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Abstract
Anthropological studies of tsunami-related folk spirituality are rare. Yet historically, ghosts have often helped residents in Iwate, Japan to mitigate some unimaginable human losses resulting from each of three calamitous tsunami which have struck its coastline during the last 122 years. Among the many tsunami death-mitigating ghost tales recorded is Yanagita Kunio’s Kyūjū-Kyū-Wa: Ōtsunami (Story 99: The Giant Tsunami), first published in 1910. Once considered meaningful to survivors who lost loved ones and friends, in recent decades, contemporary analysts have questioned the utility of its message. Using traditional ethnographic methods, contemporary Japanese media sources, and new physical evidence discovered since 2001, this study demonstrates that Story 99, which is slowly fading from public memory in the current generation, is still worthy of fulfilling its original mandate to help tsunami survivors left behind to accept and overcome their heart breaking losses from a local point of view that has never been fully articulated.
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Acknowledgements
This project would not have been possible without the long-term personal and professional relationships of the author with the residents of Tōwa-chō, Iwate (1988-present) and colleagues at Iwate Prefectural University (2011‐present). Thank you very much for your continued support!
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Throughout this monograph, the full names of Japanese people appear in their natural order, family name first, followed by given name. Romanization of Japanese family names, place names and terms follow the modified Hepburn system in principle, but defaults to accepted usages. Yanagita Kunio (1875‐1962) is known as the father of Japanese native folklore, or minzokugaku. In the original version of Yanagita’s Tōno Monogatari, stories were titled only by numbers in the sequence in which he arranged them for the book. Subtitling the numbered stories became common only later in subsequent versions of his work compiled by other authors. For example, in Morse’s English translation, Story 99 is subtitled, Fukuji’s Wife. For the sake of clarity, the subtitle used by Gotō in his popular Japanese language version of Story 99 published in 2013, Ōtsunami (The Giant Tsunami) is used here. This translation of the term Ōtsunami is the author’s.
2 This opinion is corroborated by three sources. The first is an interview by the author of Sasaki Katsuo, Head Priest of Jōtakuji in Hanamaki-shi, Iwate-ken, Japan on 10 December 2009. The second is Musashi Yūko, Kataribe (Story Teller) and Director of the Rikuzendaiku Sakan Denshōkan (The Rikuzen Carpenter and Plasterer Folk Culture Museum) in Rikuzentakata, Iwate in an interview by the author on 29 September 2018. The third is Neko Hideo, retired Tōno Municipal Museum Curator, in an interview by the author in Hanamaki, Iwate, Japan on 1 October 2018. All sources were hopeful that the information contained in this paper based on new research would shed a new perspective on Story 99.
3 When a tsunami comes, this phrase reminds residents on the Sanriku coast to scatter to higher ground individually without going back for or waiting on others (tendenbarabara ni) ‐ to save oneself first and re-join others later (Akasaka 2015)
4 Following the Meiji Sanriku Tsunami in 1896, the Asahi Shimbun paid for sekihi (stone epitaphs) listing the geographical characteristics of an imminent tsunami that were displayed publicly in every Iwate municipality affected. This history is clearly depicted in writing on the back of each sekihi that was donated.
5 Kosaji Monogatari is a folk tale from Tagajō in Miyagi Prefecture about Kosaji, the daughter of a sake store owner. Regular patrons become jealous when Kosaji is kind to an unusual customer and decide to kill the customer. Kosaji finds out, and warns the customer, who is saved. In appreciation, the customer tells Kosaji tell-tale signs of an impending tsunami. Later, Kosaji is able to save her family when she recognizes those signs (Akasaka 2015).
6 The late Tabata Yoshi is a well-known kataribe (story-teller) from Tarō, Iwate who survived the 1933 Shōwa Sanriku Tsunami when only eight years old. In her adult life, when Tabata’s grown daughter and grandchildren moved to Tarō, she created a kamishibai (Japanese-style panel story) recounting her experience entitled “Tsunami,” to teach them about her experience. She became famous when volunteering regularly to use this kamishibai to teach local school children in Tarō and anybody else who would listen about tsunami until she passed away on February 28 2018, aged 93 (The Asahi Shimbun Citation2018.)
