Otani University Academic Repository / 大谷大学学術情報リポジトリ

Robert F. Rhodes

English

JAPANESE BOOKS ON BUDDHISM Japanese Books on Buddhism Published in 2022

鈴木,善幸

スズキ,ヨシユキ

SUZUKI,Yoshiyuki

（ 14 ） 大谷大学図書館・博物館報（第41号）
大谷大学図書館
大谷大学図書館
　ある日、街を歩いていると「勉強カフェ」という看板が、目に飛び込んできました。少し気にな
り調べてみると、高校生も有料で提供される自習空間を利用している事例があることを知りました。
　そういえば公立図書館では、「調べもの」をするために利用はできますが、「自習お断り」として
いるところが多く、私自身の自宅近くの図書館でも、空席を見つける方が難しいくらいです。例え
ばご近所の京都学・歴彩館にも自習室はありますが、席数は限られております。同様に無料の学習
スペースとして、京都市では青少年活動センターもありますが、スポーツクラブやその他のイベン
ト等もあり、常に静謐とは言えないようです。また、塾や予備校の自習室を利用する高校生もあり
ますが、当然有料ですし、全員が利用できるわけではありません。高校によっては授業終了後に、
自習室を開放している事例もあることから、高校生たちが勉強するスペースを探していることに気
づかされます。
　そういった状況を勘案し、2023 年 8 月以降のオープンキャンパス参加者を対象に、当館の利用
証申請の無料受付を開始しました。今回の高校生への開放では、自習室としての利用を専らとして
おり、図書の閲覧までしかできません。当初は当館の交通の利便性から、申込者が殺到することも
懸念されましたが、主たる利用者である学生に影響のあるほどではなく、ルールを守り、利用して
いただいています。                               〈文責：図書・博物館課　課長　鈴木　善幸〉
　2023年 5月に COVID-19の感染症法上の位置づけが５類となったことを受け、大学以外の学校でも各
種活動が再開されるようになってきました。その一つに、京都市立中学校の「生き方探究・チャレンジ
体験」があります。この事業の趣旨は多様な職業体験を通じて、生徒一人一人が自分らしい生き方を見
いだす力を育むものであり、当館でもその趣旨に賛同し、今年度は可能な範囲で受入を実施しました。
　今年度の受入実績は以下の通りです。
　　①京都市立七条中学校　2023 年  7 月  4 日（火）～  7 月 7 日（金）　3 名
　　②京都市立旭丘中学校　2023 年 10 月 30 日（月）～ 11 月 2 日（木）　3 名
　　③京都市立烏丸中学校　2023 年 11 月  6 日（月）～ 11 月 8 日（水）　2 名
　体験の内容は、図書館カウンターでの貸出・返却作業をはじめ、図書の配架、実習としてレファレ
ンス対応の図書検索・出納、複製品の巻子や掛け軸の取り扱い、図書館イベントの準備、郵便物の整
理といった多様な体験もしていただきました。また、七条中学校の生徒の方には、期間中に館内整理
日がありましたので、休館して実施する配架点検、旭丘・烏丸中学校の生徒の方には、近年寄贈を受
けました江戸期から明治期の版本・写本の整理・調書作成も手伝っていただきました。
　いずれの中学生たちも、知らない場所で、たくさんの大人たちに囲まれ、緊張しながらも、初々しく真
剣な表情で業務に取り組む姿は、受入した私たちにとっても「仕事をすること」を見直すきっかけになり
ました。図書館に限らず、多くの仕事には表から見えない活動もあり、今回の体験を通じて、そういった
社会の仕組みの一端を感じ取ってもらえれば幸いです。  〈文責：図書・博物館課　課長　鈴木　善幸〉
News Source 2
京都市立中学校の「生き方探究・チャレンジ体験」の受入再開
高校生の図書館利用開始
News Source 3


Japanese

〈News Source 2〉京都市立中学校の「生き方探究・チャレンジ体験」の受入再開

磯部,美紀

イソベ,ミキ

ISOBE,Miki

阿部,友香

アベ,ユカ

ABE,Yuka

[Abstract] A Preliminary Study on the Role of Religions Institutions in a Declining Population Area: Base on a Questionnaire Survey Performed in Kasuga Mitsuka, Ibigawa-chō, Gifu Prefecture

永瀬, 圭

ナガセ, ケイ

NAGASE, Kei

A Statistical Analysis of Marital Power in Japan in the 1990s: Focusing on the Comparative Socioeconomic Status of Spouses

