1a. Manuscript text of a
shōsoku-gyo copy of the
Hokekyō (Lotus Sutra), vol. 1, commissioned by
Emperor Fushimi (1265–1317) and copied in 1304 onto the back of letters written by his father
Emperor Gofukakusa (1243–1304). Exemplar held in the Myoren-ji Temple.
1b. Manuscript letter written by Emperor Gofukakusa, on the back of which is a shōsoku-gyo
copy of the Hokekyō (Lotus Sutra).
· 121 ·
Letting the Copy Out of the Window
A History of Copying Texts in Japan
hiroki kikuchi
I
n 1906 a young scholar named Asakawa Kan’ichi (1873–1948), who was the
first professor of Japanese studies at Yale University, returned to Japan from the
United States. During his one-and-a-half year stay in Japan, he collected many his-
torical documents and books in cooperation with scholars in the Historiographical
Institute (Shiryō Hensanjo) at the University of Tokyo.
1
Today, his aquisitions are
shelved in the Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University and in the Library
of Congress. One of the characteristics of what he collected is that it includes
a number of hand-copied texts. Before the micro-camera for the production of
microfilm and microfiche came to be commonly used in the 1950s, hand-copied
texts were still indispensable for historiography in Japan, which has a long his-
tory of copying texts. The country holds what is nearly the world’s oldest extant
printed sutra, yet printing was not as prominent as handwriting in the medieval
period. And though print culture had gradually developed throughout the early
modern period, hand copies were still being produced even in the modern period.
The copying of texts by hand and the significance of this practice in Japan
are phenomena that explain the existence of hand-copied texts in the Asakawa
collection. Especially considering how Buddhist texts and diary records (kokiroku)
were copied in the medieval period, one can see that the interest in hand-copied
texts drifted in response to social change.
2
The Sanemikyō-ki (Diary of [Senior
Noble] Sanemi) copying project in the Edo (1603–1867) period will be an in-
formative case on this point.
3
In the modern period, hand-copied texts were still
produced for academic research at places like the Historiographical Institute, and
the institute’s historiography project and its connections with American scholar-
122 hiroki kikuchi
ship provide clear examples of the continued importance of the hand copying of
Japanese documents.
Manuscripts in Buddhism
In the eighth century Empress Shōtoku (718–770) had one million copies of
dhāranī (Buddhist incantations) printed and put into small wooden pagodas.
4
This is almost the world’s oldest extant printed material for which we are able
to confirm the production date. However, print culture was not always dominant
afterwards. Around the same time, in the eighth century, a great number of sutras
were copied by hand in the sutra-copying institution (shakyōjo).
5
In 740 Empress
Kōmyō (701–760), the mother of Empress Shōtoku, commissioned a copy of the
entire Buddhist canon (issaikyō) by hand.
6
At that time, technological limitation
may have been one of the reasons for making a hand copy, since it might have
been more difficult to produce various kinds of woodblock prints than to simply
write out a copy by hand.
However, another reason for copying sutras by hand was that the act was
thought to accrue Buddhist virtue. For example, Empress Kōmyō started her copy-
ing project in memory of her parents. In the medieval period the most famous
case of sutras copied for the attainment of merit is Heike nōkyō (Sutra Dedicated
by the Taira Clan) housed in the Itsukushima shrine in the Hiroshima prefecture.
7
Heike nōkyō is mainly comprised in the Lotus Sutra, which was donated by the Taira
clan (also known as Heike). Each chapter was copied onto a scroll by a member
of the family, a copying style called ipponkyō kuyō. Though the virtue of copying
sutras is originally preached in Mahayana sutras, the teachings do not necessarily
emphasize hand copying. But in Japan the virtue of copying sutras by hand was
sometimes thought to be superior to that of printing sutras. By participating in
a sutra copying project, each person was able to develop his or her own merit.
Furthermore, when a sutra copying project was done in memory of a deceased
person, sutras were usually copied onto the back of written texts such as letters,
manuscripts, and drafts originally written by the deceased person.
8
The most im-
portant point in this case was to copy sutras onto the back of actual writings of
the person memorialized since this was thought to establish a strong connection
between a sutra and that person’s personality, or even his or her spirit. Thus, hand
copies and handwriting had a religious significance in medieval Japan. (See figure 1.)
Moreover, Buddhist commentaries as well were usually copied by hand.