Sections 201–220201~220단

Of the sotoba of Taibon Gejo (退凡下乘), the outer one is Gejo and the inner one is Taibon.

Nothing is written down to say that the tenth month is called Kaminazuki, the month without gods, and that rites for the gods (神事) must be avoided in it. No source text is to be found either.

Perhaps it has this name only because there are no festivals at the shrines in this month.

Some say that in this month all the gods gather at the Daijingu, but there is no ground for it. If that were so, Ise above all should keep this month as a month of festivals, yet there is no such practice.

There are many instances of imperial progresses to the shrines in the tenth month. But most of them are ill-omened instances.

The rule for hanging a quiver on the house of a man in imperial disfavor has died out, and no one now knows it.

When the Emperor was ill, or when the world at large was in turmoil, a quiver was hung on the Tenjin shrine of Gojo. The god at Kurama called Yuki no Myojin is also a god on whom a quiver was hung.

When the quiver carried by the kantoku no osa was hung on a house, no one went in or out.

After this practice died out, in the present age it has become the fixing of a seal.

When a criminal is beaten with the rod, he is bound fast to the torture frame. The shape of the frame and the manner of binding him to it are known, they say, to no one now.

The kishomon written on Mount Hiei by calling upon the Great Teacher was first written by Jie Sojo.

The kishomon is not a matter dealt with by the law officials (法曹). In the sage reigns of old there was no governing carried on by written oaths at all. It is in recent times that this thing has spread.

Also, by the codes, water and fire take no defilement, while a vessel is held to take defilement.

When the Minister of the Right Tokudaiji was Betto of the Kebiishi, the council of the Shicho was being held at the middle gate. The ox of the officer Akikane broke loose and came into the office. It climbed onto the hamayuka, the dais that was the Betto's seat, and lay there chewing the cud.

They all said that it was a grave portent and that the ox should be sent to the yin-yang master.

His father the Chancellor heard of it and said, "An ox has no judgment. If it has feet, where will it not climb? There is no reason why a weak officer should have taken from him the poor ox that carried him to court for once." He sent the ox back to its owner and had only the mats it had lain on changed.

No ill thing came of it at all, they say.

It is said that when a man sees a strange thing and does not treat it as strange, the strangeness collapses of itself.

When the ground was being leveled to build the Kameyama Palace, there was a mound where great snakes beyond counting lay coiled together.

They said it was the god of the place, and when the matter was reported, the Retired Emperor asked, "What should be done?" Everyone said, "If they have held this ground since ancient times, they cannot lightly be dug out and thrown away."

But this minister alone said, "What harm can worms that live on the king's land do when an imperial residence is being built? Demons and gods have no evil in them. There is nothing here to blame. Only dig them all out and be rid of them."

So the mound was broken up and the snakes were sent down the Oi River. No harm came of it at all.

In tying the cords of sutra scrolls and the like, it is the common way to cross them from above and below and then draw the head of the loop out sideways between the two strands.

Koshun Sojo of Kegonin undid one tied in that way and had it done over. "This is the modern fashion," he said. "It is very ugly. To do it properly, simply wind the cord round and round and slip the end of the loop in from above downward."

He was a man of the old time, and he knew such things.

A man who was at law over another's rice field lost the suit, and out of spite he sent men to cut the rice of that field and carry it off.

They began by cutting the fields along the road as well. When someone said, "This is not the place you were at law over. Why do you do this?" the cutters said, "There is no right for us to cut that place either. But we are men going out to do a wrong, so where would we not cut?"

Their reasoning was very funny.

Of the yobukodori they say only that it belongs to the spring. Nothing sets down clearly what kind of bird it is.

In a certain Shingon book there is an order of service for calling back the souls of the dead, performed when the yobukodori cries. This is the nue.

In a long poem in the Man'yoshu it is joined to such words as "the long spring day when the haze rises." The nuedori too sounds close to the yobukodori in the way it is used.

