When it comes to Japan, most people harbor a subtle and complex emotion. China and Japan not only have indelible hatred of the country and family, but also have a profound friendship of "mountains and rivers in exotic lands, wind and moon in the same sky". Why is Japan, also rooted in traditional East Asian civilization, on a different development path than China? When did Japan evolve into a strange existence different from us? How should we understand the development of modern Sino-Japanese relations?
Professor Li Yongjing of the Department of Political Science of East China Normal University's "Mutation: Two Thousand Years of Japan" analyzes the above problems by tracing the origins of modern Japan.
Looking at Sino-Japanese relations from the perspective of 2,000 years of evolutionary history
Source | The topic of today's lecture by LUJIAZUI Reading Club LUJIAZUIBOOKCLUB is a bit big, called "The Origin of Modern Japan." So why are we talking about the question of "origin"? One of the main reasons is that our cognition is very easy to be limited by the things in front of us, resulting in our view of problems easily staying on the surface phenomena and relationships of the present, and it is difficult to form a deep understanding, which can be said to be a weakness of human nature. Exploring the origins of things is a relatively efficient way to overcome this problem. When we talk about Japan, we also need to look at it from multiple levels and perspectives, so that we can see in more detail the various mechanisms by which problems are formed.
In fact, the topic of "Japan" is not very easy to talk about, because we are accustomed to defining Japan and even Sino-Japanese relations in terms of familiar things, such as political and economic relations, and historical understanding issues, while ignoring the diversity and complexity of the objects themselves. Since we do not know the origin of the relevant things and events, we will form corresponding misunderstandings.
I remember three or four years ago in Wuhan, when people were enjoying cherry blossoms, there was a girl who was mistaken for wearing a Japanese "kimono" and caused some controversy, and the girl clarified that she was not wearing "kimono" but "Hanfu". While I have always suspected that this event may have been deliberately committed by good actors, it also shows that we lack awareness of the origins of Japanese things and the evolution of our own clothing.
Our current concern for Japan is nothing more than on topics such as politics, economics, people-to-people exchanges, and historical understanding, and there are many unknown details behind these topics. For example, in the early days of the outbreak of the epidemic last year, Japanese society launched an active fundraising campaign for China, and even the phenomenon of collective donations by members of the Diet, that is, Japanese politicians, so that the slogan "mountains and rivers, wind and moon on the same day" became a hot topic in the Chinese media for a while, which is quite telling. If these phenomena are interpreted from a single perspective, it will greatly limit our understanding.
Japanese supplies to support Hubei during the epidemic
The exchanges between China and Japan in the past two decades have been hot and cold. For example, during the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, Japan donated money, supplies and rescue teams, and relations between China and Japan, which had been very cold for several years, improved but soon became estranged. After the 2011 East China Sea earthquake, China immediately donated supplies and then sent personnel into the unidentified Fukushima radiation disaster area – a very courageous act – and the relationship between the two sides became a little closer. However, when the Diaoyu Islands incident broke out in 2012, the two sides immediately turned on each other. After that, bilateral relations entered a state of tug-of-war. This brief review shows that China and Japan tend to get closer to each other in the face of disasters and estranged in peacetime. Knowing these historical details, we cannot simply solidify Sino-Japanese relations with a few labels.
Fukushima nuclear radiation disaster area
Many people are very concerned about Japan's general election some time ago and want to know how the new prime minister will affect Sino-Japanese relations. However, friends who have studied international relations know that there are many layers that affect international relations, and it is very narrow to focus only on politicians and leaders. To paraphrase the social sciences, many things are determined by relatively stable "structures." If we can go back to the origin and think, we can properly withdraw ourselves from the cognitive limitations of the present and form another understanding of the current situation. That's why we focus on the origin of things.
The origin of Japan, which I mentioned in my book, begins with written history, and is about 2,000 years according to the current record. Because the time span is very long, I only selected some iconic node events in the book. I have a saying in the book that "Japan originated in China", which actually has a special meaning, that is, the earliest written records of Japan appear in the history books of ancient China. Ancient Japan—then known as the "Wakoku"—first appeared in the Book of Han, and was later recorded in the Book of the Later Han and the Records of the Three Kingdoms. During the formation of ancient Japan, the first event I paid attention to was the "Crowning of the Emperor Wa".
