ABSTRACT

IN the early summer of 1920 a religion called Omotokyo began to attract a great deal of attention. The Japanese have often been compared with the Athenians, and the comparison extends to a predilection for running after new things, especially new religions. We find in the same year an endeavour to popularise Seizaho, or a “Method of Quiet Sitting,” an offspring of the Zen meditation, which was itself a rather distant derivative of the Indian yoga. There were a number of popular religions, the existence of which never seemed to arouse any hostility on the part of the older establishments, which, indeed, never lacked generous support. The best known of these faiths was Tenrikyo, a quietistic Neo-Shinto sect, founded by a farmer’s wife and boasting over a million followers. Of somewhat similar origin was Omotokyo, but of different character. There is a quiet, sleepy town called Ayabe in the western part of Kyoto prefecture, the centre of a sericultural district, surrounded by hills. In modern times it has come into note as the home of Omotokyo, the junction of two not very important railways and the site of one of Japan’s largest filatures, where several thousand girls reel silk. Here in 1836 was born the foundress of Omotokyo. In 1855 she married a dissolute carpenter named Deguchi, who made her the mother of eight children before his excesses killed him. For many years thereafter she toiled early and late, now rearing silkworms, now picking rags and wastepaper. Except the two youngest daughters, the children showed no gratitude for such devotion, but deserted her as soon as they could look after themselves. It was not until 1892

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that she got religion, suddenly declaring herself possessed of a god and saying that she would build a temple for all the world at Ayabe. o She was apparently quite mad, and was even imprisoned for arson but liberated because the court found her to be insane. Her insanity proved to be more remunerative than a lifetime of toil. Followers gathered round and took care of her. One of her favourite occupations from this time till her death in 1918 was the making of Ofudesaki, or “honourable writings,” with a writing-brush. The papers on which this entirely illiterate woman made these strange figures were carefully preserved, and expounders of the faith have traced in them fanciful resemblances to Chinese characters and equally fanciful interpretations of these decipherments.