Block the openings / video 56-3 Tao Te Ching

Today's Tao

Block the openings.

Close the gate. (Ch.56)


Japan stories


Have you ever tried to learn Japanese?

Or, have you ever heard someone saying that learning Japanese is too hard?

Learning Japanese is difficult, I agree, but I want to say: "speaking Japanese is not".

All the kids born and raised in Japan can speak Japanese without difficulty, of course, but even for them learning Japanese is tough.

Why is it?

There are two obvious reasons. One is Kanji / Chinese characters.

The other is the Japanese grammar that they teach inside and outside the country.

Most students in Japan hate Japanese grammar lessons. One cannot blame them because our skills to teach them is far from satisfying.

New comers to the islands of Geisha and Hello Kitty will soon discover that their spoken language is much easier than the one they have learned outside unless they have a daring ambition to speak it correctly, which most clients of Geisha and owners of Hello Kitty do not do.

The key is the quasi-non-existence of a subject in a sentence. Sometimes, they are not even allowed to pronounce a subject while talking.

Is it difficult for an English-speaker to imagine a language without a subject?

Once you comprehend this, you will have a much easier access to the language and the people who use it to think and communicate.

For the Japanese, "self" was not something to be born with but an abstract concept that they learned painstakingly. When all of the people had finally come to consider the notion of "self" as part of common sense, they just found out how physically and psychologically painful it was to live with it.

Isn't it high time the people who invented the word Zen (not Chan) evaluated the pros and cons of abandoning Mu ga 無我 (=No self) and embracing Ga 我 (=Self)?


To read the text for the video, please visit Tao by Matsumoto 56-3 Block the openings.


Tao answers your question!

One who says / video 56-2 Tao Te Ching

Today's Tao

One who says does not know. (Ch.56)


Japan stories


Words can tell us more than we imagine sometimes.

For example, the word Satori is internationally known these days, but I wonder how many people have ever tried to think about it etymologically.

"Sa" means «thus» and "tori" «take».

Therefore, the entire word Satori tells us to take all as it is.

The photo above is a scene that the Japanese were once very familiar with.

It is a sort of gambling for kids and kids-at-heart. You pay some money (equivalent to the price of a Big Mac; if you are an adult, you have to pay the price of a Big Mac + French fries) and receive five to six cork tops, which are toy bullets. You stretch your arm with the toy rifle, stabilize the body, aim for the middle of the target and shoot. If the target falls down, you can get it.

The expensive targets are often too heavy and never fall down. All you can do is to laugh and make the shop owner happy.

In by-gone days, this "shateki" was something typical at a "matsuri", or a Japanese fanfare.

Etymologically speaking, the word "ma" means «empty space-time»; "tsuri" means «suspended».

The word "matsuri" tells us that festivity is a suspended emptiness.


To read the text for the video, please visit Tao by Matsumoto 56-2 One who says.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 56-1 Say / video

Today's Tao

One who knows does not say. (Ch.56)


Japan stories


Life is floating. Or, we are living in a floating world.

Zen masters and Lao Tzu say that our soul does not go anywhere after its battery runs out. Life is just a catalyst to stimulate us.

Some people may want to regard life as a school, or a learning process to step up towards a better class in the spiritual hierarchy although Zen masters and Lao Tzu might find it a bit misleading.

The Japanese think we go to another world by way of water after our physical energy has run out. Zen masters, especially Dogen, is strongly against this idea, but what can they do?

At the beginning of the Obon week in summer, many Japanese families go to a river, a lake or a sea to meet the souls of the loved ones who have already left this floating world. A few days later, they lead the visiting souls back to the shore or the bank.

In both brief walks, we carry a chochin, or a paper lantern. On the way to meet the souls of the visitors, we don't light it. At the water's edge, we light the candle inside. The souls follow the light and come home with us. We spend some days together. On the way back, we light the lantern at home and lead the visitors to the water's edge. Then, we put out the candle flame there, stopping the souls of the other world from following us back to our home.

Beautiful as it may sound, it is a folklore belief, ladies and gentlemen.


To read the text for the video, please visit Tao by Matsumoto 56-1 Don't say.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 48-3 Do nothing / video

Today's Tao

By doing nothing, you can do everything. (Ch.48)

Japan stories

The Japanese are tired now. Not only the old ones, but also the young ones.

Especially the young male Japanese are very tired. Some of them are even too exhausted to make love.

The girls call them herbivore boys.

Men with a vital libido who do not miss a chance to "eat the meat of a girl" are considered carnivore.

