Waiting To Be Discovered

You can search the entire Library of Congress, and you will not find one item that links suiseki, the Japanese art of appreciating small stones, with Shinto, the native Japanese religion. A review of the available suiseki experts fares no better. Yet, it is my contention that the marriage of Shinto and suiseki, like a metaphor of the Japanese origin myth, has helped to preserve the unique spirit of this island nation. The case for this contention involves a brief review of: relevant aspects of Shinto; suiseki; Japanese aesthetics; the arrival and impact of Chinese cultural in general and Buddhism in particular.

The supporting framework for the relationship between Shinto and suiseki began long before suiseki arrived on Japanese shores in the sixth century. In the distant mist of myth we find the Shinto creation story, which includes both kami and ritual practices. "At first floating between earth and sky, a white cloud appeared, three kami came into being…seven generations of kami followed and the lineage continued with Izanagi and Izanami, who descend from heaven; their union produced the islands of Japan and all of nature, including Ama-terasu-o-mi-kami, who is worshipped to this day."1 It is worth noting here that “wedding stones” symbolizing Izanagi and Izanami, are venerated to this day off the coast of Ise. By the time suiseki arrived in Japan, sometime during the reign of Empress Suiko (593-628) Japanese Shinto was home to the many spirits, including kami and ancestors from the family, clan, and ruler. At this time, and to some extent still today, there was spirit, i.e., kami, in all, and natural objects, such as stones or mountains, were considered the abode of this spirit. Since dieties were too numinous to portray, it makes sense that the Japanese would have been more likely to have a rock than a figural statue as a god symbol. In short, according to Shinto beliefs, place and people are from one creative spirit; hence, the lineage of the Japanese people is derived from place. Here people and place, sharing the same spirit, are conflated. The mountain, the stone, the land of Japan and its people, are one.

Stone is both the home and boundary of the sacred. Among the many Shinto rituals involved in these stone boundaries and abodes, two specifically related to suiseki are: delineation of space and lustration. Given their early reverence for natural manifestations, such as water, rocks, and sun, the Japanese responses to these phenomena (to purify oneself and to identify sacred precincts) seem quite appropriate. Much later these practices were named Shinto, i.e., way of the gods, to distinguish it from Buddhism, which had entered Japan in the sixth century. The earliest sacred spaces were indicated by simple stone boundaries and rock piles. Shinto shrines were surrounded by fences, ropes, and the like to separate the sacred precinct from the outer worlds, as found at the Shinto shrine at Ise. And torii gates identify larger Shinto shrines. The suiseki counterpart is found in the setting of the stone into a specially made dish. Here “roped off” has become “dished off.” The idea that one should be purified, i.e., wash before entering or approaching the stone finds its suiseki counterpart in the cleaning of stones. Even today, part of what defines suiseki is preparing suiseki stones by washing them.

Suiseki demonstrates some of the major themes of Japanese aesthetics, including: a concern for nature (I argue most strongly for stone); a tendency to assimilate the ideas of other cultures, particularly the Chinese; conservation of the past; habit of miniaturizing the natural world.2 An investigation of stone in Japan reveals that their longstanding interest in rocks parallels their art and aesthetics. From the creation myth to Shinto shrines, and from suiseki to architecture, the presence of rocks is central. For example, we see the prominence of stone in the Jomon stone pieces and stone circles; for foundations of early homes; and as the first porches built in the northwest of dwellings. The power of nature in general and stone in particular is shown in both Shinto shrines made of stone and the subsequent ready acceptance and endurance of suiseki.

The stones of Shinto Japan faced a tidal wave of Chinese culture in the sixth century. For it was then that Buddhism and penjing, the Chinese version of small landscapes in a dish, met Shinto. We know that Empress Suiko, who ruled Japan from 593 to 628c.e., received the penjing from the Chinese. While she and her son, Shotoku, embraced and advanced Buddhism, Japanese cultural responses to the tremendous flood of Chinese imperial taste included imitation, absorption and accommodation.

In pre-Buddhist days it had been a sign of status to care for the Shinto shines. So to find a source of status, a rival political group imported Chinese influence and Buddhism. But to keep the peace, it would have been difficult if not impossible to just devalue everything that had been before, especially given the Japanese penchant for tradition and preservation. Indeed, the well-known Japanese interest in tradition is so pronounced as to have made them the sole repository of a good deal of Chinese culture. Ironically enough, along with Buddhism, the major rival to Shinto, came penjing, which was to prove the ally of Shinto. There is a great deal written about Buddhism, Shingon, etc. vs. Shinto. Certainly Shinto was under siege. One wonders how it survived with such strength, for as late as the nineteenth century, there were efforts to remove Buddhist influence from Shinto, and Shinto was made the state religion. Surely more than the Japanese penchant for tradition was at work, and one Shinto support was the arrival of suiseki. How appropriate that it arrived at about the same time as the Buddhism which seemed its greatest threat.

