Zen that poetry and painting were discussed; and it was in a style tinged with Zen that Seami wrote of his own art. But the religion of the Noh plays is predominantly Amidist; it is the common, average Buddhism of medieval Japan.

(3) I have said that the priests in
Sotoba Komachi
represent the Mystic Sect. The followers of this sect sought salvation by means of charms and spells, corruptions of Sanskrit formulae. Their principal Buddha was Dainichi, "The Great Sun." To this sect belonged the Yamabushi, mountain ascetics referred to in
Tanik
ō
and other plays.

(4) Mention must be made of the fusion between Buddhism and Shinto. The Tendai Sect which had its headquarters on Mount Hiyei preached an eclectic doctrine which aimed at becoming the universal religion of Japan. It combined the cults of native gods with a Buddhism tolerant in dogma, but magnificent in outward pomp, with a leaning towards the magical practices of Shingon.

The Little Saint of Yokawa in the play
Aoi no Uye
is an example of the Tendai ascetic, with his use of magical incantations.

Hatsuyuki
appeared in "Poetry," Chicago, and is here reprinted with the editor's kind permission.

Footnote

*
See further my
Zen Buddhism & its relation to Art.
Luzac, 1922.

I
N
the eleventh century two powerful clans, the Taira and the Mi-namoto, contended for mastery. In 1181 Kiyomori the chief of the Tairas died, and from that time their fortunes declined. In 1183 they were forced to flee from Ky
ō
to, carrying with them the infant Emperor. After many hardships and wanderings they camped on the shores of Suma, where they were protected by their fleet.

Early in 1184 the Minamotos attacked and utterly routed them at the Battle of Ichi-no-Tani, near the woods of Ikuta. At this battle fell Atsumori, the nephew of Kiyomori, and his brother Tsunemasa.

When Kumagai, who had slain Atsumori, bent over him to examine the body, he found lying beside him a bamboo-flute wrapped in brocade. He took the flute and gave it to his son.

The bay of Suma is associated in the mind of a Japanese reader not only with this battle but also with the stories of Prince Genji and Prince Yukihira. (See p. 204.)

By Seami

PERSONS

THE PRIEST RENSEI
(formerly the warrior Kumagai
).

A YOUNG REAPER
,
who turns out to be the ghost of Atsumori
.

HIS COMPANION

CHORUS

PRIEST

Life is a lying dream, he only wakes
Who casts the World aside.

I am Kumagai no Naozane, a man of the country of Musashi. I have left my home and call myself the priest Rensei; this I have done because of my grief at the death of Atsumori, who fell in battle by my hand. Hence it comes that I am dressed in priestly guise.

And now I am going down to Ichi-no-Tani to pray for the salvation of Atsumori's soul.

(He walks slowly across the stage, singing a song descriptive of his journey.
)

I have come so fast that here I am already at Ichi-no-Tani, in the country of Tsu.

Truly the past returns to my mind as though it were a thing of today.

But listen! I hear the sound of a flute coming from a knoll of rising ground. I will wait here till the flute-player passes, and ask him to tell me the story of this place.

REAPERS
(
together
)

To the music of the reaper's flute
No song is sung
But the sighing of wind in the fields.

YOUNG REAPER

They that were reaping,
Reaping on that hill,
Walk now through the fields
Homeward, for it is dusk.

REAPERS
(together)

Short is the way that leads
*
From the sea of Suma back to my home.
This little journey, up to the hill
And down to the shore again, and up to the hill—
This is my life, and the sum of hateful tasks.
If one should ask me
I too
^†
would answer
That on the shores of Suma
I live in sadness.
Yet if any guessed
my
name,
Then might I too have friends.
But now from my deep misery
Even those that were dearest
Are grown estranged. Here must I dwell abandoned
To one thought's anguish:
That I must dwell here.

PRIEST

Hey, you reapers! I have a question to ask you.

YOUNG REAPER

Is it to us you are speaking? What do you wish to know?

PRIEST

Was it one of you who was playing on the flute just now?

YOUNG REAPER

Yes, it was we who were playing.

PRIEST

It was a pleasant sound, and all the pleasanter because one does not look for such music from men of your condition.

YOUNG REAPER

Unlooked for from men of our condition, you say!

Have you not read:—

"Do not envy what is above you

Nor despise what is below you?"

Moreover the songs of woodmen and the flute-playing of herdsmen,

Flute-playing even of reapers and songs of wood-fellers

Through poets' verses are known to all the world.

Wonder not to hear among us

The sound of a bamboo-flute.

PRIEST

You are right. Indeed it is as you have told me. Songs of woodmen and flute-playing of herdsmen...

REAPER

Flute-playing of reapers...

PRIEST

Songs of wood-fellers...

REAPERS

Guide us on our passage through this sad world.

PRIEST

Song...

REAPER

And dance...

PRIEST

And the flute...

REAPER

And music of many instruments...

CHORUS

These are the pastimes that each chooses to his taste. Of floating bamboo-wood

Many are the famous flutes that have been made;

Little-Branch and Cicada-Cage,

And as for the reaper's flute,

Its name is Green-leaf;

On the shore of Sumiyoshi

The Corean flute they play.

And here on the shore of Suma

On Stick of the Salt-kilns

The fishers blow their tune.

PRIEST

How strange it is! The other reapers have all gone home, but you alone stay loitering here. How is that?

REAPER

How is it, you ask? I am seeking for a prayer in the voice of the evening waves. Perhaps
you
will pray the Ten Prayers for me?

PRIEST

I can easily pray the Ten Prayers for you, if you will tell me who you are.

REAPER

To tell you the truth—I am one of the family of Lord Atsumori.

