Abstract
This chapter offers a fresh analysis of the late Tokugawa ideologue, Ōshio Heihachirō (1793–1837). Having earned prestige as an Osaka magistrate’s inspector, Ōshio retired from his post to teach Wang Yangming Neo-Confucianism at his private academy. Yet, at the height of a 4-year famine, Ōshio led his students on a two-day riot in early 1837 that leveled nearly one-fifth of Osaka. Although earlier English scholarship has centered on the philosophical underpinnings of the attack and Ōshio’s apotheosis as an archetypical Japanese hero, this study uses new sources to underscore Ōshio’s relationship with the public. In particular, it showcases Ōshio’s pointed efforts to attract local outcastes to his cause and how he positioned himself on the margins of society to appeal to as broad an audience as possible. The chapter contends that individual interest played an equal if not greater role than ideology during the riot. For the public sphere, the attack inspired subsequent movements led by both elite and commoner firebrands.
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Notes
- 1.
In Japanese, the term denoting Wang Yangming is Ōyōmei, and the philosophy, Yōmeigaku.
- 2.
Hinin (非人) existed outside of the official Tokugawa social hierarchy, the shinōkōshō (士農工商 warrior-agrarian-artisan-merchant hierarchy).
- 3.
Miyagi Kimiko. Ōshio Heihachirō (Tokyo: Asahi shimbunsha, 1977), 272.
- 4.
Okamoto Ryōichi and Watanabe Takeru. Ōsaka no sesō, Volume 7 (Osaka: Mainichi Hoso), 180.
- 5.
Samurai from the Imagawa family had served as bodyguards for Tokugawa Ieyasu. Matsuura Sanae Ōsaka hennen shi, Volume 19 (Osaka: Osaka shiritsu chuo toshokan, 1975), 25.
- 6.
Many questions surround Ōshio’s heritage; one was whether Ōshio was even born in Osaka (Miyagi 1977).
- 7.
Japanese language biographies do not explain why Ōshio’s parents were buried in separate temples—we may speculate that his parents had different religions or that their own ancestors were buried in different areas.
- 8.
There is, again, no proof that Ōshio was a direct descendent of the Imagawa samurai. Miyagi Kimiko, ed. Ōshio Chūsai in Nihon no meicho, Volume 27 (Tokyo: Chuo kornosha, 1978); and Ōsaka fu-shi, Volume 7 (Osaka: Kahoku, 1988), 55–6.
- 9.
Okamoto Ryōichi Ōshio Heihachirō (Osaka: Sogensha, 1975), 40.
- 10.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 33–4.
- 11.
Ōshio’s wife was the daughter of a rich farmer, and not a samurai, revealing the samurai to have a “headstrong, iconoclastic nature” according to Ivan Morris. Ivan Morris The Nobility of Failure: Tragic Heroes in the History of Japan (New York: Meridian, 1976), 188.
- 12.
Okamoto 1975, 41–3.
- 13.
Yamane Chiyomi, “Kirishitan kinseishi ni okeru kyōsaka kirishitan ikken no igi” Ōshio Kenkyū (Volume 19, 1985), and Nakagawa Sugane “Inari Worship in Early Modern Osaka” Osaka: The Merchant’s Capital of Early Modern Japan (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999) both cover Ōshio’s involvement in locating and detaining practitioners of Christianity in the late 1820s.
- 14.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 33–4.
- 15.
Morris wrote that the retirement is comparable to Saigo Takamori’s 40 years later, as this was an opportunity for Ōshio to dedicate himself to Yōmeigaku and to “rectify the unjust system” (190).
- 16.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 35–6.
- 17.
Ibid, 37
- 18.
“Senshindō sakki” in Iwanami Nihon shi jiten (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1999).
- 19.
Takahata Tsunenobu Ōshio Chūsai, Sakuma Shozan (Tokyo: Meitoku
shuppansha, 1981), 21–3.
- 20.
Ibid, 25.
- 21.
Ibid, 23–4.
- 22.
Ibid, 27.
- 23.
Ibid, 28.
- 24.
Ibid., 30.
- 25.
Miyagi (1978), 272.
- 26.
Miyagi (1977), 271.
- 27.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 38.
- 28.
Peter Kornicki, in fact, argues that it is indeed the diverse nature of the summons’ audience that indicates widespread literacy in Osaka and its surrounding communities. Kornicki, Peter The Book in Japan: A Cultural History from the Beginnings to the Nineteenth Century. (Honolulu: The University of Hawai’i Press, 2001), 275.
- 29.
This translation of the gekibun derives from the version printed in Aoki Kōji and Hosaka Satoru, eds., Hennen hyakushō ikki shiryō shūsei, Volume 14: 1836–7, (Tokyo: San-ichi shōbō, 1986), 181–2. An earlier, abridged English translation may be found in David J. Lu’s Japan: A Documentary History, Volume 2 (London: Routledge Press, 1996), 280–1.
- 30.
Here Ōshio cites Confucius’ description of the world as 四海 or the four seas. He actually paraphrases Confucius’ statement that “if there shall be distress and want within the four seas, the Heavenly revenue will come to a perpetual end.” Legge, James, ed. The Chinese Classics, Volume 1 (Safety Harbor, FL: Simon Publications, 2001), 350.
- 31.
The text mentions 東照神君 or the Eastern Avatar, yet the term may also represent Tokugawa Ieyasu. As Oshio cites the 250 or so years of peace, it is likely that he is referring to the beginning of the Tokugawa period and thus the first shogun.
- 32.