Carnivore boys do not mind hanging around all night to look for their prey at Roppongi in Tokyo. On the other hand, the herbivore prefer staying at home without wasting energy.

The choice between them has nothing to do with the attractiveness of his personality or appearance. Herbivore boys are not necessarily ugly nor have bad manners. Some of them are good-looking and gentlemanly.

Simply, they do not have desire to follow his prey and to devour her heart and body. The herbivore boys are not interested in those "trifle" matters. There are much more important things in life. For example, taking the photos of trains and playing Loveplus on Nintendo DS.


Please visit Do nothing 48-3 to read the Today's Tao sentence.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 48-2 Reduce and reduce / video

Today's Tao

You reduce and reduce it.

Eventually, you reach the state of doing nothing. (Ch. 48)

Japan stories

Some things change. Other things remain the same.

Please look at the photo. I shot it in the parking lots of a supermarket in my hometown Chiba, Japan. The place was a rice paddy when I was a child.

Can you see what the boy is looking at? Those are Yakitori. Yaki mesa "to grill" and Tori "a bird". If you speak about its meaning etymologically, the word should be used only for grilled chicken on a bamboo skewer. But these days the term is employed to describe any meat on a skewer as the contradiction in the photo shows: on the red lantern it says "Yakitori", but most of the photos with prices are inviting you to buy «pork» on a skewer.

Although the image has integrated into a Japanese landscape, a van like this is not at all an authentic Yatai, which is a sort of ricksha with a kitchen facility. The chef would pull the cart, spraying the nice smell in the neighborhood. It was hard to resist.

Well, the smell hasn't change much. All the skewered meats being grilled tickle the inside of our nostrils from the distance.

Visit Japan and taste it!



To read the text of Today's Tao sentence, please visit Reduce and reduce 48-2.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 23-1 Say no words / video

Today's Tao

Saying no words makes things come about by themselves. (Ch.23)


Japan stories


Who is the best novelist ever in Japan?

Surely, the answers vary.

Some might say Murasaki shikibu (Lady Murasaki) who wrote «the Tale of Genji».

Other might say Yukio Mishima who committed Harakiri.

Haruki Murakami, the author of «Norwegian Wood», is certainly an up-and-coming star in Japanese literature.

It is a question without one definite answer, isn't it?

So, let's paraphrase the question.

Which Japanese novelist might you miss the most if he or she had not written any works?

My answer is Yasunari Kawabata and I guess that many fans of Japanese literature share the opinion.

Before his «Snow Country», the Japanese word Geisha was a pejorative. After his invention of the heroine Komako, the word has gained some divine power.

Komako the Onsen geisha (hot spa geisha) is the symbol of the pure and sacred womanhood in the collective consciousness of many Japanese and non-Japanese men and women.

"Not all the Japanese, though", I have to admit.



Mishima might have preferred a samurai boy to a geisha girl. Murakami may fancy a glass of gin and tonic with the author of «the Cather in the Rye» more than having Sake with Kawabata, served by a Komako at a snowy onsen ryokan (Japanese style inn).

But look at Japanese boys hanging around Akihabara who adore girls in a Maid Cafe. Aren't they looking for a Komako in a fantasized maid's cutsie wootsie costume?

Thank you, Mr. Kawabata. We are glad that you wrote it.


No matter how much Mishima tried to create his public image resembling the photo, his classmates at Gakushuin high school know who he was. Tough luck, Mishima-san.

-To read the text of Today's Tao, please visit Tao Te Ching Chapter 23-1 Say no words.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 22-1 Twisted / video

Today's Tao

Twisted therefore complete. (Ch.22)

Japan stories


When you visit a Buddhist temple or a Shintoist shrine, you will surely see it.

It is a piece of paper called "Omikuji".

You will find a bunch of them tied on the braches of the trees in its precincts.

Japanese men and women pay a few dollars or euros to a young lady working in vermilion and white traditional costume if it is at a Shinto shrine. In exchange, they receive this piece of paper.

As all the good students of Japanese know very well, the prefix "O" expresses politeness.

Though only advanced students of Japanese know it, the prefix "Mi" is an old way to express politeness.

The word "kuji" has plenty of respect, it seems.

It means "lottery".

Although it does not win you money or anything, it will tell you about your future.

Each piece of paper has detailed descriptions concerning your money, love, family, education, job, and others.

If you like what it is written, you keep it.

If you don't like it, you tie it on the branch. Then, divinity will take care of the purification of your bad luck.