7 Musashi Yūko, Kataribe (Story Teller) and Director of the Rikuzendaiku Sakan Denshōkan (The Rikuzen Carpenter and Plasterer Folk Culture Museum) in Rikuzentakata, Iwate currently continues to tell this kind of tsunami tale on Iwate’s Rikuchū Coast.
8 From this point on in this article, the term Hanamaki-Tōno-Rikuchū Cultural Corridor (HTRCC) is used because the Japanese referent does not adequately specify for readers unfamiliar with Iwate history the geographical and cultural territory this district encompasses. The HTRCC consists of the towns and villages that stretch west to east in Iwate from the central inland planes in Hanamaki to the prefecture’s Pacific coast, and north to south along this coastline from Kuji and Miyako to Ōtsuchi and Kamaishi. Rikuchū is the name given to this middle (Iwate) portion of the Sanriku Coast (Thompson 2014).
9 Morse (2015, xiii) describes Tōno as a “magical” place where real people believed in a wide variety of spiritual beings. These beings formed the backdrop for many of the stories and experiences told by local inhabitants.
10 This explanatory note was added by the author.
11 In addition, information here regarding kairitsu dantō and kairitsu kanshō in Iwate and the HTRCC comes from an interview with Sasaki Katsuo, Head Priest of Jōtakuji in Hanamaki-shi, Iwate-ken, Japan on 10 December 2009.
12 Most of Ishii’s books, which include commentaries on Tōno and its legends, were published prior to the 2011 tsunami. However, his blog (2013) referred to here, developed out of a related television appearance and NHK Television Textbook (2014), was written after the 2011 tsunami.
13 In the HTRCC during the 1800s and early 1900s, yūrei (ghosts) ‐ like those described in the accounts of post-tsunami sightings on the Rikuchū Coast today (as Takino and her companion are portrayed in Story 99) ‐ had a look and personality identical to their fully human selves prior to death (Neko 1994).
14 This explanatory note was added by the author.
15 This is the author’s English translation of Ishii’s Japanese rendition of Sasaki Kizen’s 1930s version of Fukuji’s encounter with Takino on the beach at Tanohama (Ishii Citation2014).
16 NHK is the acronym for Nippon Hōsō Kyōkai, Japan's national public broadcasting organization.
17 This is the author’s translation of the program title.
18 This viewpoint is based on a group interview with five residents of Yamada-chō (who asked that their names not be made public) by the author in Iwate-ken, Japan on 30 September 2017.
19 In the Historia footage, Masaru refers to Fukuji’s sighting of Takino as a maboroshi ‐ a person, an animal, an entity ‐ that is thought to exist but which nobody has actually seen (Sakata et. Al. 1995).
20 The words sincerity, selflessness, and responsibility in English here are the author’s, derived from Masaru’s narrative in the NHK episode described ‐ chosen to capture the way he describes the love he believes Fukuji felt toward his wife Takino and why he envisions her next life the way he does in Story 99.
21 This English translation of the Japanese term kuyō egaku is the author’s (Thompson Citation2009, 2010).
22 In the most recent formal survey of kuyō egaku in Iwate conducted in 2008, 413 paintings were identified; however, many more have been found since and continue to be discovered (Aramata and Takahashi Citation2010, 62–66; Tōno Museum Citation2001, 72–78).
23 Egaku are typically large, elaborate ema – framed votive prayers of thanks or wishes portrayed in writing or visually upon special wooden tablets of various sizes.
24 Kuyō egaku can be divided into three major types. Over half of those found depict the dead in a household scene as described. These are classified as the seikatsu-gata (lifestyle-type), and are found in great numbers between Tōno and the Rikuchū Coast. The raigō-gata (escort-type) and the seikatsu-raigō-gata (lifestyle-escort type) portray the deceased being met by the Amida Sanson (the Amida Trinity) but comprise a smaller proportion of the total number (Thompson Citation2009, 14–16; 2010, 9).
