Accounts from a Pure Land Buddhist priest/activist.

My friend, Jason (who helps translate), and I went for a second visit to Shingyou 真行寺 temple to meet with Takanobu Fujioka, a Jodo shinshu priest who has done his own research with the Jodo sect during WWII. He was seven years old when the war ended and recalled seeing at his elementary school field villagers being trained to stab US soldiers with the sharpened end of a bamboo pole as they floated down parachutes. His point was that everyone, civilians and soldiers alike, were fully committed to the war effort. As the government established State Shinto endorsed the emperor as the direct descendent of the gods, Japan felt fully entitled to impose its power over the rest of the world.

Under this auspices according to Fujioka san, local Jodo priests praised the war in sermons and gave their dead soldiers posthumous names that demarcated high honor and gratitude. Parishes in Kumamoto alone raised enough money to buy two airplanes and give them as donations to the Japanese air force.

This disturbing photograph was sent from one of his [father's] parishioners to the temple from China as evidence of his efforts in the war. It suggests that the soldier was responding to an endorsement the temple had given him in going to war.



A piece of information I'm still seeking out is to what extent specific temples in the prefecture were actively propagandizing the war. Unfortunately, according to Fujioka san, records of sermons from that period do not exist. As a result, there is little evidence to verify what temples were more supportive than others. I'm hoping that over the course of this year, I can collect more first-hand accounts from local priests or parishioners who lived through the war. Given that priests who questioned the war were jailed (and in a few cases executed), its little surprise that there are no accounts of war protests in Kumamoto during WWII (according to Fujioka san's findings). However, given the near obligatory support expected from temples at the time, an absence of support from any temple during that time might reflect resistance to endorse the war.

Interviews

Recently I've been interviewing more Pure Land Buddhist priests around Kumamoto in order to collect more personal stories and archives concerning the war period. Because my language skills are not fluent yet and my interviewies speak little to no English, I typed up a short introduction about my project that I give at the beginning of the interview. It provides a little picture into what I'm doing. It's written here first in English, then in Japanese for Japanese readers.

"I am currently researching the Pure Land Buddist sect in Kumamoto during the Pacific war period. In the past decade, books in English and Japanese have been published revealing the ways Buddhist sects heavily supported the war effort. While most of the findings concern the institutional level, little information has been provided about local level activity during the war.
Japan was not only invaded other countries during the Pacific war, but it too was heavily attacked in retaliation by US forces, culminating in the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Kumamoto as well suffered great loss especially towards the end of the war. Under these conditions, I am interested in exploring what role local temples played throughout the war. Did they openly endorse it? Was there resistance? Did they simply follow suit unquestioningly?
The information I am collecting is mainly through documents that the Kumamoto Pure Land branch has published itself, through interviews with priests and parishioners, and through newspaper archives.
I hope to eventually publish a paper based on my findings in a scholarly journal."

研究の目標

現在、私は大平洋戦争の頃の熊本の浄土真宗について研究しています。
少し前に、すべての仏教の戦争の後援を元に数冊の本が出版されました。しかし、そういった本には大体宗教指導者と政府間との政策のことしか書かれてありません。地元のお寺の情報については得る事が困難です。
ご存知の通り、戦争で日本はアジア諸国に戦いを仕掛けましたが、反撃もよく受けました。熊本もまた標的の一つとされました。その様な状況下で、熊本のお寺がどの様な役割を果たしたのかという事に関心があります（賛成、反対、無反応？）。
こういった研究をインタビュー、浄土真宗に関係のある出版物、新聞記事などで調査してみたいのです。最終的に、その調査結果をまとめて論文を書きたいと思っております。

Books in my war chest.

Here are a few books that have been really helpful lately in my understanding of Japanese Buddhist involvement during WWII.

Brian Daizen Victoria exposes institutional Buddhism's unconditional support of the war-time government in great depth in Zen at War (Second Edition, 2006). It's a fascinating look at how heads of all sects fully endorsed the totalitarian regime, giving soldiers and generals alike religious justification in going to war.

The second book, Sengo goju nen: Nenbutsusha no Heiwa he no Koe (Fifty years after the War: The voices of prayers for peace)(1995), is a collection of recounts from the war by Pure Land Buddhist priests from Kumamoto. Unlike Victoria's focus on institutional Buddhism, this book provides narrative to ordinary priests living through a devastating situation back home. I'm hoping to combine these stories with interviews of priests in Kumamoto alive during that period as the foundation for my paper.