During the Suiko era the Japanese pretty much copied Chinese styles, and suiseki was no exception. The Chinese interest in dramatic, vertical, gouged stones was aped by the Japanese, as was the use of small stones and landscapes in a dish. Other examples of coping with the Chinese culture wave were absorption and assimilation. Shinto deities were considered incarnations of the Buddha, and Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples were located in the same complex. The pagoda in the shrines/temple complexes during the Asuka illustrates the philosophic bend of mind prevalent during the period. The pagoda: contained sacred Buddhist relics; originated from the Indian stupa; and represented the magic Mount Meru. The most popular ones had five stories, symbolizing both the five elements and the four directions plus the center. The use of relics, i.e., their location and relocation, shows the portability of the sacred. Further, one could import a Shinto shrine into a Buddhist temple complex. So, just as suiseki arrived from China, the portability of the sacred in general, and Shinto in particular, was demonstrated.

Combining with the native Shinto ‘spirit in the mountain, stone, and landscape,’ were the Chinese philosophies regarding the symbolic power of the mountain. This included the Taoists, the Confucianists, Feng Shui geomancy, and so forth.3 Rocks functioned as mountains. Stone or small replicas of mountains, either as hill censors or as stones in a dish, could work for more than one religious belief. For the Buddhists it could be Mount Meru, holy mountain at the center of the world; for Taoists, the paradise of Mount Horai. Covello and Yoshimura have noted that to satisfy Yin-Yang doctrine the stone of yang meets the yin of water.4 And for Shinto, the stones could be miniature mountains, the abode of kami.

It may seem ironic that things as rigid as mountains and stones were such fluid religious symbols, but the evidence is widespread, and the abstract idea of transfer, as in the transfer of power to and from the mountain cited above, was in play. Still other applications of this ‘transferring of energy’ are found in the borrowing back and forth between Shinto and Buddhism, which included, but was not limited to, mountain symbols.

Shinto used mirrors as grave goods, and Chinese Tang mirrors often show Mount Penglai. The idea that the Shinto goddess was represented by a symbol is archaic, for example, in the sun goddess’ symbol as the divine mirror, kept at the Ise shrine. This, too, points to the tranferability of power, e.g., from the deity to the symbol of the deity.

A Tang grave painting even shows penjing. And a prayer of Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty dated 645c.e., refers to mountains as places “with special markers …divine immortals keep moving …the worship of mountains was one of the major elements of the Chinese state religion.” At a time when religions and socio-political groups were in conflict, the mountain was a useful multivalent religious symbol. Shared by many different belief systems, it reinforced Shinto and Buddhism; suiseki could function as both a Shinto artifact and an artform.

Even as various Buddhist sects developed, these too seemed to serve the cause of supporting suiseki. The Japanese Buddhist sects of Shingon and Tendai valued the mountains, as is evident from the creation of extensive temple compounds on Koya-san and Hiei-zan. “During the Nara period the so-called six sects of Buddhism occurred. Hosso, the oldest sect, had its center at Horyuji. When it was introduced to China from India by the pilgrim Hsuan Tsang its central doctrine was that the only true reality was consciousness. This certainly supported the Shinto ideas of kami. During this time the continued influence of ancestor worship meant valuing tradition, including kami of the past. When the Tendai sect established its main temple on Mount Hiei outside Kyoto so the mountain, already an object of veneration, could protect the city from evil, native Japanese animism grew within Buddhism.

Furthermore, what anthropologists today call ‘sympathetic magical thinking’ prevailed. Like other cultural currents of the time, this, too, supported the maintenance of suiseki. People were thought to assume some of the supernatural power present in mountains. So the ideas of transporting and transferring power, like the previous examples of the Shinto relics and mirrors, and the current example of transferring power from the mountain to the person, were well established. Since transfers from the deity to an object and from the mountain to a person were accepted, surely the transfer from earth to earth, i.e., mountain to a piece of the mountain (stone), is entirely possible, or even probable, especially given the Japanese kami in the landscape. The continued thriving of suiseki, regardless of which religious group was in power, testifies to its fundamental appeal to the Japanese aesthetic.

Gradually, as the native aesthetic later reasserted itself, the Japanese taste for subtle, quiet, austere stones triumphed, particularly during the Kamakura (1185-1333 c.e.), when Zen philosophy was in the ascendancy. The Japanese attraction to and respect for natural materials are fundamental attributes of Japanese art. During the Kamakura, warriors developed a close relationship with Shinto shrines, like that of Heian aristocrats with Buddhist temples. As we might expect, styles of suiseki, like other aspects of culture, underwent changes that reflected these relationships. During the Kamakura, suiseki is described in the poems of Zen priests, and often shown with irises. Then, during northern and southern courts (1333-1392 c.e.), suiseki and Zen priest connections continued, as they wrote of seeing “the whole world in a tray.”5 The Shogun Yoshimasa ruling from 1449 to 1603 c.e. was instrumental in developing the tea ceremony and wabi aesthetic, and had a large collection of suiseki. Suiseki subsequently became part of the tea ceremony. During the Edo, suiseki’s popularity spread and an interest in large, dramatic stones developed.

