The Demon said to the swordsman, "Fundamentally, man's mind is not without good. It is simply that from the moment he has life, he is always being brought up with perversity. Thus, having no idea that he has gotten used to being soaked in it, he harms his self-nature and falls into evil. Human desire is the root of this perversity." Woven deeply into the martial traditions and folklore of Japan, the fearsome Tengu dwell in the country's mountain forest. Mythical (...) half-man, half-bird creatures with long noses, Tengu have always inspired dread and awe, inhabiting a liminal world between the human and the demonic, and guarding the most hidden secrets of swordsmanship. In The Demon's Sermon on the Martial Arts, a translation of the 18th-century samurai classic by Issai Chozanshi, an anonymous swordsman journeys to the heart of Mt. Kurama, the traditional domain of these formidable beings. There he encounters a host of demon; through a series of discussions and often playful discourse, they reveal to him the very deepest principles of the martial arts, and show how the secrets of sword fighting impart the truths of life itself. The Demon's Sermon opens with The discourses, a collection of whimsical fables concerned with the theme of transformation-for Chozanshi a core phenomenon to the martial artist. Though ostensibly light and fanciful, these stories offer the attentive reader ideas that subvert perceived notions of conflict and the individual's relationship to the outside world. In the main body of work, The Sermon, Chozanshi demonstrates how transformation is fostered and nurtured through ch'i - the vital and fundamental energy that flows through all things, animate and inanimate, and the very bedrock of Chozanshi's themes and the martial arts themselves. This he does using the voice of the Tengu, and the reader is invited to eavesdrop with the swordsman on the demon's revelations of the deepest truths concerning ch'i, the principles of yin and yang, and how these forces shape our existence. In The Dispatch, the themes are brought to an elegant conclusion using the parable of an old and toothless cat who, like the demon, has mastered the art of acting by relying on nothing, and in so doing can defeat even the wiliest and most vicious of rats despite his advanced years. This is the first direct translation from the original text into English by William Scott Wilson, the renowned translator of Hagakure and The Book of Five Rings. It captures the tone and essence of this classic while still making it accessible and meaningful to today's reader. Chozanshi's deep understanding of Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Shinto, as well as his insight into the central role of ch'i in the universe, are all given thoughtful treatment in Wilson's introduction and extensive endnotes. A provocative book for the general reader, The Demon's Sermon will also prove an invaluable addition to the libraries of all those interested in the fundamental principles of the martial arts, and how those principles relate to our existence. (shrink)

There are some salient female figures who play significant roles in the Bible’s stories. Unfortunately, their stories are not described sufficiently; or in other words, male’s roles have dominated mostly and disguised them. Female figures are conveyed in relation to the men, such as wives, mothers and daughters. Patriarchal culture has abolished women’s roles in history, cultures and religions which give crucial impacts to the exclusion of women in most of their life’s aspects. One of such women who’s deprived is (...) Aseneth, the Joseph’s wife, the Potipherah’s daughter. Aseneth is the significant female figure who plays an outstanding role. Furthermore, she’s an heavenly prophet, to whom the mystery of God’s revealed unspeakably. It’s related to the event when God touched Aseneth’s mouth with the honeycomb, the similar significant story of the calling of the prophets, as it happened upon Jeremiah (Jer 1:9) and Isaiah (Isa 6:6ff). Aseneth’s figure will be able to inspire and strengthen women to come out from their silence and reluctance. Otherwise, she will have encouraged women to struggle against the obstacles of cultures and religion faced for the sake of men’s and women’s equal life. Keywords: Woman, Patriarchal, Aseneth, Joseph, prophet, Culture, religion, equal. Abstrak: Ada banyak tokoh-tokoh perempuan yang cukup berperan dalam Alkitab, namun kisah mereka dipotong atau dihilangkan demi menonjolkan peran dan dominasi laki-laki. Kaum perempuan hanya disebut sepintas lalu dalam kaitan dengan laki-laki, yaitu sebagai istri, ibu dan anak perempuan. Budaya patriarkhi telah menyingkirkan perempuan dalam sejarah, budaya dan agama yang berdampak pada penyingkiran kaum perempuan hampir dalam semua bidang kehidupan termasuk dalam kehidupan keagamaan. Salah satu kisah perempuan yang dihilangkan atau disembunyikan adalah kisah Asnat, anak Fotifera dan istri Yusuf. Asnat adalah seorang perempuan yang aktif bahkan seorang nabi Surgawi, dimana kepadanya disingkapkan rahasia Allah yang tak terkatakan. Hal ini dihubungkan dengan peristiwa disentuhnya mulut Asnat dengan sarang lebah, sebagai sebuah kisah pemanggilan nabi-nabi. Peristiwa yang sama terjadi pada pemanggilan Yeremia (Yer 1:9) dan Yesaya (Yes 6:6 dst) sebagai nabi. Kisah Asnat akan memberikan inspirasi dan kekuatan bagi kaum perempuan untuk keluar dari kebungkaman dan kepasifan mereka serta berjuang melawan rintangan-rintangan budaya dan agama yang ada demi kehidupan yang setara antara laki-laki dan perempuan. Kata-kata Kunci: Perempuan, Patriarki, Asnat, Yusuf, nabi, budaya, agama, kesetaraan. (shrink)