"Wakoku" is the ancient Chinese's name for the city-states on the Japanese archipelago at that time; "The Emperor of the Wa" refers to the acceptance of the canonization of the Chinese Dynasty, that is, becoming a vassal of the Chinese Dynasty. This incident first took place during the Western Han Dynasty, when China's sphere of influence reached the south-central part of the Korean Peninsula, so it was natural for the King of the Wao to ask the Han Dynasty to canonize him as the king of the Japanese archipelago. From this moment on, Japan ceased to be an isolated island nation, but was integrated into the East Asian world system. Speaking of this, friends may think that this is nothing special, but we should note that there is a cognitive point here, that is, the formation of national self-consciousness - Japan formed a special consciousness around the 4th century AD: the heavenly consciousness.
The current Prime Minister of Japan, Fumio Kishida
We know that the emperors of the Chinese Dynasty called themselves "Son of Heaven" and governed "Tianxia" according to the mandate of Heaven, and Japan also formed the concept of "Tianxia". This leads to the question: "There is no royal land under the whole world", "the Son of Heaven" should be unique, since China already has the Son of Heaven, how can Japan have another one?" Analyzed on a spiritual level, this is the first step in the formation of self-consciousness in Japan. This sense of self-esteem that rivals the Chinese dynasty has been buried in the soil like a seed. Next, we can observe how this seed breaks the ground, how it deforms, develops and grows little by little under the moisture of natural rain.
The second landmark event soon appeared, that is, the "Daika Reform", which was very important in Japanese history. Beginning in 645 AD, the Japanese emperor reformed the Tang system, which was the most advanced system in the world at that time, and Japan stepped from a low-level tribal country to an advanced country with institutional civilization in one fell swoop. Speaking of which, some friends may think of the so-called "democratic reform" led by the United States in Japan after its defeat in 1945. If you don't know the origin of Japanese history, many people will simply believe that American-style democracy can transform a civilization and even tame the "thorn-headed country". This view and understanding is obviously too simplistic.
Su I, a famous Japanese minister in history who was killed for "Dahua reform", entered the deer
To make a long story short, one of the very important reasons why Japan was able to quickly accept new things after the war was that there was a precedent in Japanese history. Japan is willing to carry out reforms based on advanced civilization, and the "Great Transformation and Reform" is such a precedent; With such precedents and foundations, it is not difficult to understand the comprehensive absorption of modern Western institutional civilization by Meiji Japan, like the Meiji period in the mid-to-late 19th century. The development of civilization has a succession, and the Japanese ethnic group is very willing to accept advanced civilization, which is an advantage of the Japanese.
After the Daika reform, Japan gave birth to a new national name, that is, from "Wakoku" to "Japan". The Japanese envoy specially dismissed the Chinese emperor for this reason. At that time, Wu Zetian was in power, and she specially issued an edict that the term "Japan" would be used in future diplomatic documents. The original meaning of "Japan" is "the country of the sunrise", which actually contains the careful thinking of Japanese politicians at that time - Japan regarded itself as the "country of the sunrise", the sun rose in the east and set in the west, so the Chinese Dynasty located in the west of Japan was naturally the "country of sunset". On the other hand, the Japanese also realized that the word "倭" is not only not pronounced beautifully, but also has a beautiful shape. These nuanced and subtle contrasts between oneself and the Chinese world reflect the evolution and formation of Japan's sense of self.
Now that Japan has developed a self-consciousness of independent naming, the next friction is inevitable. In 663 AD, the first war between Japan and China, the Battle of Shiramura River, broke out. Japan sent 20,000 elite troops to the Korean Peninsula to fight a battle with the Tang Dynasty, and although Japan eventually suffered a crushing defeat, the whole incident still seemed a little incredible. Because Japan was well aware that the Tang Dynasty was a very powerful regime on the East Asian continent, it would send elite troops to war with the Chinese Dynasty for the help of such a small country as Baekje on the Korean Peninsula. In fact, this matter does not stem from simple impulses, but has the deep support and motivation of self-awareness that competes with China. After this war, we can notice similar mechanisms of spirit and desire in the following war between China and Japan.
The Battle of Baekchon River was a hot war between China and Japan over the Korean issue, and since then the wars between the two countries have also revolved around the Korean Peninsula; Among them, one of the more famous in history is the War to Aid Korea, which resisted Toyotomi Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty. From 1592 to 1598, the two sides fought intermittently for seven years, consuming countless manpower and material resources. Some say that it was this war that led to the emptiness of the treasury of the Ming Dynasty and became the trigger for its subsequent demise. Next, there is the well-known Sino-Japanese War and the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea. Although the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea is ostensibly a war between China and the United States, in fact, the root cause is still the legacy of the Sino-Japanese War, and in the final analysis, it is a problem of reconstructing the East Asian order system.