In the next era, the Meiji, there was a major push to revitalize the past and restore the native traditions. Suiseki, with its strong Shinto roots, was a focus of artistic attention. This is when the word suiseki was used for the first time, and many categories of stone developed. The dominant Confucianism emphasized: historical studies, the Japanese past, myths and legends of old Japan, the Kojiki and the Nihonshoki. This is reflected in the writings of the Meiji era suiseki collector Marushima, who wrote: “Humans do not die. Although their earthly bodies die and return to earth, their spirits keep their existence within some other objects. Westerners keep their spiritual existence by leaving books behind; my spirit shall live in my stones.”6 The other side of increasing Shinto influence was decreasing Buddhist influence. This was called shinbutsu bunri, an attempt to return Shinto to its native purity. Once again, Shinto and suiseki supported one another.

To an island nation, rocks as microcosmic mountains, and water, the all surrounding liquid, are dominant natural presences. No wonder suiseki, the ‘water stone’ that supported Shinto, was well received in Japan. The mountain as stone was incorporated by Buddhism and Shinto. Perhaps the Chinese first put the small stones on a stand to represent legendary islands and mountains associated with Buddhist or Taoist beliefs. But the Japanese, committed as they were to conserving tradition, to Shinto, to the spirit in nature, to borrowing the best of other cultures, were ever able to adapt and nourish their own unique roots. They would have no trouble, given the kami in stone, in adapting suiseki to their own purposes and using it to validate Shinto.

Suiseki, the art of small stones, the quintessential Japanese art form, formed an important cornerstone to Shinto. Together suiseki and Shinto reflect the Japanese interest in tradition, nature, and adaptation. The love of tradition is reflected in small stones because stones by definition are ‘old’, Japanese homes are small, kami are enduring, and ancestors are important. Stones even carry ownership geneologoies, i.e., stones are held and passed from generation to generation, with papers to show the ownership lineage. Even today, the tokonoma is likely to display suiseki and, as Covello and Yoshimura observed, “Among the most popular types of suiseki are those that suggest a distant mountain, a waterfall, an island.”

If the connection between suiseki and Shinto is so strong, why have art historians and suiseki scholars missed it? Maybe until now we have overlooked the obvious. Our non-verbal communication patterns are pervasive, yet few people could expound a paragraph describing their own eye contact patterns. In the same way, the inherent and reinforcing bonds between suiseki and Shinto, even as they follow the threads of Japanese history, may have been too obvious to see and articulate.

But the overlooking of a subject does not negate its importance. And the coincident arrival of penjing and Buddhism was perfect. It provided a way to preserve Shinto and the Japanese aesthetic. Most agree that what makes Japanese art unique is this aesthetic, which is fed by the wellspring of Shinto. But one of the buckets that allowed continued access to the well of Shinto, was the small stones of suiseki. How better to “bring home” the ancient ways and the native Japanese spirit than in a small, portable stone, set in a “special space” in the home or business.

1. The Art of Japan, Hugo Munsterberg, Charles Tuttle, Vermont, 1958, page 4.

2. The list of gardens and paintings which depict actual landscapes in miniature is legion. And contemporary examples of excellence in miniature worlds, such as microchips, are commonplace. In the interests of space I have limited discussions of this miniaturizing tendency. But I cannot resist noting that Heian art suggests it, as well as yin-yang and nature in art. During the Heian images showed minutely identified emotions, and nature motifs functioned to express emotions. This supports the use of nature and miniature, i.e., the minute in art. The Heian was a time when yang was shown as rigid exteriors, formal, Chinese architecture and expressionless royal faces. In contrast, the receptive, interior yin was Japanese personal space depicted for privacy, as in Tales of Genji. It is interesting that very effeminate men were the style, mimicking the Japanese cultural receptivity to China. Is this why stones are small and indoors? And later, say in the Kamakura, when warriors and Zen thrive, there is a boom in large stone outdoor gardens.

3. The Japanese philosophic milieu also included other Chinese ideas which had probably reached Japan at an earlier date, perhaps by way of Korea. These include the theory of the five elements and the trigrams, which are associated with the practice of Feng Shui. In these paradigms the creative element cycle is overlaid on the compass; various elements are most active in these places and “stand for” them. The trigram energy of the northwest begins as the youngest son, who is the mountain, and becomes the father, i.e., heaven. The role of the mountain is central in Japanese philosophy as the symbol for: Japan itself, the feng shui son of heaven, heaven on earth in the northwest, the abode of the Shinto kami, Mount Meru, etc., etc. The earth element, the mother, unites with heaven to produce, among other things, the youngest son, the mountain. Hence, mountain, and stone, though the product of the union of heaven and earth, are reflections of the mother, the earth element.

4. The Japanese Art of Stone Appreciation, Covello & Yoshimura, Charles Tuttle, 1990, page 17.

5. Suiseki, Rivera, Stonebridge Press, Berkeley, 1997, page 40.