Evolution of the Japanese, Social and Psychic | Page 4

attitude of Confucius towards the gods--Ready acceptance of Western agnosticism--Prof. Chamberlain's assertion that the Japanese take their religion lightly--Statements concerning religion by Messrs. Fukuzawa, Kato, and Ito--Statements of Japanese irreligion are not to be lightly accepted--Incompetence of many critics--We must study all the religious phenomena--Pilgrimages--Statistics--Mr. Lowell's criticism of "peripatetic picnic parties"--Is religion necessarily gloomy?--God and Buddha shelves universal in Japan--Temples and shrines--Statistics, 286
XXVI. SOME RELIGIOUS PHENOMENA
Stoical training conceals religious emotions--The earnestness of many suppliants--Buddhistic and Shinto practice of religious ecstasy--The revolt from Buddhism a religious movement--Muro Kyu-so quoted--"Heaven's Way"--"God's omnipresence"--Pre-Christian teachers of Christian truth--Interpretation of modern irreligious phenomena--Japanese apparent lack of reverence--Not an inherent racial characteristic--Sketch of Japanese religious history--Shinto--Buddhism--Confucianism--Christianity--Roman Catholicism--Protestantism--Religious characteristics are social, not essential or racial, 296
XXVII. SOME RELIGIOUS CONCEPTIONS
Japanese conceptions as to deity--The number and relation of the gods to the universe--Did the Japanese have the monotheistic conception?--Attractiveness of Christian monotheism--Confucian and Buddhist monism--Religious conception of man--Conception of sin--Defective terminology--Relation of sin to salvation--"Holy water"--Holy towels and the spread of disease--The slight connection between physical and moral pollution--W.E. Griffis quoted--Exaggerated cleanliness of the Japanese--Public bathing houses--Consciousness of sin in the sixteenth century--A recent experience--Doctrine of the future life--Salvation from fate--"Ingwa"--These are important doctrines--"Mei" (Heaven's decree)--Japan not unique--Sociological interpretations of religious characteristics, 310
XXVIII. SOME RELIGIOUS PRACTICES
Loyalty and filial piety as religious phenomena--Gratitude as a religions trait--Hearn quoted--Unpleasant experiences of ingratitude--Modern suppression of phallicism--Brothels and prostitutes at popular shrines--The failure of higher ethnic faiths to antagonize the lower--Suppression of phallicism due to Western opinion--The significance of this suppression to sociological theory--Religious liberty--Some history--Inconsistent attitude of the Educational Department--Virtual establishment of compulsory state religion--Review and summary--The Japanese ready learners of foreign religions--The significance of this to sociology--Japanese future religion is to be Christianity, 322
XXIX. SOME PRINCIPLES OF NATIONAL EVOLUTION
Progress is from smaller to larger communities--Arrest of development--The necessity of individualism--The relation of communal to individual development--A possible misunderstanding--The problem of distribution--Personality, 332
XXX. ARE THE JAPANESE IMPERSONAL?
Assertion of Oriental impersonality--Quotations from Percival Lowell--Defective and contradictory definitions--Arguments for impersonality resting on mistaken interpretations--Children's festivals--Occidental and Oriental method of counting ages--Argument for impersonality from Japanese art--From the characteristics of the Japanese family--The bearing of divorce on this argument--Do Japanese "fall in love"?--Suicide and murder for love--Occidental approval and Oriental condemnation of "falling in love"--Sociological significance of divorce and of "falling in love," 344
XXXI. THE JAPANESE NOT IMPERSONAL
The problem stated--Definitions--Remarks on definitions--Characteristics of a person--Impersonality defined--A preliminary summary statement--Definitions of Communalism and Individualism--The argument for "impersonality" from Japanese politeness--Some difficulties of this interpretation--The sociological interpretation of politeness--The significance of Japanese sensitiveness--Altruism as a proof of impersonality--Japanese selfishness and self-assertiveness--Distinction between communal and individualistic altruism--Deficiency of personal pronouns as a proof of impersonality--A possible counter-argument--Substitutes for personal pronouns--Many personal words in Japanese--Origin of pronouns, personal and others--The relation of the social order to the use of personal pronouns--Japanese conceive Nationality only through Personality--"Strong" and "weak" personality--Strong personalities in Japan--Feudalism and strong personalities, 356
XXXII. IS BUDDHISM IMPERSONAL?
Self-suppression as a proof of impersonality--Self-suppression cannot be ascribed to a primitive people--Esoteric Buddhism not popular--Buddhism emphasized introspection and self-consciousness--Mr. Lowell on the teaching of Buddha--Consciousness of union with the Absolute a developed, not a primitive, trait--Buddhist self-suppression proves a developed self--Buddhist self-salvation and Christian salvation by faith--Buddhism does not develop rounded personality--Buddhism attributes no worth to the self--Buddhist mercy rests on the doctrine of transmigration, not on the inherent worth of man--Analysis of the diverse elements in the asserted "Impersonality "--Why Buddhism attributed no value to the self--The Infinite Absolute Abstraction--Buddhism not impersonal but abstract--Buddhist doctrine of illusion--Popular Buddhism not philosophical--Relation of "ingwa," Fate, to the development of personality--Relation of belief in freedom to the fact of freedom--Sociological consequences of Buddhist doctrine, 377
XXXIII. TRACES OF PERSONALITY IN SHINTOISM, BUDDHISM, AND CONFUCIANISM
Human illogicalness providential--Some devices for avoiding the evils of logical conclusions--Buddhistic actual appeal to personal self-activity--Practical Confucianism an antidote to Buddhist poison--Confucian ethics produced strong persons--The personal conception of deity is widespread--Shinto gods all persons--Popular Buddhist gods are personal--Confucian "Heaven" implies personality--The idea of personality not wholly wanting in the Orient--The idea of divine personality not difficult to impart to a Japanese--A conversation with a Buddhist priest--Sketch of the development of Japanese personality--Is personality inherent?--Intrinsic and phenomenal personality--Note on the doctrine of the personality of God, 389
XXXIV. THE BUDDHIST WORLD-VIEW
Comparison of Buddhist, Greek, and Christian conceptions of God--Nirvana--The Buddhistic Ultimate Reality absolute vacuity--Greek affirmation of intelligence in the Ultimate Reality--Christian affirmation of Divine Personality--The Buddhist universe is partly rational and ethical--The Greek universe is partly rational and ethical--Corresponding views of sin, salvation, change, and history--Resulting pessimism and optimism--Consequences to the respective civilizations and their social orders, 398
XXXV. COMMUNAL AND INDIVIDUAL ELEMENTS IN THE EVOLUTION OF JAPANESE RELIGIOUS LIFE
Japanese religious life has been predominantly communal--Shinto provided the sanctions for the social order--Recent abdication of Shinto as a religion--Primitive Shinto world--view--Shinto and modern science--Shinto sanctions for the modern social order--Buddhism is