Nothing at all is to be trusted. The foolish trust in things deeply, and so they come to resent and to rage.

Power is not to be trusted: the strong perish first. Riches are not to be trusted: they are easily lost in a moment. Talent is not to be trusted: even Confucius did not meet his time. Virtue is not to be trusted: even Yan Hui was unfortunate. The favor of a lord is not to be trusted: punishment comes swiftly. The obedience of servants is not to be trusted: they turn and run away. The goodwill of others is not to be trusted: it is certain to change. Promises are not to be trusted: there is little good faith in them.

If a man trusts neither himself nor others, he rejoices when things are right and does not resent it when they are wrong. When there is room to left and right he is not caught; when there is distance before and behind he is not blocked. When the space is narrow he is crushed and broken.

When a man uses his mind narrowly and harshly, he goes against things and quarrels and is ruined. When he is broad and gentle, not one hair of him is harmed.

Man is the spirit of heaven and earth. Heaven and earth have no limit. How should the nature of man be different? When he is broad and great and without end, joy and anger do not touch him, and nothing troubles him.

The autumn moon is a thing beyond all praise. A man who says the moon is the same at any season, and cannot tell one from another, is truly to be pitied.

When coals are put in the brazier before the Emperor, they are not taken up with the fire tongs. They must be moved straight from the earthen vessel. So the charcoal must be piled with care that it does not roll off.

On the progress to Hachiman, an attendant wearing a jo-e (淨衣) took up the charcoal with his hand. A man learned in court usage said, "On a day when a man wears white, there is no harm in using the tongs."

The music called Sofuren does not take its name from a woman longing for a man. It was first Shofuren (相府蓮), 'the lotus of the minister's residence,' and the two were written for one another.

It is the music of the time when Wang Jian of Jin, being a minister, planted lotuses at his house and loved them. From this a minister is called renpu (蓮府).

Kaikotsu (廻忽) is likewise Huihu (廻鶻). There was a strong barbarian country called Huihu. After those barbarians submitted to the Han, they came and played the music of their own country.

Taira no Nobutoki Ason, when he was old, told this as a tale of the past.

"Saimyoji Nyudo sent for me one evening at dusk. I said I would come at once, but I had no hitatare, and while I was casting about for one, a messenger came again and said, 'Have you no hitatare, then? It is night, so come quickly, however odd your dress.'

"So I went in a limp hitatare, just as I was at home. He brought out a flask with a cup set on it and said, 'It was lonely to drink this wine alone, so I called you. There is nothing to eat with it. The household must be asleep. See whether there is anything fit for it, and look wherever you like.'

"So I took a paper torch and searched every corner, and on a shelf in the kitchen I found a small earthen dish with a little miso stuck to it. I said, 'I have found this.' 'That will do well enough,' he said, and gladly we went on to cup after cup, and he was merry.

"In those days things were like that."

On his way to worship at Tsurugaoka, Saimyoji Nyudo sent a man ahead to the house of Ashikaga Sama Nyudo and stopped there.

What the host set out was this: with the first cup, beaten abalone; with the second, shrimp; with the third, kaimochi, and there it ended. At that seat the host and his wife and Ryuben Sojo sat as the people of the house.

Then the guest said, "I look forward to the dyed cloth of Ashikaga that I receive every year." "It is ready," said the host, and there before him he had the women make thirty bolts of dyed cloth of many kinds into kosode, and sent them after him.

A man who saw it was living until lately, and it was he who told this.

A certain great rich man said, "A man should put all else aside and give himself wholly to gathering wealth. To be poor is to live without worth. Only the rich are counted as men.

"If you would gather wealth, you must first train your mind for it. That mind is nothing strange. Hold to the thought that man lives on and on, and never for a moment look upon impermanence. This is the first rule of the mind.

"Next, you must not meet every need. A man in this world, for himself and for others, has wants beyond number. If you follow your desires and think to have your way, a million coins will not stay with you even for a while. Wants never come to an end; wealth has an end. To follow endless wants with wealth that has an end cannot be done.