Ōshio cites kusa no kage (草の陰) as a referent to another world, presumably of the past sage kings.
- 33.
The document refers to this as shigo no gokuraku jōbutsu 死後の極楽成仏.
- 34.
Harold Bolitho, “The Tempō Crisis,” in Cambridge History of Japan, Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 117–9.
- 35.
Tetsuo Najita, “Ōshio Heihachiro (1793–1837),” in Personality in Japanese History, Albert M. Craig and Donald H. Shively, eds., (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970), 171.
- 36.
Mukae Tsutomu, “Gekibun no shisō o saguru” Ōshio kenkyū, (Volume 30, 1991), 48.
- 37.
Okamoto (1975), 152–4.
- 38.
Tōshōdaikongen may also refer to Tokugawa Ieyasu, who was enshrined in Nikko as the Eastern Avatar.
- 39.
Diagrams, measurements, and reproductions of these banners may be found in Hennenn hyakushō ikki shiryō shūsei, 221. It is also important to note the prevalence of peasant uprising sahō (conventions), which according to Hosaka Satoru’s work includes weapons, banners, and slogans. Hosaka Satoru, Ikki to shūen (Tokyo: Aoki shoten, 2000); and Hosaka Satoru, Hyakushō ikki to sono sahō (Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 2002).
- 40.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 54.
- 41.
Okamoto and Watanabe (1973), 177–9.
- 42.
Only 20 of Ōshio’s men came from social strata higher than the peasant class. Kokuritsu Shiryōkan, Ōshio Heihachirō ikken kakitome (Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppansha, 1987), 1–2.
- 43.
Okamoto and Watanabe (1973),179–81.
- 44.
Ibid., 181–2.
- 45.
Matsuura, 25.
- 46.
Ibid., 25–6.
- 47.
Okamoto and Watanabe, 183.
- 48.
Ōsaka fu-shi, 70–2.
- 49.
Maps of the riot are included as inserts in Okamoto and Watanabe (1973) and Miyagi (1977).
- 50.
Kitajima Masamoto, Mizuno Tadakuni (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1969), 206.
- 51.
Ibid., 205.
- 52.
Arima Seiho, Takashima Shuhan (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1958), 101.
- 53.
Miyagi (1978), 517.
- 54.
Najita, 178–9.
- 55.
Morris, 183.
- 56.
Indeed, Ōshio warranted mention in Rubinger (1982), Bix (1986), and Walthall (1986), but did not merit more than five of pages of analysis in each text.
- 57.
Sakai Hajime, “Sōkan ni atatte” Ōshio kenkyū (Volume 1, 1976), 1.
- 58.
Half of the 46th volume of the Nihon shisō taikei (Compendium of Japanese Thought) contains both a classical Japanese transliteration and original Kambun reproduction of the Senshindō sakki along with an annotation and glossary.
- 59.
Some of the most notable publications in the 1980s and 1990s include: a transcription of inspector reports and trial recordings in 1987’s Ōshio Heihachirō ikken kakitome; Osaka area residents’ response to the riots in 1990’s Minshū shiryō ga kataru Ōshio jiken (The Ōshio Incident as Depicted in Historical Documents of the Masses); and personal letters of communication between Ōshio and his family, students, and colleagues in the three-volume 2003 Ōshio Heihachirō shokan no kenkyū (Studies of Ōshio Heihachirō’s Correspondence).
- 60.
Sone Sakishin “Ōshio no ran shiryōkan” (Ōshio Revolt [sic] Museum). <http://www.cwo.zaq.ne.jp/Ōshio-revolt-m/>
- 61.
Okamoto Ryōichi, Ran/ikki/hinin (Tokyo: Kashiwa shobo, 1983), 188–9.
- 62.
Kuboi Norio, Edo jidai no hisabetsu minshū (Tokyo: Akashi Shoten, 2004), 133.
- 63.
Uchida Kusuo, “Ōshio no ran to buraku jūmin—kōsatsu no tame no kisosagyō” Ōshio Kenkyū (Volume 6, 1978), 5–6.
- 64.
Kuboi, 134.
- 65.
Nakada, Masayuki, ed., Ōshio Heihachirō kengisho (Tokyo: Bunken shuppan, 1990), 217–18.
- 66.
Hennen Hyakushō ikki shiryō shūsei, 430–1.
- 67.
Summaries of Ikuta’s philosophy and riot may be found in Harry Harootunian, Things Seen and Unseen: Discourse and Ideology in Tokugawa Nativism (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988), 276–92; and Mark McNally Proving the Way: Conflict and Practice in the History of Japanese Nativism (Cambridge: Harvard University Asia Center, 2005), 222–7.
- 68.
See Jeffrey Newmark, “Yamadaya Daisuke’s 1837 Nose Movement,” Early Modern Japan Journal (Volume 22, 2014), 7–28.
- 69.
Nakada, 150.
- 70.
Ibid., 161
- 71.
Yabuta Yutaka, Kinsei Ōsaka chiiki no shiteki kenkyū (Osaka: Seibundo shuppan, 2005), 347–9.
- 72.
Ibid., 351–3.
- 73.
Watanabe Tadashi, Ōsaka machi bugyōsho ibun (Osaka: Toho shuppan, 2006), 230.
- 74.
Ibid., 231–2.
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Newmark, J. (2017). A Self-Made Outlier in the Tokugawa Public Sphere: Ōshio Heihachirō and His 1837 Osaka Riot. In: Welter, A., Newmark, J. (eds) Religion, Culture, and the Public Sphere in China and Japan. Religion and Society in Asia Pacific. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-2437-5_6
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