https://archive.org/details/tokugawareligion0000bell/mode/2up
Tokugawa Religion (1957)
By Robert N. Bellah
Contents
Introduction to the Paperback Edition
I. Religion and Industrial Society in Japan
II. An Outline of Japanese Social Structure in the Tokugawa Period
III. Japanese Religion: A General View
IV. Religion and the Polity
V. Religion and the Economy
VI. Shingaku and its Founder, Ishida Baigan
VII. Conclusion
APPENDIX I. A Memoir of Our Teacher, Ishida Translation of Ishida
Sensei Jiseki
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APPENDIX II. List of Chinese and Japanese Words
APPENDIX III. List of Chinese and Japanese Names
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
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Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
About this ebook
Robert N. Bellah's classic study, Tokugawa Religion does for Japan what Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism did for the West.
One of the foremost authorities on Japanese history and culture, Bellah explains how religion in the Tokugawa period (160-1868) established the foundation for Japan's modern industrial economy and dispels two misconceptions about Japanese modernization: that it began with Admiral Perry's arrival in 1868, and that it rapidly developed because of the superb Japanese ability for imitation.
In this revealing work, Bellah shows how the native doctrines of Buddhism, Confucianism and Shinto encouraged forms of logic and understanding necessary for economic development.
Japan's current status as an economic superpower and industrial model for many in the West makes this groundbreaking volume even more important today than when it was first published in 1957.
With a new introduction by the author.
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From the United States
Violet
5.0 out of 5 stars Love this book
Reviewed in the United States on August 26, 2014
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Very interesting, used this book to write a very long paper about Japanese honor culture. Very well written.
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BR3
4.0 out of 5 stars Eye opener
Reviewed in the United States on July 25, 2005
The author developed the ideas of this book in his Ph.D. dissertation at Harvard in the 1950s, and this book originally came out in 1957. The subtile was "The Values of Pre-Industrial Japan." Apart from the different subtitle and new introduction by the author, the 1985 and 1957 books seem exactly the same.
Sociologist Bellah follows the foot steps of Max Weber, a German sociologist who explained, several generations before, that Northern European capitalism was strongly influenced by Protestantism (the religion of N. Europe for the last 500 years). Bellah similarly makes a strong argument that the industrialization of Japan had its roots in a very special religious ans pre-religious configuration. Though he comments about more ancient and more recent Japan, his focus period is the so-called "Tokugawa Period": 1600-1868. He feels that in this period Japan's religion and values had greatly stabilized compared to the upheavals of past centuries. The religion and values continued to evolve in the T period, but they were steadily leading to a concentration of politcal power in the person of the emperor.
Japan's case is very different from N. Europe in may ways. Let me just mention one: for more than a 1,000 years before the T period, what is called Japanese religion had been a blend of Shinto, Confucianism, and Buddhism (and some Taoism). That blend always remained close to real life, through codes of ethics that were taken seriouly in day to day living. Bellah makes illuminating comparisons to China, and a couple of key comparisons to Europe that are also very illuminating.
Why did I give such an important book 4 rather than 5 stars? First because I coudn't give it 4.5 stars. The half star I take off is to live some room for other books that are as important but also better written. The book is clear enough to be very well understood. Although I know a few authors that organize their material better and put more emphasis on concise sentences, one has to excuse Bellah for 1) dealing with a complex material often written in Japanese and 2) extracting a politco-econo-religious connection which too few social scientists have attempted. Highly recommended.
6 people found this helpful
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Dr. Mohamed Taher
5.0 out of 5 stars Tokugawa religion : the cultural roots of modern Japan
Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2005
Bellah begins by defining religion as "a set of symbolic forms and acts that relate man to the ultimate conditions of his existence." He argues that beginning with the single cosmos of the undifferentiated primitive religious worldview in which life is a "one possibility thing," evolution in the religious sphere is toward the increasing differentiation and complexity of symbol systems. His evolutionary religious taxonomy specifies five stages: primitive (e.g., Australian Aborigines), archaic (e.g., Native American), historic (e.g., ancient Judaism, Confucianism, Buddhism, Islam, early Palestinian Christianity), early modern (e.g., Protestant Christianity), and modern (religious individualism). In the modern stage of religious evolution, the hierarchic dualistic religious symbol system that emerged in the historic epoch is collapsed and the symbol system that results is "infinitely multiplex." In this posttraditional situation, the individual confronts life as an "infinite possibility thing," and is "capable, within limits, of continual self-transformation and capable, again within limits, of remaking the world, including the very symbolic forms with which he deals with it, even the forms that state the unalterable conditions of his own existence."
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An interesting perspective on Protestant Work Ethic applied / tested in other cultural setting.
3 people found this helpful
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wutanglen
3.0 out of 5 stars Good Thesis, but a Difficult Read
Reviewed in the United States on February 17, 2000
The Thesis is important. The idea that the religious beliefs of the Japanese, a mix of Zen, Buddhism, Shinto, and a bit of Confucianism, created a Protestant like Work ethic in Japan. It is intriguing. The Weber thesis of Western Europe and the North American states that the Protestant religion ground in many a pull yourself up by the bootstraps mentality is a good one. Look at the economic and industrial success of majority Protestant countries vs. majority Catholic countries. Bellah carries this type of idea to the Japanese. The vocabulary of this book is tought. It is not an easy read, but it is informative and it is thought provoking.
10 people found this helpful
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Patrick McCoy
935 reviews
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September 22, 2011
I was so impressed with Robert Bellah’s book of essays about Japan and Japanese culture, Imagining Japan, that I tracked down his earliest book, Tokugawa Religion (1958). Again he has some interesting things to say about the Japanese and their culture. For example:
It is the particular system or collectivity of which one is a member, which counts, whether it be family, han, or Japan as a whole. Commitment to these tends to take precedence over universalistic commitments, such as commitment to truth or justice.
Bellah makes the claim that the religion of the Tokugawa period influenced Japan in the Meiji period to undergo modernization in a manner that reflects the Protestant work ethic that was influential in the modernization of the west as expounded by Max Weber. It seems as a sociologist Bellah is something of a disciple of Weber, which is also evident in Habits of the Heart. He sees the “shinsu” religion as the closest to Western Protestantism and its ethic most similar to the Protestant ethic. Religion is seen as means of maintaining and intensifying central values, supplying motivation, and reinforcing asceticism and diligence and economy. He also points out that if religion gets credit for modernity, it also deserves the blame for imperialism that resulted in WWII.
He also states that Japan didn’t have to go through the slow process of accumulation like the west in order to modernize. The capital required was too great, thus government controlled modernization due to lack of capital in the private sector. (He cites Kemalist Turkey as an example of this model) He also states that modernization should first be seen in political terms and not only in economic development. It is political because it was concerned with the increase of power and wealth as a means. This is seen in the “zaibutsu” economy, which was dependent on government for support. There was also a desire to restore the emperor and increase national power.
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Nash
48 reviews
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August 26, 2007
This book grew out of Professor Bellah's own dissertation in the 60s, so the readers should read with that information in mind. As you would expect from someone who did a Ph.D. at Harvard and also the first of its kind to sort of do a DOUBLE DEGREE by combining East Asia Studies with Sociology, this book is packed with well-researched information of Tokugawa Japan. If you a sociologist, though, you may not agree with all the theoretical assumption he made. But then, again, it was the sign of time. Don't be upset when you read something that you don't agree. Even Professor Bellah himself sort of changed his mind years later in his Foreword for later editions! Despite the changes in recent sociological theories, this book serves as a solid foundation for researchers of subsequent eras to build upon, agreeing with it or otherwise.
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