To read the text of Today's Tao, please visit Tao Te Ching Chapter 22-1 Twisted. You will find a little article about Shohei Imamura's films, too.


Tao answers your question!



-They are based on a true story. In 1950 Kinkaku-ji / Golden Pavilion was burnt down. A young monk set fire. Yukio Mishima thought the temple was too beautiful for the monk to face. Another Japanese writer Tsutomu Minakami made up a totally different story. The young monk was having affair with a girl from the same village, who was now working in the quarter Gobancho, a district of pleasure.

Tao Te Ching Chapter 16-9 Satori / video

Today's Tao

Learning constancy is called enlightenment. (Ch.16)


Japan stories


Satori = Enlightenment? What is Satori, really?

The word has been confusing the Japanese mind for ages.

Most Japanese didn't give a hoot about Satori before because they were pesants and Shintoist-Buddhists (of a non-Zen school).

In principle, Zen buddhists were samurais, soldier-bureaucrats who occupied merely a fraction of Japanese population.

After the end of Tokugawa Shogun era, all the people became legally equal, and everyone wanted to behave like a samurai.

It was cool to meditate squatting in an exotic fashion and think about something abstract like Satori.

Well, what does it mean by Satori?

Linguistically, the word doesn't have a Chinese origin, which is quite rare since most of conceptual terms were imported from China in the middle age.

"Sa" means "that". "Tori" "take"

Please look at the photo above. Can you recognise four Kanji characters on the square wooden plate?

香取神宮 ka-tori-jin-gu

This is the name for one of the oldest Shinto shrines in Japan.

The second one from the top 取 is the Kanji for "tori / take".

So, Satori means "Take that".

Is it just a coincidence that it resembles Lao Tzu's «throw away that one and take this one.» (Chapter12 / Five Colours)?


Tao answers your question!



To read the text of Today's Tao, please see Tao Te Ching Chapter 16-9 Satori.


Keep on squatting, my friend!

Satori is life itself.

Of course, you can accept and love your life while meditating.

Tao Te Ching Chapter 20-1 "Yes" and "yeah" / video

Today's Tao

Between "yes" and "yeah" how great is the distance? (Ch.20)


Japan stories


Would you please look at the photo carefully?

Can you see the image of a pitcher on the screen?

And, excuse me if you are not from a baseball playing country.

Baseball is not exactly a sport whose joy the whole world shares.

Even the Committee of the Olympic Games decided not to play baseball any more.

The Japanese love the game.

Baseball is by far the most important sport in Japan.

But it doesn't have a long history in the country of the rising sun.

Not long, compared to Sumo.

Once the Japanese were the inhabitants of the floating world Uki-yo and adored playing Sumo.

Not any more.

Only the imaginary pitcher of this three-dimensional batting exercises machine tells how the Japanese used to look at the world.

They used to think life was something projected in our mind screen.

At that time, there was not a movie projector, so they chose a poetic expression "floating world".

As baseball was ousted from the Olympic Games, the Japanese were asked to leave the floating paradise for the material world.


To read the text of Today's Tao, please see Tao Te Ching Chapter 20-1 "yes" and "yeah".


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 19-1 No discernment / video

Today's Tao

Destroy discernment. Throw away intellect. And people's benefit will be 100 times as much. (Ch.19)


The Japanese hide things well.

Can you see the small sticker on the wall in the photo?

It says «No littering».

If someone wants to ignore the sign, I wonder why he doesn't do it with conviction.

He hides the rubbish.


This sector of Chiba City was once a notorious red light district. Not any more.

Good mothers and fathers of the town "cleaned up" the neighbourhood.

Although the effectiveness of their effort was questionable, thanks to Japan's decades-long bad economy, bars and good old "oriental baths" in the area have lost their clients.

Good mothers and fathers achieved their objective.

Now, the town center is deserted.

Deserted, but hospital-clean in its appearance.


Please see Tao Te Ching Chapter 19-1 No discernment to read the text of Today's Tao.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 18-1 Tao out of use / video

Today's Tao

After great Tao has fallen out of use, we have "morality of love" and its rules. (Ch.18)


Rules are strict in Japan.

At the platform in a railway station, you can hear something like:

"The train will depart at 8:47AM thirty second."

And it does exactly at the time.

In the train, you may find some Japanese men standing by the conductor's booth and staring at him.

They are admirers of the excellent train control by the conductor.

These days in Tokyo, you can have your own fans if you are a train conductor.