Because of time constraints, we can only make a very brief review of Sino-Japanese relations here, but even so, we have discovered a relatively stable variable in the process: spirit and desire, which are relatively stable mechanisms that support human behavior.
In June of this year, I talked about the current Sino-Japanese relationship in a casual conversation with a Japanese friend. Today, he said, the Japanese are still worried about being "annexed" or "engulfed" by China. I think that the ideas of contemporary Japanese people and those of contemporary Chinese can be said to be completely different; China is committed to building a "community with a shared future for mankind" and has no intention of annexing any country. This huge difference in cognition between the two sides is a kind of "social fact" that we should take seriously; Or rather, it is an epistemic, psychological, conceptual fact. Because ideas are a stable psychological structure that has gradually formed in history, Japan's worries about China's "annexation" or "engulfment" have deep historical and psychological roots, just as China's self-consciousness of building a "community with a shared future for mankind" has deep historical and psychological roots.
Returning to the historical records of Japan, there is another very important issue, that is, the problem of writing. Around the 8th century, Japan gradually developed its own script. We know that the Japanese alphabet is divided into "hiragana" and "katakana"; According to historical records, katakana comes from monks who copied Buddhist scriptures and wrote them with neat and dignified strokes to show devotion, while hiragana comes from cursive writing and is used for everyday writing and expression. From the process of absorbing Chinese characters in Japan, we can see the special way that the Japanese treat foreign things: they will do the most detailed and thorough analysis of foreign things, then change them for their own use, and finally become completely part of themselves.
We know that kanji are hieroglyphs, one of the most difficult languages in the world, and the ancient Japanese used both kanji ideograms and phonetics, which was actually very difficult. There is a very famous sinologist in Japan called Shirakawa Shizune, who specializes in Chinese characters, and he noticed the influence of Chinese characters on the Japanese national spirit. From the point of view of origin, this effect may be difficult for us to imagine.
We can imagine that for a people who do not yet have a written word, when they suddenly see Chinese characters, they will feel that it is like a heavenly book, like a spell, and even deify it, just like we look at oracle bone today, and we can imagine that this impact is huge. After centuries of digestion, the Japanese began to edit kanji and completely transform them into their own script. This process shaped the way the Japanese think, and when they faced a developed civilization again, they would operate in the same way, absorbing it and transforming it into a part of their own civilization. For example, Japan's absorption of Confucianism and Buddhist thought is quite smooth. From an outside perspective, we may find this an amazing process; But if you look at the origins of Japan, you will find that this is actually a natural thing. This is my understanding of the "origin of modern Japan".
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Since the language issue was mentioned, I would also like to mention in passing the negative influence of Japanese writing on China. We know that one of the characteristics of ancient Chinese is the use of single characters, and modern Chinese has a large number of two-character words, some of which are created by the Japanese before and after the Meiji Restoration. Relevant research by scholars has shown that there are three types of two-character words borrowed from Japanese in modern Chinese; One is entirely a creation of the modern Japanese, and the other is a similar character in ancient Chinese, but the modern Japanese have given them new meanings and usages. A typical example is the word "society"; There was a combination of these two characters in ancient Chinese texts before, but the meaning was completely different from today. There are also many words that surprise us, such as the everyday words "correct" and "excellent", which I thought we had since ancient times, but they also originated in Japan. When we express our cognition in words, language has a subtle effect on our thinking. If kanji influenced the way the ancient Japanese saw the world, the way we see the world today also has the influence of Japan after the Meiji Restoration.
Finally, I would like to point out again that the subtitle of the book "Mutation: Two Thousand Years of Japan" is easily misunderstood as this book is about Japanese history, but it is not; The theme of this book is to analyze the historical origin of Japanese things today, and it is an attempt to conduct a kind of psychoanalysis of the Japanese nation and culture. On the one hand, I hope that this kind of work will help us clarify the origins of what we see as "modern Japanese society", so that we can examine Sino-Japanese relations more objectively; On the other hand, by analyzing the relationship between China and Japan that has formed a long-term evolutionary relationship with each other, I also hope that we can reflect on ourselves and form a new understanding of ourselves and civilization.