Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan (21 page)
Read Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan Online
Authors: Herbert P. Bix
Tags: #General, #History, #Biography & Autobiography, #Military, #World War II
To instruct the crown prince and his five classmates, Shiratori wrote five volumes of “national history,” titled simply
Kokushi
. The first chapter of volume 1 of the
Kokushi
, or “General Introduction,” addresses the racial origins of the Japanese and begins by stating the essence of his views on the national ideology:
The imperial house unified our land and people and created the empire. Not only did it rule as the head of state, it also became integrated with the people and the head of their religion. Because of the ineffable feeling of intimacy between the throne and the people, the imperial house was able to create an extremely firm foundation for a state. However, just as the imperial house is a line of emperors unbro
ken for ages eternal; the people too, from generation to generation, father to child, have propagated down to today. Not once has there been a change in the race. Therefore we, descendants of the people who assisted the founder at the time of her creation of the state, have carried out the will of our ancestors and become eternally loyal subjects. The successive imperial families have loved the loyal subjects of their progenitor and always trusted in the people's cooperation in carrying out their grand plans. This indeed is the essence of our
kokutaiâ¦.
There is no mistakeâ¦in saying that we have been a homogeneous race since antiquity.
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Shiratori's unusually clear statement of the national ideology starts with the exceptional nature of the Japanese “race” and ends with the theme of its homogeneity. In between it entrenches myth and the sacred at the point of origin. It stresses the unbroken line of imperial succession from the divine “foundress,” implying that Japan has been under the continuous control of a descendant of the gods. The uniqueness of the polity lies also in the inexpressible connection between the imperial house and the people. Japanese subjects have been, and will continue to be, “eternally loyal,” always serving successive emperors “in carrying out their grand plans.”
Shiratori implanted in Hirohito's mind the very same ideas about the “national polity” that had been taught in the public school system ever since Emperor Meiji, in the early 1880s, had ordered that history instruction start with the meaning of the foundation myths.
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By highlighting the notion of the divine origin of the imperial line, and linking it to the myth of the racial superiority and homogeneity of the Japanese, Shiratori impeded anything near an objective discussion of Japanese history. These two key elements of prewar emperor ideology became a critical part of Hirohito's intellectual inheritance.
Kokushi
does not explicitly distinguish between myth and history. It narrates myths about the emperor's divinity in the spirit of
the Imperial Rescript on Educationâthe document that placed the emperor at the center of the nation's spiritual life and guided the Japanese people in worshiping him as a god. In “Emperor Jimmu” Shiratori continues “the story” of the founding of the state as narrated in the
Nihon shoki
. Although the
Nihon shoki
projected an idealized, fictional “Jimmu” (the direct descendant of Amaterasu
mikami) rather than historical fact, Shiratori nowhere indicates the difference in his text.
[Emperor Jimmu]â¦fought battles in many places, lost soldiers and imperial brothers, but never was beaten by disasters. Each time he met difficulty, he renewed his courage, became ever strongerâ¦and suffered together with his own soldiers. With the divine protection of his imperial ancestors and the assistance of loyal subjects, he finally accomplished his great purpose. Thereupon he built a palace in the land of Kashiwara at the southeast foot of Unebi Mountain, where he stored the imperial regalia and was enthroned as emperor.
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Shiratori went on to observe that Jimmu had been able to accomplish his great project because of “the people's love and affection for the imperial house, their loyalty and courage, their perseverance in difficulties, and their mutual cooperation and assistance of the emperor.” After his enthronement Jimmu rewarded those who had made contributions by appointing them as local governors, “thereby treating the people with boundless affection.”
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Shiratori wrote his “national history” to harmonize with the modern “emperor system,” of which he was a loyal servitor. He neither applied his critical skills to Japan's legendary beginnings nor insisted that the old stories related events that had never occurred and therefore constituted myth rather than fact. His textbook helped shape the religious imagination of the emperor every bit as much as Sugiura's ethics lectures did. We cannot know what Shiratori may have communicated verbally to Hirohito in discussions,
but he certainly did not
write
a more nuanced interpretation of the manifest deity concept until much later.
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Every single chapter of all five volumes of
Kokushi
, from Emperor Jimmu onward, is (as historian Tokoro Isao noted) named after an emperor. In the course of his narrative, Shiratori describes how the sacred mirror and sword came to be enshrined at Ise and Atsuta, how the imperial household compelled local rulers to surrender their sacred objectsâthe mirrors, jewels, and swords that were once the symbols of their authority; and how these “regalia” became the symbol of legitimacy of the imperial household.