Thanks to Nintendo's «Ressha de Go (Go by train/ a train simulator)», those fans know all the regulations and hazards at any station in Yamanote Line.

Of course, they know perfectly where hazard signals and speed limit panels are.

Lao Tzu doesn't like rules, but some surely do.


To read the text of Today's Tao / Tao out of use, please see Tao Te Ching 18-1 Tao out of use.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 17-1 The highest / video

Today's Tao

The highest is the one that the lower ones don't know of. (Ch.17)


Where is the best city to eat out in on the planet?

Paris?

I am afraid not.

Recently, the famous Michelin Guide book awarded more 3-starred restaurants to Tokyo than to Paris.

(although as a nation France has more 3-starred restaurants than Japan)

Its chief editor apologetically admitted that it is natural because Tokyo has four times as many restaurants as Paris.

Therefore, please study today's photo well if you have a business engagement in Tokyo or vacations in the Japanese archipelago.

These written on the dark blue cloth are the Kanji characters for Sushi.

Caution!

Normally this type of a small establishment is fairly expensive.

A sushi bar with a conveyor belt is much cheaper.

Except in Aomori City!

Aomori City, located in the north of Japan, is considered to be the best town (quality-price-wise) in the country and enjoys plenty of cheap but good sushi bars without a conveyor. Some of them are even cheaper than those with a conveyor belt.

Nevertheless, Aomori might not be the best city to eat sushi in on the planet.

Tokyo may beat Paris, but I don't know if Aomori can beat Boston (quality-price-wise).

Let me know your opinion.


To read Today's Tao / The highest, please see Tao Te Ching Chapter 17-1 the highest.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 16-1 Do emptiness / video

Today's Tao

Do emptiness perfectly. (Ch.16)


Geisha are gone.

We don't have them any more.

It is what we call social engineering.

We have transformed our town.

We got cleaner, better organised, and even wealthier.

I used to go to school with sons and daughters of Geisha.

Geisha got wealthier as well.

They abandoned their kimonos, and bought a Dior and a Louis Vuitton.

They shipped their old Toyota to Russia and asked AMG to upgrade their new Mercedes.

And they have become invisible.

Old businesses continue, of course, but they have put their money safely on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

Oh, excuse me. Not so safely.

You never know. One day they may have to wear old kimonos again and stand at the street corner.


To read the text of Today's Tao, please see Tao Te Ching 16-1 Do emptiness.

To read other episodes of Japan stories, please click the label below.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 15-1 Dark Depth / video

Today's Tao

In the old days, a man who knew well about Tao comprehended Dark Depth minutely and subtly. (Ch.15)


When you visit Japan, I hope that you will have some time to go to an onsen, a traditional hot spa resort.

This symbolises what Japan is.

Hospitality, warmth, tradition, and a bit of promiscuity.

A bit of contradiction as well.

You may be able to find an old onsen ryokan (a Japanese style hotel with maids in a kimono) with a gigantic wooden bath you share with other visitors. Then, you will find an old Williams pinball and a Space Invader video game machine half abandoned in its amusement hall.

Kusatsu, where I shot the photo above, is one of the magical places in Japan. A splendid memory guaranteed.

Please ask me if you need some advice on your choice of a onsen in Japan.


As for the text of Today's Tao video, please visit Dark Depth / Tao Te Ching Chapter 15-1.


Tao answers your question!

Tao Te Ching Chapter 14-18 Big Bang

Today's Tao

Then, you can see the beginning of the distant past. (Ch.14)


Ha, ha, ha, ha. Ha, ha, ha, ha.

This is the way actors laugh in a Kyogen play.

Laughter is your personal Big Bang.

When you do "ha, ha, ha, ha", you can change your emotional cosmos immediately.

"The beginning of the distant past" is the world-famous Big Bang.

But when did the beginning of the world take place?

Tao doesn't have time.

So, it has to be now.


Naoto Matsumoto says:

Kyogen is a comic counterpart to the serious Noh theatre of Japan, in which characters rarely laugh. You don't have to worry about falling asleep during a Kyogen performance.

And, you know, it is you who is creating the world, your hologram.


«Related Articles»
-You can't see Tao 14-1
-The form without a form 14-2
-You can't hear Tao 14-3
-The sound without a sound 14-4
-You can't grasp Tao 14-5
-The minute being 14-6
-You can't find out Tao 14-7
-Mixed and one 14-8
-Not brilliant 14-9
-Yama Uba under it 14-10
-Tao has no name 14-11
-Back to nothingness 14-12
-The shape without a shape 14-13
-Evasive being 14-14
-Tao's face 14-15
-Tao's rear 14-16
-Distant past 14-17
-Big Bang 14-18
-Tao's quintessence 14-19
-Tao by Matsumoto / Tao Te Ching / Chapter 14


Tao answers your question!