"If a want stirs in your heart, know that an evil thought has come to destroy you. Be strict and afraid, and do not spend even a little.

"Next, if you think of money as a servant to be used as you please, you will never be free of the misery of poverty. Fear money and honor it as you would a lord or a god, and do not order it about.

"Next, though you meet with shame, do not be angry and do not resent it.

"Next, be honest and keep your promises firmly.

"For the man who keeps this rule and seeks gain, wealth will come as fire goes to what is dry and as water goes to what is low.

"When money is heaped up and does not run out, he makes nothing of feasting and music and women, he does not adorn his dwelling, and though he does not have his wants, his heart is always at peace and glad."

Yet men seek wealth in order to have their wants. Money is counted as wealth because it answers our wants. To have wants and not fulfill them, and to have money and not use it, is to be the same as a poor man altogether. What is there then to take pleasure in?

This teaching seems to say only that a man should cut off the wants of the world and not grieve at being poor. Better to have no wealth at all than to make desire your pleasure. Better not to have the boil than to wash it in water and call that pleasure.

Come to this point, and there is nothing to divide poor from rich. Kukyo (究竟) is the same as risoku (理即). Great desire resembles no desire at all.

The fox is a creature that bites people.

At Horikawa-dono a toneri was bitten in the foot as he slept.

At Ninnaji, a low-ranking monk passing before the main temple at night was set upon by three foxes that sprang at him and bit him. He drew his sword and fought them off, and stabbed two of the foxes. One he stabbed to death, and two got away. The monk was bitten in many places, but he came to no great harm.

The Shijo Komon said, "Tatsuaki is a man of high standing in that art. The other day he came and said, 'It is the height of my poor judgment and a very rough thing to say, but I privately think there may be something questionable about the fifth hole of the flute. The reason is this. The kan (干) hole is hyojo, and the fifth hole is shimomu, and between them lies shozetsu. The upper hole is sojo, and next comes fusho, and the shaku (夕) hole is oshiki. Next comes rankei, and the middle hole is banshiki, and between the middle hole and the sixth lies shinsen. In this way one pitch is hidden in every gap, but the fifth hole alone has no pitch in the gap above it, and yet the gaps are spaced alike. That is why its sound is unpleasant. So when a man blows this hole he must always draw back. When he cannot draw back, it does not match the other sounds. Few can blow it well.' The height of his judgment is truly delightful. This is what is meant when they say that the master who goes before fears the one who comes after."

On another day Kagemochi said, "The sho is tuned before it is taken up, so a man has only to blow it. The flute is tuned within the breath while it is blown, so at every hole, on top of what is taught by word of mouth (口傳), a man must add the gift he was born with and put his heart into it. This is not a matter of the fifth hole alone. Nor should it be laid down that one must always draw back. If a man blows badly, no hole sounds well. A master blows them all in tune. When the ryoritsu (呂律) does not fit the other instruments, the fault is the man's, not the instrument's."

"In all things the outlying country is coarse and rude, but the dance music of Tennoji alone need not blush before the capital." When this was said, a musician of Tennoji told me this.

"The music of this temple is matched well against the tone chart, and its sounds are in beautiful order beyond any other place. The reason is that the chart of the Prince's day is here still, and we take it for our standard. It is the bell before the Rokujido. Its sound is the very middle of the oshiki mode. Since it rises and falls with the cold and the heat, we take for our guide the time between the Nirvana Assembly in the second month and the Shoryoe. It is a secret matter. With this one pitch we tune every sound."

In general the sound of a bell should be in the oshiki mode. This is the mode of impermanence, the sound of the Hall of Impermanence at the Jetavana monastery.

The bell of Saionji was to be cast in the oshiki mode, and it was recast many times without success, until one was sought out and found in a distant province.

The bell of Hokongoin is also in the oshiki mode.