Abstrak: Teks-teks Alkitab banyak menempatkan perempuan dalam posisi yang lebih rendah daripada laki-laki. Hal itu terjadi karena teks Alkitab ditulis oleh para lelaki pada budaya patriarki yang mengakibatkan terbungkamnya suara perempuan. Menyadari kenyataan itu kaum feminis pada tiga dekade terakhir telah berupaya menggali dan menafsirkan ulang teks-teks tersebut untuk membantu kaum perempuan mencapai kesetaraan mutualis dengan laki-laki. Tulisan berikut merupakan salah satu bagian dari upaya tersebut yang mendemonstrasikan bagaimana perempuan pada zaman penulisan Alkitab, khususnya kitab Kidung Agung, bukan hanya memainkan (...) peranan penting tetapi juga yang mendominasi seluruh isi kitab. Kata-kata Kunci: Perempuan-laki-laki, patriarki, kesetaraan, penafsiran Alkitab, Kidung Agung, seksualitas, tubuh perempuan. Abstract: Many Biblical texts placed women lower than men. It happens because they were written by men of a patriarchal culture and thus the voice of women was usually silenced. Realizing these facts, feminist groups for the last three decades have been working to re-read and to reinterpret the texts in order to help women find their equal position to men. The following article is one of those efforts to demonstrate how women in the biblical periods, specifically in the Song of Songs, not only played important roles, but also dominated the whole content of the book. Keywords: Woman-man, patriarchy, equality, bible interpretation, the song of songs, sexuality, woman body. (shrink)

Some people in Japan are still comfortable with the paternalistic role of doctors, but others wish that their own decisions would receive a greater amount of respect. A total of 747 students of universities and colleges and 114 parents of these students participated in a questionnaire survey. Most of the participants thought that autonomy should be respected in situations involving death with dignity and euthanasia, whereas it should not be respected in attempted suicide and involuntary admission of individuals with mental (...) illness. A cluster analysis revealed that the participants could be divided into the following groups: aid in dying advocates, complete libertarians, protectors of the mentally ill, complete paternalists, and questionables. The assertion of independence score of the Scale for Independent and Interdependent Construal of the Self showed a significant difference among the 5 clusters. These findings suggest that the traditional paternalistic relationship between doctor and patient is undergoing a gradual transformation in Japan. (shrink)

In this paper, we present and defend an analysis of harm that we call the Negative Influence on Well-Being Account (NIWA). We argue that NIWA has a number of significant advantages compared to its two main rivals, the Counterfactual Comparative Account (CCA) and the Causal Account (CA), and that it also helps explain why those views go wrong. In addition, we defend NIWA against a class of likely objections, and consider its implications for several questions about harm (...) and its role in normative theorizing. (shrink)

On April 5 2000, the Diet elected Yoshiro Mori as Japan's 55th prime minister. His predecessor, Keizo Obuchi, had suffered a stroke and became unable to carry out his official responsibility. Mori, who was the former Secretary General of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), inherited the three party coalition between the LDP, the new Komei Party and the Conservative Party, and reappointed all of Obuchi's cabinet members. Yohei Kono was reposted as the Minister of Foreign Affairs; Hideo Usui as (...) Justice; Kiichi Miyazawa as Finance; Hirofumi Nakasone as Education, Science and Technology; Yuya Niwa as Health and Welfare; Tokuichiro Tanazawa as Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries; Takeshi Fukaya as International Trade and Industry; Toshihiro Nikai as Transport; Eita Yashiro as Posts and Telecommunications; Takamori Makino as Labor; Masaaki Nakayama as Construction; Kosuke Hori as Home Affairs, Mikio Aoki as Chief Cabinet Secretary; Kunihiro Tsuzuki as Management and Coordination; Tsutomu Kawara as Defense; Taichi Sakaiya as Economic Planning; Kayoko Shimizu as environment; and Sadakazu Tanigaki as Financial Reconstruction. (shrink)

Sensory organs are specialized to receive different kinds of input from the outside world. However, common features of their development suggest that they could have a shared evolutionary origin. In a recent paper, Niwa et al.1 show that three Drosophila adult sensory organs all rely on the spatial signals Decapentaplegic and Wingless to specify their position, and the temporal signal ecdysone to initiate their development. The proneural gene atonal is an important site for integration of these regulatory inputs. These (...) results suggest the existence of a primitive sensory organ precursor, which would differentiate according to the identity of its segment of origin. The authors argue that the eyeless gene controls eye disc identity, indirectly producing an eye from the sensory organ precursor within this disc. BioEssays 26:825–828, 2004. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)