PRIEST

One of Atsumori's family? How glad I am!

Then the priest joined his hands
(he kneels down)
and prayed:

NAMU AMIDABU

Praise to Amida Buddha!
"If I attain to Buddhahood,
In the whole world and its ten spheres
Of all that dwell here none shall call on my name
And be rejected or cast aside."

CHORUS

"Oh, reject me not!

One cry suffices for salvation,

Yet day and night

Your prayers will rise for me.

Happy am I, for though you know not my name,

Yet for my soul's deliverance

At dawn and dusk henceforward I know that you will pray." So he spoke. Then vanished and was seen no more.

(Here follows the Interlude between the two Acts, in which a recitation concerning Atsumori's death takes place. These interludes are subject to variation and are not considered part of the literary text of the play.
)

PRIEST

Since this is so, I will perform all night the rites of prayer for the dead, and calling upon Amida's name will pray again for the salvation of Atsumori.

(The ghost of
ATSUMORI
appears, dressed as a young warrior
.)

ATSUMORI

Would you know who I am
That like the watchmen at Suma Pass
Have wakened at the cry of sea-birds roaming
Upon Awaji shore?
Listen, Rensei. I am Atsumori.

PRIEST

How strange! All this while I have never stopped beating my gong and performing the rites of the Law. I cannot for a moment have dozed, yet I thought that Atsumori was standing before me. Surely it was a dream.

ATSUMORI

Why need it be a dream? It is to clear the karma of my waking life that I am come here in visible form before you.

PRIEST

Is it not written that one prayer will wipe away ten thousand sins? Ceaselessly I have performed the ritual of the Holy Name that clears all sin away. After such prayers, what evil can be left? Though you should be sunk in sin as deep...

ATSUMORI

As the sea by a rocky shore, Yet should I be salved by prayer.

PRIEST

And that my prayers should save you...

ATSUMORI

This too must spring

From kindness of a former life.
*

PRIEST

Once enemies...

ATSUMORI

But now...

PRIEST

In truth may we be named...

ATSUMORI

Friends in Buddha's Law.

CHORUS

There is a saying, "Put away from you a wicked friend; summon to your side a virtuous enemy." For you it was said, and you have proven it true.

And now come tell with us the tale of your confession, while the night is still dark.

CHORUS

He
^†
bids the flowers of Spring
Mount the tree-top that men may raise their eyes
And walk on upward paths;
He bids the moon in autumn waves be drowned
In token that he visits laggard men
And leads them out from valleys of despair.

ATSUMORI

Now the clan of Taira, building wall to wall,
Spread over the earth like the leafy branches of a great tree:

CHORUS

Yet their prosperity lasted but for a day;
It was like the flower of the convolvulus.
There was none to tell them
*
That glory flashes like sparks from flint-stone,
And after—darkness.
Oh wretched, the life of men!

ATSUMORI

When they were on high they afflicted the humble;
When they were rich they were reckless in pride.
And so for twenty years and more
They ruled this land.
But truly a generation passes like the space of a dream.
The leaves of the autumn of Juyei'
^†
Were tossed by the four winds;
Scattered, scattered (like leaves too) floated their ships.
And they, asleep on the heaving sea, not even in dreams
Went back to home.
Caged birds longing for the clouds—
Wild geese were they rather, whose ranks are broken
As they fly to southward on their doubtful journey.
So days and months went by; Spring came again
And for a little while
Here dwelt they on the shore of Suma
At the first valley.
^‡
From the mountain behind us the winds blew down
Till the fields grew wintry again.
Our ships lay by the shore, where night and day
The sea-gulls cried and salt waves washed on our sleeves.
We slept with fishers in their huts
On pillows of sand.
We knew none but the people of Suma.
And when among the pine-trees
The evening smoke was rising,
Brushwood, as they call it,
*
Brushwood we gathered
And spread for carpet.
Sorrowful we lived
On the wild shore of Suma,
Till the clan Taira and all its princes
Were but villagers of Suma.

ATSUMORI

But on the night of the sixth day of the second month
My father Tsunemori gathered us together.
"Tomorrow," he said, "we shall fight our last fight.
Tonight is all that is left us."
We sang songs together, and danced.

PRIEST

Yes, I remember; we in our siege-camp
Heard the sound of music
Echoing from your tents that night;
There was the music of a flute...

ATSUMORI

The bamboo-flute! I wore it when I died.

PRIEST

We heard the singing...

ATSUMORI

Songs and ballads...

PRIEST

Many voices

ATSUMORI

Singing to one measure.

(
ATSUMORI
dances
.)

First comes the Royal Boat.

CHORUS

The whole clan has put its boats to sea.
He
*
will not be left behind;
He runs to the shore.
But the Royal Boat and the soldiers' boats
Have sailed far away.

ATSUMORI

What can he do?
He spurs his horse into the waves.
He is full of perplexity.
And then

CHORUS

He looks behind him and sees
That Kumagai pursues him;
He cannot escape.
Then Atsumori turns his horse
Knee-deep in the lashing waves,
And draws his sword.
Twice, three times he strikes; then, still saddled,
In close fight they twine; roll headlong together
Among the surf of the shore.
So Atsumori fell and was slain, but now the Wheel of Fate
Has turned and brought him back.

(
ATSUMORI
rises from the ground and advances toward the
PRIEST
with uplifted sword
.)

"There is my enemy," he cries, and would strike,
But the other is grown gentle
And calling on Buddha's name
Has obtained salvation for his foe;
So that they shall be re-born together
On one lotus-seat.
"No, Rensei is not my enemy.
Pray for me again, oh pray for me again."

By Zemb
ō
Motoyasu (1453-1532)