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Through his examination of the “sacred virtues” of the leading emperors in Japanese history, Shiratori (like Sugiura) came to believe and to teach that emperors were often a driving force in the modernization of the country. The idea of the emperor as a promoter of progress had its roots in the early Meiji period and was another of the key concepts of modern emperor ideology. It meant the monarch's active promotion of the nation's material and spiritual culture and not simply the notion, common to all monarchies, of
noblesse oblige
, or the monarch's concern for his people. It is precisely this “modernizing” side of imperial leadership that Shiratori emphasized.
Shiratori's historical survey put at Hirohito's disposal numerous examples of activist emperors who had combined power and authority in their own person. Although his lectures teemed with examples of ancient and medieval emperors who embodied moral goodness and benevolence, Shiratori concluded that some medieval emperors, for all their virtues, were unable to rectify long-standing political evils and so “the sufferings of the people steadily increased.”
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Even when regents for child, adult, and abdicated emperors took the initiative, the deadlock of politics and economics remained unresolved until Japan entered the Kamakura period (1193â1336), when the
bakufu
(military government) controlled the country. Having brought his narrative forward into the age of the
warriors, Shiratori set out to show how the Imperial House continued to play an important role in government long after it had delegated political and military affairs to the
bakufu
.
He also cast a positive light on the northern dynasty, which had been neglected since the Meiji restoration, and from which Hirohito was descended. Only a few years earlier, in 1911, the old historical controversy over the question of imperial legitimacy during the period of the northern and southern courts (1336â92) had been resolved when the government of Prime Minister Katsura Tar
“decided in favor of southern legitimacy and decreed that henceforth the [primary school history] texts should deal with the years 1336 through 1392 as âThe Period of the Yoshino [that is, southern] court.'”
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Thus, at a time when Japanese general education deliberately obfuscated the existence of a major dynastic schism in the national history, fearing it might undermine popular belief in imperial sovereignty, Shiratori acknowledged the schism and treated the northern line of emperors sympathetically.
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Finally Shiratori reviewed the foreign wars of the Meiji era, explaining to Hirohito and his classmates how the modern empire was won through a process of constantly seeking “peace in the Orient,” taking into account the interests of other nations, and always acting toward neighbors benevolently and justly. Shiratori acknowledged Chinese resistance to the colonization of Taiwan after the war of 1894â95, but he was silent about the injustice involved in Korea's loss of sovereignty, presenting what occurred as of benefit not only to Koreans but to the “Orient” in general.
Of all the countries in the world, only our empire was able to secure peace in the Orient. Because Korea was the original reason why our empire had to fight earlier with China and later with Russia, the empire tried to destroy the root of this problem forever. As soon as the war of 1904â5 [against Russia] began, we made Korea promise to listen to our advice and concluded a type of treaty with it. When it came
to 1905, our empire made a new treaty in which it took control of Korea's diplomacy [that is, stripped it of its diplomatic rights], established a resident-general in Seoul, and had him manage Korean affairs.
After taking charge of Korea's diplomacy in order “to protect it” from threats by “other strong countries,” Japan encountered obstruction from the Korean court, which “turned its back on this agreement in 1907.” This led to a new treaty, by which the resident-general obtained the right to “supervise Korea's domestic politics” and “Korea became our protectorate.”
Nevertheless, this system proved insufficient for improving the institutions of Korea and enhancing the peace and welfare of that nation. So, in 1910, we made a treaty with Korea and permanently annexed it. Thus the root of the problem in the Orient, which had troubled the empire for many years, was completely removed.
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Shiratori's interpretation of Japanese-Korean relations reflects the moral complacency and hypocrisy of Japanese popular attitudes toward Korea at the time of its annexation. He also implies that the imperial project itself was sensible and rational, for annexing Korea established peace in the region and meant progress for Koreans.
Having reached the end of the Meiji era, Shiratori concluded by describing in superlative detail Crown Prince Hirohito's grandfather, Emperor Meiji. From early childhood Meiji was active and courageous but also subdued, self-disciplined, frugal, benevolent, and wise, and always generous to his subjects. Meiji learned from the lectures of his entourage and listened attentively to those who brought him information. Moreover, “The emperor had a deep fondness for
waka
poetry and day and night recited verse. By writing his own poetry he naturally gained a benevolent heart [migokoro
].”
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Shiratori was successful in his main aims of furnishing Hirohito with examples of imperial benevolence, explaining the process of development of Japanese history, and stimulating his interest in history in general.
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In later years Hirohito acquired more detailed knowledge of the Meiji era from reading
Meiji tenn-ki
[Chronicles of Emperor Meiji], which was edited and completed by officials of the Imperial Household Ministry in 1933 but kept hidden in the Imperial Household Ministry until the centennial year of the Meiji Restoration, 1968, when the first volumes began to be published. Even today scholars are not allowed to examine the primary materials on which it is based.
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