Previous video / Ch.14 text / Next video

You can't see Tao video / Tao Te Ching Chapter 14-1

Today's Tao

Even if you try to see it, you can't do it. (Ch.14)


You can't see Tao. For sure. Modern Japanese life is far from the Taoist way of living.

Surely, it is far from the Buddhist or Shintoist way, too.

When you visit Japan, would you still like to experience a mystic Orient? Well, if you have to pay a hefty amount of dollars or euros for your flight ticket, it may be an inevitable sort of wish. Oh, c'mon, you are better than that!

The moment you abandon the quest of a postcard image of Japan, the real Japan will start caressing your sense of beauty. The key word is a "juxtaposition".

A girl disguising a Manga character in a pink mini-skirt and rainbow coloured knee-high boots may be walking in front of an ancient sacred meditation site of medieval Zen monks.


To read the text of Today's Tao video, please see You can't see Tao / Tao Te Ching Chapter 14-1.


Tao answers your question!

Excitement video / Tao Te Ching Chapter 13-1

Today's Tao

Favour and disgrace are like excitement. (Ch.13)


Is a two-dimensional girl better than a three-dimensional one?

Yes, to some modern Japanese boys.

Probably not just to modern ones, to ancient ones as well, like samurais.

In Edo period, which is an exceptionally peaceful 200 plus years in Japanese history, some samurais collected Ukiyo-e wood prints enthusiastically.

Beautiful girls in kimonos were drawn and printed by old masters in them.

Certainly, they are one of the predecessor of Manga girls.

Now the admiration of fictive beauty is inherited by modern Japanese girls as well, and it is expanding its horizon to the rest of the world.


To read the text of Today's Tao video, please check Excitement / Tao Te Ching Chapter 13-1. You will find the text there. The article was written some time ago, but its video was recorded recently. Thank you.

If you have any questions, I am more than happy to answer them.
Naoto Matsumoto


Tao answers your question

Five colours video / Tao Te Ching Chapter 12-1

Today's Tao

Five Colours make man's eyes blind. [Ch.12]


Once graveyards were a playground of ghosts. Nowadays man is happy to turn them into a pricey residential area to make money.

I wonder where all those Japanese ghosts have gone. Did they leave our high-tech Japan?

No. The ghosts have found their new nooks and crannies. For example, a vending machine.

You can find a vending machine in the middle of nowhere in Japan. It stands alone in paddy fields or a Buddhist chapel. Besides, it is lit all night long.

A vending machine can swallow your hand like Mouth of Truth in Rome. Or, another machine may start crying like a girl every night at 2:00 AM. They are an act of a ghost, some modern Japanese kids with a Nintendo DS in the hand believe.


To read the text of Today's Tao video, please see Five colours / Tao Te Ching Chapter 12-1. This is the last video in the chapter. The other sentences of the chapter have their own corresponding video already.


Tao answers your question!

Wheel video / Tao Te Ching Chapter 11-2

Today's Tao

Thanks to this emptiness, the wheel is useful. [Ch.11]


All the chapter 11 videos have been shot except the first and second sentence because at the time when I wrote the articles I didn't have the slightest idea of what YouTube was and how it worked.

I am glad that I can reach a larger audience thanks to those videos.

It is like a vending machine of ancient wisdom. When we are thirsty, we need a nice can of fresh soda pop immediately.


Would you please see Wheel / Tao Te Ching Chapter 11-2 to read the text of Today's Tao video.


Tao answers your question!

30 spokes video / Tao Te Ching Chapter 11-1

Today's Tao

Thirty spokes share one hub. (Ch.11)


Japan stories

Having gone through the two decades long of sluggish economy, the Japanese seem to be transforming themselves into a post-consumer society.

One of the biggest discussions in the country is about the young men without any sexual drive.

They are called "herbivorous men".

They are not interested at all in carnal intercourse. They prefer two-dimensional fictive characters in Manga, which is printed on paper (grass?).

They are getting less and less interested in dating and purchases related to courting a girl.

In short, they spend drastically less money.

Certainly, they are good disciples of Taoism.


To read the text of Today's Tao video, would you please see 30 spokes / Tao Te Ching 11-1?


Tao answers your question!