日本 17 世紀以後的戒殺護生思想：以德川綱吉為中心=The Thought of Refraining from Killing and Protecting Living Beings in Japan after the Seventeenth Century--Centering on Tokugawa Tsunayoshi
In Japan, the thought of refraining from killing and protecting living beings has lasted long in the history. However, this long-established action such as releasing captured animal out of pity was almost gone during the troubled warring times in the 15th to 16th century. Yet then in the early 16th century, when the Edo bakufu (shogunate military government) formed and started to govern the whole Japan with great power, this government gradually developed civil administration in the attempt to make people abandon the concept of taking killing and suicide (especially dying for the superior) as war hero’s acts, and to turn the popular sentiment toward the Buddhist thought of refraining from killing and protecting living beings. For a start, the Edo bakufu forbad dying for the superior. Later the 5th shougun Tokugawa Tsunayoshi set up the Edicts on Compassion for Living Beings, which relentlessly terrified those that like to hunt and forced them not to kill. Even though most parts of the edict was abrogated right after Tokugawa Tsunayoshi’s death, the idea that one should not abandon the children, cattle and horses had deeply remained in many people’s mind. The Edicts on Compassion for Living Beings was easily considered as an extremely cruel law which only protects dogs. Fortunately, the science of history which developed well in Japan during the last 25 years has not only uncovered and restored the actual state for people to see Tokugawa Tsunayoshi’s real intention, but also honors the contribution of his favored minister who carried out this law together--Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu--on arts & humanities. This research sorts all the key documents at present, starts with how the thought of refraining from killing and protecting living beings was in Japan before Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, and then discusses the positive and negative facts of the Edicts on Compassion for Living Beings.