表紙、扉、奥付、Contents

古谷, 伸子

コヤ, ノブコ

KOYA, Nobuko

Social and Cultural Contexts of Integrated Agricultural Practices in Thailand

Han Sangyun

B O O K  R E V I E W S 133
only partially answered in the chapter in which they are raised and has to wait for them 
to be fully addressed in a further chapter of the book. Finally, Groner takes very good 
care to revise his previous research by updating it based on new sources and providing 
new interpretations. In sum, Paul Groner’s latest contribution to the field of Japanese 
Buddhism continues the remarkable trajectory of his earlier works by expanding and 
deepening our understanding of Japanese Buddhism in the medieval period. 
Shinchigaku to bukkyō 神智学と仏教  (Theosophy and Buddhism). By Yoshinaga 
Shin’ichi 吉永進一. Kyoto: Hōzōkan, 2021. iv + 372 pages. Hardcover. ISBN 13: 978-
4-8318-5564-0.
Han Sangyun
The Theosophical Society was established by the Russian occultist Helena Petrovna 
Blavatsky (1831–1891) and the American lawyer and journalist Colonel Henry Steel 
Olcott (1832–1907) in New York in 1875 and was famously relocated to India in 
1879. Although the society was not the first to use the word “Theosophy”—the term 
had, according to Blavatsky, a long history going back to the third century—it is this 
particular group that most people think of when they hear the term today. Claiming to 
be the modern successor to a number of schools of ancient thought, the Theosophical 
Society pursued both the reconciliation of all religions across the globe and the unity 
of religion and science, based on the idea that all nature is derived from one absolute 
and universal truth. At the same time, it highlighted “the Orient” as a place of mysti-
cal wisdom, paying special attention to Indian religious traditions and connecting 
with religious reform movements in India and other Asian countries. As represented 
in volumes such as Theosophy across Boundaries (SUNY, 2020), edited by Hans Martin 
Krämer and Julian Strube, and in the latter’s recent monograph Global Tantra (Oxford 
University Press, 2022), the transnational and transgressive features of Theosophy have 
garnered increasing attention and are now considered significant subjects in global reli-
gious history.
Shinchigaku to bukkyō by Yoshinaga Shin’ichi is a pioneering monograph that 
deals with Theosophy from the perspective of the history of Japanese Buddhism. The 
author, who passed away in 2022, originally studied biology at Kyoto University but 
along the way decided instead to major in religious studies. Interested in the thin line 
between religion and science, Yoshinaga became one of the most important historians 
of occultism in Japan, focusing from the mid- to late 1970s on topics such as psychi-
cal research, hypnotism, UFOs, and, of course, Theosophy. His interests in the latter 
T H E  E A S T E R N  B U D D H I S T  4 ,  1134
continued well into the first decade of the twenty-first century, and from around this 
period his main research subject became theosophical entanglements with Japanese 
Buddhism. Shinchigaku to bukkyō is a compilation of his achievements on this topic, 
gathering articles published mostly after 2007.
The introduction offers an explanation about why Theosophy matters in the his-
tory of modern Japanese Buddhism. As Yoshinaga discusses, during the Meiji 明治 era 
(1868–1912) Japanese Buddhists actively established international networks to promote 
their Buddhism to global society, and this work necessitated some negotiation with reli-
gious trends outside of Japan. In this process, theosophical discourses on Eastern reli-
gions were appropriated in Japan and ultimately had a great impact on the development 
of new understandings of Japanese Buddhism. To put it simply, Yoshinaga argues that 
the Theosophical Society was one of the crucial agents involved in the transformation 
of Buddhism in modern Japanese society. With that in mind, he suggests that we con-
sider the hybrid and intermingled aspects of this new type of Buddhism that arose due 
to contact with the “West.” Indeed, while it is true that such theosophical depictions of 
Buddhism constituted a form of what Edward Said (1935–2003) referred to as “Orien-
talism,” Yoshinaga considers that we should go beyond mere critique and examine how 
these Orientalist discourses actually changed the global religious landscape. Referring to 
the notion of “strategic Occidentalism” (p. 33), coined by James E. Ketelaar,1 Yoshinaga 
insists that Japanese Buddhists were not just passive recipients of foreign discourses but 
rather were selective in how and what they chose to appropriate.
The book consists of three parts, each with three chapters. The first part, titled 
