Masayuki’s patronage academy is paralleled by another sponsored by his
cousin, the Lord of Mito, Tokugawa Mitsukune.^31 At Mito, Mitsukune col-
lected a group of scholars for another massive historical project, in this case
to write the history of Japan from its legendary origins to the present, a work
which went on for generations after Mitsukune’s death. In the Mito circle we
find a number of notable scholars, including the Ming refugee Chu Shun-sui
and the Buddhist monk Keichu, who became the ancestor of the National
Learning movement. There was, in short, an upsurge of intellectual status
emulation among the great lords. It became fashionable to promote new
religious ideologies; the Mito domain was among the most militant in attempt-
ing to suppress Buddhism, while Lord Aizu meddled in the factional politics
of Shinto. The overall effect was to encourage the flow of scholarship in
autonomous paths.
Ansai took maximal advantage of the new prestige of scholarship, which
he turned into a religion in its own right. He energetically explored two
different religious niches: reviving the Sung sage cult and then going on to
formulate his own version of Shinto. Stimulated by his contact with Koretaru
in the Aizu circle, Ansai extolled reverence as the principle which Shinto and
Neo-Confucianism have in common, and equated the cosmogonic myths of
the Nihon-shoki with Chinese cosmology. His followers venerated Ansai as a
living kami (god) and fitted out his school with initiation rites of an amalga-
mated Confucian-Shinto cult.
The fourth major school was created by Yamaga Soko, a former student
of Hayashi Razan. In the new educational system he represents a different
niche, having spent his early career as a military instructor in a domain school.
In 1666 Soko formulated Bushido, the Way (do) of the Warrior. Samurai codes
were not new; versions had existed since the 1100s, stressing loyalty to supe-
riors unto death. Soko, however, was living in peacetime conditions, and he
raised the question of what was the function of the samurai, since they did not
work. The answer was drawn from Confucianism: the samurai role was to
punish people who transgressed moral principles.^32
Soko broke with both the Chu Hsi and Wang Yang-ming schools, on
grounds that their doctrines had brought not peace to the Sung but foreign
conquest. Striking a new political note, he stated that since China had repeat-
edly been conquered but Japan never (and had in addition twice conquered
Korea), Japan was superior and had right to the title of Middle Kingdom. The
adulation of Chinese culture, which had shaped Japan from Buddhist times
through the Neo-Confucians, now began to be thrown off. It would be an
error of tautology to attribute this to an incipient nationalism in the society at
large. The dynamic can be found within the new structure of Tokugawa
intellectual competition. Soko carved out his position in opposition to the
surrounding schools of his time, above all to the Neo-Confucians, arch-adula-
Innovation through Conservatism: Japan • 357