The Japanese Arts and Self-Cultivation

by Robert E. Carter, Eliot Deutsch (Introduction)

Explores how spiritual values are learned and mind and body developed through the practice of the Japanese arts.

Genres: Japan, Art, Nonfiction, Philosophy

197 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2007

Reviews

[Elena · Rating 4 out of 5]

A philosophically significant inquiry into the ways Japanese culture has developed for teaching ethics through aesthetic practice. This cultural and philosophical possibility has, unfortunately, not been explored much in Western cultures (though there have always been fringe movements exploring this possibility, among the Elizabethans, the Romantics and possibly 19th century Aestheticism). Generally though, in the mainstream Western philosophical tradition, there is still this belief that aesthetics and ethics are distinct domains, and that moreover neither has any noetic content whatsoever.

Carter nicely shows how this bifurcation (really trifurcation) causes a parallel fracturing within the psyche. This is perhaps what leads to the age-old problem of akrasia, or weakness of the will, in Western ethics. That is, we often seem to rationally grasp the rules and principles of right action perfectly well, while this rational understanding nonetheless often fails to empower us to apply these precepts to inform our life practices.

Ultimately, our philosophical inability to bridge the gap between theory and practice in ethics leads to the larger educational problem. That is, our eduation does nothing to encourage us to become individuals capable of integrating our ongoing, lived experiences into meaningful wholes because our tradition gives us no way of conceptualizing the human being in its unity, and insists instead on sharp divisions among these key humanistic disciplines. These divisions allow them to remain mere abstract intellectual acquisitions sealed off from lived experience. This in turn leads to cultural problems (a disengaged, cynical nihilism that becomes our default stance towards the world). The problem of meaninglessness we all find ourselves complaining about these days might have its ultimate source here: we no longer know how to transmit practices that enable cultivate selves to connect to their world, and to perceive it as a motivating source of significance. This inability to connect saps us of any motivation to do good at all. I find myself agreeing with Carter's implicit philosophical point, reiterated at many points in this book, that Western ethics puts the cart (rules) before the horse (shaping unified agents) while Japanese practices do not.

He shows how an artist, say, a potter, when she forms the materials of her craft, actually forms herself as an ethical agent. Moreover, she becomes a unity that is capable of experiencing her world as a unity - at least in fleeting glimpses that effect a reconciliation. Aesthetic practice intiates and strengthens a line of communication between subject and world that is the fuel of ethics. Thus aesthetics (the ability to form our experience into a unity) is the condition for ethics (the ability to adequately respond to life situations). The practices that enable us to integrate the psyche and to repair its moment-to-moment relationship with the world I take it is the lesson Japanese ethics/aesthetics has to teach us, if Carter is right.

So Carter's little book, which seems to be focused on a rather specialized topic in Japanese aesthetics, packs philosophical dynamite and a much more generalizable insight. There is a similarity with Aristotelian ethics (which, importantly, likens learning ethics to learning a craft - unfortunately, few later ethicists caught on and developed this crucial point!). Ultimately, knowledge, moral practice, and aesthetic experience form an indivisible unity within the integrated personality. They function best when they are allowed to inform one another. Only when they do can reason guide action and draw on our full capacity for experience in formulating appropriate responses to situations we encounter. A way of life that seeks to cultivate this unity must therefore seek to join these domains into one coherent spiritual outlook. His study ultimately shows how and why this is so, and how another culture has charted this possible line of human development that our own has largely left unexplored.

[Olga · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Japanese Arts and Self-Cultivation by Robert Carter was a long read, but highly engaging. I was savouring each page and took so much from it for my calligraphy practice and, of course, my understanding of the Japanese culture.
Some chapters, like the ones on aikido, ikebana, and landscape gardening were more inspired than the other ones, which, I guess corresponds to what the author is more comfortable with/has more understanding of, as he, for example, is a practitioner of aikido.
Sadly, the chapter on tea, in which I was particularly interested, was completely dull and vague.
Carter agenda is to connect Japanese arts and ethics into an active spiritual practice, which to me sounded plausible. He quoted a few Japanese philosophers who wrote on arts and philosophy, which I liked and which made me more interested in modern Japanese thought.
The book sounded like a praise to Japan and Zen Buddhism, although the author added in the end that he was aware of the drawbacks of Japanese culture, like sexism, nationalism and aloofness, as well as their war crimes, which he preferred not to concentrate on in this study. I’m now really curious about the books he mentioned that give critique of Zen as a condoning force behind those not so pleasant aspects of Japanese history.
Highly recommended if you are into Japanese culture, literature, it’s arts, or Zen Buddhism.

[Gabe · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the more important books I’ve read. Truly an exceptional work. The book, quite underhandedly, makes a quite damning critique of the project of western moral philosophy by showing how a truly successful ethics does not merely tell you what *is* good, but more importantly teaches you *how to be good.* It does so by demonstrating in detail how the practice of the arts in Japan is used for precisely that way of teaching one how to be good. Unfortunately, I doubt this book will ever receive the attention it deserves because it’s presented in a way that makes it only seem relevant to a narrow audience, ie those interested in Japan and its arts.

[Peter Boylan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Carter did a nice job of showing the cultural threads that connect the Japanese arts from the martial arts to tea ceremony to gardening and others very nicely. I wasn't impressed with the attempt to make a Japanese ethics out of the whole thing though. The chapters introducing the arts are quite nice. You can skip the conclusion.

[Layne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Had to read it for a college course but was extremely interesting and enjoyable nonetheless

[sanaz · Rating 3 out of 5]

It really helped me writing a piece about Japanese art. But better than that it me really want to start learning a Japanese art myself.