“Shinchigaku no rekishi” 神智学の歴史 (A History of Theosophy), offers informa-
tion about the historical context of the reception of Theosophy in Japan. Chapter 1 
focuses on the movement before its arrival in the archipelago, especially on its imag-
ined understanding of “the East.” Yoshinaga asserts that even before Theosophy was 
established, Western occultists had already depicted the East as a repository of ancient 
wisdom. However, by claiming to have learned directly from the Indian “Mahatmas,” 
Blavatsky was unique in bringing an important shift to this symbolic power relation-
ship between East and West. Her ideas and activities also played a crucial role in shift-
ing the focal point of the Western imagination about the East from the Middle East to 
India and Tibet—a fact still discernible in contemporary esoteric discourses. Alongside 
other related trends of the time such as the New Thought movement, Theosophy 
enlivened Western interest in “Eastern” religions, stimulating the appearance of many 
self-proclaimed Buddhists and Yoga practitioners.
After this general introduction to the movement, chapter 2 of part 1 then provides a 
brief trajectory of Theosophy in Japan between the Meiji and Shōwa 昭和 (1926–1989) 
1 Ketelaar 1991.
B O O K  R E V I E W S 135
periods. In the Meiji era, Theosophy was presented to the country mainly by two fig-
ures: first by Henry Steel Olcott, the cofounder and first president of the society, and 
later by Edward Stanley Stevenson (1871–?), a member of the Point Loma Theosophi-
cal Society. After this initial period, the Tokyo International Lodge and the Mahayana 
Lodge were established during the Taishō 大正 era (1912–1926), and despite the fact 
that neither lasted for long, they each contributed to the spread of Theosophical ideas 
in Japanese society. During the Shōwa period, through the efforts of Miura Sekizō 
三浦関造 (1883–1960) in particular, Theosophy and yoga gained further influence in 
Japan. 
Chapter 3 of the first part provides more detail regarding several actors responsible 
for introducing Theosophical ideas into Meiji Japan. Yoshinaga focuses on the role of 
a number of Japanese Buddhists such as Anesaki Masaharu 姉崎正治 (1873–1949), 
who was a key member of the Teiyū Rinri Kai 丁酉倫理会 (Teiyū Society for Ethics); 
the abovementioned Edward Stevenson; and Naruse Jinzō 成瀬仁蔵 (1858–1919), a 
pioneer of women’s higher education in Japan. Through the study of their individual 
cases, Yoshinaga reveals that Theosophical ideas were adopted in Japan not only in the 
context of religious circles but also in relation to ethical and educational discourses.
Part 2, “Bukkyō to no kōsaku” 仏教との交錯 (Buddhist Entanglements), explores 
in detail how Theosophy connected with Japanese Buddhism. The first chapter of part 
2 is an in-depth consideration of Olcott’s visit to Japan in 1889, perhaps one of the 
most important historical moments in the reception of Theosophy in the archipelago. 
Olcott’s visit took place during the late-1880s Japanese obsession with “Western Bud-
dhism.” Olcott, being but one of many Euro-American Buddhist sympathizers critical 
of the religious and political systems of their nations, was appropriated by the Japanese 
clergy as an anti-Christian weapon. Taking the opportunity both to assert the social 
and ethical values of their own religion and to promote it not only inside but also out-
side of Japan, the country’s clergy were incredibly proactive in their interaction with 
Olcott. Yoshinaga examines the role Buddhist media played around the time of the 
Meiji 20s (1887–1896) in these interactions with the West, considering, for example, 
periodicals such as Kaigai bukkyō jijō 海外仏教事情 (The Bijou of Asia).
At the same time, there were gaps between the Western and Japanese approaches 
to Buddhism. For example, whereas Theosophists’ interest in Buddhism assumed that 
Southeast Asian Buddhism was superior to the Mahayana, Japanese Buddhists obviously 
did not share this perspective. Furthermore, Theosophists also believed that Buddhism 
was but one religious system and therefore its partial truth should be integrated with 
that of other religions. That is, although Japanese Buddhists never fully empathized 
with the Theosophical understanding of their own “religion,” a number of Theosophical 
ideas did continue resonating with them even after the demise of “Western Buddhism” 
as a prevalent topic in Japanese circles. In the second chapter of part 2, Yoshinaga 
T H E  E A S T E R N  B U D D H I S T  4 ,  1136
focuses precisely on how Theosophical-influenced perspectives—namely, a pantheistic 