25 Depicting the living with the dead is thought to bring bad luck or even death to the living (HBE 2008).
26 Emishi were indigenous, aboriginal people who once lived in north-east Japan in an area that today includes Iwate prefecture. The first mention of Emishi in Japanese literature dates to AD 400. Their origin is unknown, but they are often thought to have descended from the Jōmon people (14,000 ‐ AD 300) and seem to be related to the Ainu (Takahashi 1986).
27 The folk beliefs and practices associated with kuyō egaku are known by local experts as minzoku shinkō (folk belief systems), but do not have a specific name. A leading theory regarding the origin of kuyō egaku is that the pre-existing influences of Emishi spirituality emphasizing the existence of multiple dimensions of existence (which dates back to the region’s prehistory), and nembutsu kuyō coupled with tariki (first introduced to the region in the eighth century by Tendai monks), fused with Shinto theology and its teachings pertaining to the spiritual world (introduced during the Edo period [1604‐1868]). This blend, which is also known to have influenced the creation of a local folk tradition known as Nana Kannon Shinkō, ([the] Seven Boddhisattva Faith, is thought to have also influenced the creation of kuyō egaku, a one-of-a-kind folk theological expression grounded in but distinctive within Japan’s posthumous portraiture tradition. Nana Kannon Shinkō promoted a belief that relationships portrayed in the kuyō egaku portrait could transcend death (Obara 1996; Neko Citation2001; HBE 2008).
28 The nembutsu kuyō ritual was first spread throughout Japan by Tendai Buddhist monks in the eighth century, was thoroughly incorporated into teachings disseminated in HTRCC parish communities by the Tendai, Nichiren, Jōdō, Ji and Sōtō sects (and others much smaller), permeating the popular culture of the HTRCC by the 12th century ‐ and continues its influence within these religious traditions in the present (Tōno Museum Citation2001; Thompson Citation2009; 2010).
29 Tariki was propagated throughout Japan during the tenth century by Genshin, a Jōdō sect priest, though incorporated by other Buddhist sects as well (Tōno Museum Citation2001; Thompson Citation2009, 2010).
30 The local expressions, thoughts, and actions used by some HTRCC residents to represent the folk theology expressed through kuyō egaku has been documented in local literature, poetry, and in various local paintings (HBE 2008; Tōno Museum Citation2001, 8–15).
31 Kuyō egaku are considered by Japan’s folk art scholars to be a type of ema (a votive prayer or wish to the Japanese gods). Until the discovery of kuyō egaku, there was general agreement that votive icons in Japan were only concerned with issues associated with earthly life (Tōno Museum Citation2001, 11).
32 A ritual commonly performed immediately after a death event prior to kuyō to assuage the spirit of the deceased. Unless tamashizume and kuyō are performed in a timely manner, the theology of Japanese formal religion and folk-spirituality dictate that the living could be in danger of harassment by the unrecognized human soul (HBE 2008).
33 Tariki-style kuyō expression involves a group of performers whose performance prays for subjects in the next world with the expectation of reciprocity.
34 Photographs of these momentous events could be observed for months afterwards in train stations throughout Iwate.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Christopher S. Thompson
Christopher S. Thompson is Associate Professor of Japanese Language and Culture in the Department of Linguistics at Ohio University where he recently completed a nine-year term as department Chair. He is a cultural anthropologist who has researched, written, and presented on a variety of topics related to the praxis of tradition and modernity in contemporary Japan, particularly in rural environments. Thompson’s latest research has focused on the role of traditional culture in tsunami recovery efforts on the Sanriku Coast of north-east Honshū, specifically in Iwate prefecture. His recent publications include: Memoirs of Tsunami Revitalization In Coastal Iwate Prefecture (Iwate-ken Engan ni Okeru Fukkoshien Katsudō no Taiken Shuki), Translated into Japanese by Harumi Ogawa. In, Kumamoto, and Nobuoka edts. Saigai to Bungaku: Nichibei no ōtō to Shōgen (Calamity and Literature: Responses and Testimonies From America and Japan), Eihōsha, Hiroshima, Japan. 2015 and, Are You Coming to the Matsuri?: Tsunami Recovery and Folk Performance Culture on Iwate’s Rikuchū Coast. The Asia-Pacific Journal. Vol. 12, Issue 5, No. 2, February 3, 2014.