Ansai Yamazaki was an Early Edo period Confucian and Shintoist of highly individual character.
Background
Ansai Yamazaki was born on 24 January 1618 in Kyoto. His personal name was Yomishi, his common name Kaemon, and his literary name Ansai, and as a Shinto leader he went by the literary name Suika. His father, Yamazaki Join, was a masterless samurai of Himeji, who made his living as an acupuncturist.
Career
In his youth Ansai was sent to the Buddhist monastery on Mt. Hiei, but he left the monastery and in 1632 entered Myoshin-ji, one of the major Zen temples of Kyoto. In 1636 he moved to Kyuko-ji, a temple in the domain of Tosa in Shikoku, becoming a full-fledged Zen monk. There he became acquainted with Nonaka Kenzan, an official of the Tosa domain who was attempting to introduce administrative reforms based upon the ideals of Confucian doctrine. Through him, he met Kenzan's teacher, Tani Jichu, the founder of Neo-Confucian studies in Tosa, and under him studied the Chu Hsi school of Neo-Confucianisin.
Shortly thereafter, he returned to Kyoto and in 1655 opened a school there. He was a forceful educator, extolling Chu Hsi's teachings as the highest expression of Confucian thought and laboring to instill their essential principles in his students. In 1657 he made a visit to the Grand Shrines of Ise, where he found himself greatly attracted to Shintoism. He studied Shinto under Yoshikawa (Kikkawa) Koretari in Edo, and by combining Shinto teachings with the metaphysics of Chu Hsi Neo-Confucianism, in time developed a new school of Shinto known as Suika Shinto, which emphasized the essential unity of Shintoism and Confucianism.
After going to Edo in 1658, he became the teacher of such distinguished personages as Inoue Masatoshi, lord of the domain of Kasama in Hitachi, and Kato Yasuyoshi, lord of the domain of Ozu in Iyo, and also came under the patronage of Hoshina Masayuki, lord of the domain of Aizu and younger brother of the third shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu. Thereafter he divided his time between Edo and Kyoto, teaching half a year in each, but after the death of Hoshina Masayuki in 1671, he settled down in Kyoto and devoted himself to writing,
He had some six thousand disciples, of whom the eminent Confucian scholars Sato Naokata, Miyake Shosai, and Asami Keisai were the most outstanding. Sato and Asami were both somewhat critical of Ansai’s views on Shinto, and as a consequence were expelled from his school, though in later times they came to be recognized as the legitimate transmitters of Ansai’s teachings. Asami Keisai’s disciple Miyake Kanran is particularly noteworthy for the role he played in transmitting the teachings of Ansai to the domain of Mito. He was in the service of Tokugawa Mitsukuni, lord of the domain of Mito, and participated in the compilation of the Dai-Nihon shi, the great history of Japan sponsored by Mitsukuni. Ansai’s views on the essential unity of Shinto and Confucian teachings formed the basis for the idealization of the imperial family and institution that characterized the Mito scholars. Other well-known figures who, though they lived considerably later, were much influenced by Ansai’s views on the reverence due to the imperial house and who attempted to translate them into reality include the eighteenth century scholars Takenouchi Shikibu and Yamagata Daini and the nineteenth century scholar Umeda Umpin, all of whom were arrested because of their antishogunate sentiments and died as a result. Ansai left a large number of works, which have been collected in the Yamazaki Ansai zenshu. He is buried in the grounds of Komyo-ji (Kurodani) in Kyoto.
Religion
In 1642 he renounced the Buddhist religion and became a Confucian.