worldview and attitudes favorable toward “religious experience”—intersected with Japa-
nese Buddhist discourses during the second and third decades of the Meiji era.
Chapter 3 in part 2 focuses on the figure of Hirai Kinza 平井金三 (1859–1916), a 
Buddhist reformer of the Meiji 20s who actively engaged with global society. Besides 
playing an important role in Olcott’s visit to Japan in 1889, he is also famous for partic-
ipating in the World’s Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893. After this visit to the 
United States, Hirai went on to give several lectures and publish a number of articles on 
Japanese religion for American audiences. In these exchanges, he developed an under-
standing of Buddhism based on “syntheticism” (sōgōshugi 総合主義), a perspective that 
echoed contemporary Western trends pursuing the harmony between different religions. 
In this chapter, Yoshinaga traces Hirai’s life by focusing on his ideological journey: his 
relation with Theosophy, Unitarianism, hypnotism, psychic research, Zen, and psycho-
therapy. Through the case of Hirai, whose ideas developed across various intellectual 
realms, Yoshinaga is able to demonstrate one aspect of Meiji religion’s dynamism.
Part 3, titled “Reisei shisō to kindai Nihon” 霊性思想と近代日本 (Spirituality and 
Modern Japan), broadens the scope of the book to focus on the Japanese encounter 
with yet another Western esoteric idea: Swedenborgianism. Emanuel Swedenborg 
(1688–1772) was a Swedish Christian theologian and spiritualist whose theory led, 
in the late eighteenth century, to the foundation of a religious group called The New 
Church. Mixing over the course of the nineteenth century with other European cur-
rents of spiritualism and occultism, Swedenborgianism became a central part of West-
ern esoteric culture. The first chapter of Part 3 shows how these ideas by Swedenborg 
were appropriated in the context of modern Japanese society. As had happened with 
Theosophy, in its early stages Swedenborgianism was also introduced to Japanese 
Buddhists not as part of “esotericism” or “occultism,” but as a form of “Western Bud-
dhism.” For example, translations of articles on Swedenborg by Philangi Dasa (Her-
man Carl Vetterling; 1849–1931) appeared in various Japanese Buddhist journals from 
1888, and his representative work Swedenborg the Buddhist (1887) was translated in 
1893 under the title Zuiha bukkyōgaku 瑞派仏教学. As Yoshinaga makes clear from the 
reception of Dasa’s work, Swedenborg’s ideas were read in connection with Buddhism, 
a perspective that inspired Japanese Buddhists such as Ishidō Emyō 石堂恵猛 (d.u.) to 
compare the Swedish mystic with Kūkai 空海 (774–835), the founder of Shingon eso-
teric Buddhism.
On the other hand, as the Buddhist reform movement progressed, a rationalistic 
understanding of the religion became the norm in Meiji society. The well-known 
Buddhist philosopher Inoue Enryō 井上円了 (1858–1919) and the Shin Bukkyōto 
Dōshikai 新仏教徒同志会 (New Buddhist Society) are representative of this trend. 
Those who took such a rationalist stance called for the eradication of superstition, 
B O O K  R E V I E W S 137
which resulted in mystical religious experiences and the notion of an afterlife becom-
ing problematic topics. In this context, D. T. Suzuki (Suzuki Daisetsu 鈴木大拙; 
1870–1966), a lay Buddhist famous for his contribution to the promotion of Zen in 
the anglophone world, reframed Swedenborg’s philosophy in the face of the prevailing 
rationalism. The second chapter of part 3 focuses on Suzuki, who although a member 
of the New Buddhist Society, positively evaluated Swedenborg’s detailed explanation 
of a world beyond the senses in an attempt to provide another perspective concerning 
contemporary debates on the spiritual aspect of Buddhism.
The final chapter of part 3 introduces the Japanese writer and pioneer feminist 
Hiratsuka Raichō 平塚らいてう (1886–1971). Yoshinaga points out that Hiratsuka’s 
idea that women’s liberation can only be achieved when one transcends the secular 
world through religious or mystical experiences is in fact closely related to popular 
contemporary trends during the Meiji 40s (1907–1911) such as hypnotism, Zen 
meditation, and breathing techniques. Likewise, the author hypothesizes that it was 
such interest in the spiritual world that led Hiratsuka to become a follower of Ōmoto 
大本, a so-called new religion, whose doctrine explicitly borrowed several concepts 
from Swedenborg. In this sense, Hiratsuka’s case implies yet another aspect of Sweden-
borgianism’s entanglement with Japanese spiritual culture.
The book ends with the history of William Montgomery McGovern (1897–1964), 
a “White Buddhist” and professor of political science at Northwestern University. As 
mentioned above in the case of Theosophy, Western discourses on Buddhism tended 
to underestimate Mahayana Buddhism, rarely paying attention to it. In this regard, 
McGovern is unusual in that he became a priest of the Shin 真 Buddhist sect, one 
of the largest currents of the Mahayana. Although his interest in Eastern religion 
appears to have first been inspired by his mother, who had herself once been a mem-
ber of the Theosophical Society, it was through direct contact with Japanese Bud-
dhists during his stay in the country (1913–1917) that he discovered the value of the 
Mahayana. By considering both McGovern and those Buddhist colleagues around 
him, Yoshinaga reveals yet another chapter of the Japanese Buddhist entanglement 
with global society, showing that modern Buddhist history in fact consists in the 
overlapping of several complex and diverse pictures that cannot be easily organized 
into one linear narrative.
Yoshinaga’s body of work undoubtedly paved a new path for the study of Buddhism 
in modern Japan. Until he began his research more than two decades ago, Western 
esoteric ideas such as those found in Theosophy had not been acknowledged as seri-
ous topics in the field. In this work, however, Yoshinaga shows us how it was precisely 
through the negotiation process with these “unorthodox,” “Western” ideas that mod-
ern Japanese Buddhism developed. Therefore, this book continues to broaden the 
field’s horizon by making us question preexisting dichotomies and reconsider what 
T H E  E A S T E R N  B U D D H I S T  4 ,  1138
constitute “orthodox” versus “unorthodox” Buddhism and “Eastern” versus “Western” 
ideas. Yoshinaga invites us to go beyond these notions, encouraging the reader to pur-
sue a true global history.
Although one could perhaps claim that the protagonists in Yoshinaga’s case studies had 
only limited influence in the whole of Japanese Buddhist history—an assertion that can 
perhaps be made in relation to most case studies and in relation to any field—the book 
nevertheless manages to depict modern Japanese religious culture in terms of multilayered, 
dynamic historical moments that had not yet been captured within preexisting academic 
notions of “religion” and “Buddhism.” Ōmi Toshihiro, who contributes a commentary 
(kaidai 解題) on Yoshinaga’s oeuvre for the volume, also acknowledges the novelty of the 
work: he regards Shinchigaku to bukkyō as a major event for the field of modern Japanese 
Buddhist history that initiates perhaps the most important shift in the subject since the 
publication in 1959 of Nihon kindai bukkyōshi kenkyū 日本近代仏教史研究 (Studies in 
the History of Buddhism in Modern Japan) by Yoshida Kyūichi 吉田久一 (1915–2005).
I would also note that like the figures analyzed in the book, Yoshinaga too served 
as a bridge between the international and domestic intellectual worlds. As one of the 
first Japanese to become acquainted with late twentieth and early twenty-first century 
Euro-American research on “Western esotericism,” he interacted with the most impor-
tant researchers in the field and ultimately introduced such trends to Japan, which can 
be clearly perceived in this volume. Though the term “Western esotericism” itself has 
in the past few years been the target of polemics, the recent proliferation of academic 
studies on this topic has indeed contributed to the reconsideration of religious history 
by focusing on aspects of modernity heretofore considered “irrational” or “supersti-
tious.” Aware of these debates, Yoshinaga explored the possibilities (and limitations) of 
applying such theoretical frameworks to the Japanese case; the establishment of the East 
Asian Network for the Academic Study of Esotericism (EANASE) in 2020, which is 
currently coordinated not only by Japanese, Korean, and Chinese but also by European, 
North American, and Latin American scholars, is one of the outcomes of his activities. 
Yoshinaga Shin’ichi unfortunately passed away in March 2022 after a long battle 
with cancer, perhaps unable to fully appreciate the fruits of his efforts. I have no doubt, 
however, that Shinchigaku to bukkyō, the result of a lifetime dedicated to bringing light 
to marginalized aspects of modern Japanese Buddhist history—and to the appropria-
tion of “occultism” in East Asia—will continue to inspire countless scholars, both in 
Japan and, hopefully, beyond.
REFERENCE
Ketelaar, James E. 1991. “Strategic Occidentalism: Meiji Buddhists at the World’s Parliament of 
Religions.” Buddhist-Christian Studies 11, pp. 37–56.


BOOK REVIEWS Yoshinaga Shin’ichi. Shinchigaku to bukkyō

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