Sajakkini

Josh Hong

“Japan did a lot of bad things in Malaysia during the Second World War. I am so deeply sorry.” Shizuko uttered her apology to me, in a tone full of shame and guilt, on a breezy summer day in 1994.

We were in Ealing, a beautiful London suburb, surrounded by the lush green trees and grass, by the River Thames. It was a fine and lazy afternoon, but she decided to raise the delicate issue nonetheless. I could see she was struggling to express the remorse that the successive governments in Tokyo had failed to demonstrate in an unequivocal manner.

Still, one thing is clear: Shizuko and I have been able to remain close friends for more than a decade because we had crossed the psychological barrier thrust upon us by a war that neither of us was involved in, yet had to confront nonetheless.

When the Sino-Japanese dispute over Tokyo’s attempt to revise its war past escalated in recent weeks, some Malaysian journalists were quick to cite The Chrysanthemum and the Sword (1), the seminal book by US anthropologist Ruth Benedict, to prove that Japan is a nation shrouded in a culture of shame, and it is therefore hard, if not impossible, for the Japanese to feel remorseful for the wrongs that their country had committed.

In contrast, the same journalists heaped praises on Germany for its courage and integrity to face up to its Nazi past, hence securing for itself an anchor position at the heart of Europe, and being represented in dignity at the WWII Commemoration in Moscow early this week.

Many attribute Germany’s forthright attitude towards WWII to the culture of guilt elaborated in Benedict’s book, with some even arguing that it was the Christian culture of confession that leads Germany as a nation to repent of its sin.

I am not too sure how many of the local journalists have thoroughly studied Benedict’s psychoanalysis on Japan (well, you know how Malaysians love to impress others by showing off our reading lists and bulky bookshelves at home), but it is worth looking into the different attitudes between Japan and Germany in terms of how a nation should deal with its own past.

Before those who are bent on reading my writings selectively accuse me of trying to paint Germany in a negative light, I do have immense admiration for the Germans who have been dealing with their nation’s darkest hours in all honesty and humility. Still, by turning the Christian idea of confession of one’s own sin into a culture of guilt and seeking to explain Germany’s acknowledgement of its sinful past accordingly, one may have made the mistake of tackling a complex issue with a reductionist mind.

JOSH HONG acquired the peculiar habit of reading too much into news as early as when he was a teen. Constantly alarmed by the unofficial divide-and-rule policy of the major dailies in Malaysia, he hopes to bridge the gaps between different ethnic groups the best he can. He appreciates the existence of various races as a most gracious gift of God, and thanks Samuel P Huntington for strengthening his will to fight against hegemony of all kinds.

Face up to mistakes

Benedict argues in her book that “in a nation where honor means living up to one’s own picture of one self, a man may suffer from guilt though no man knows of his misdeed and a man’s feeling of guilt may actually be relieved by confessing his sin” (p. 223).

Although one is eager to give credit to Christian culture for the ability of the western world as a whole to own up to its own wrongs and move on, what Benedict has addressed above is hardly something Christian in nature. For in Christianity, one’s dignity lies in living in accordance with God’s image and will, not personal pride and honor. Following from this, one should, and is expected to be, able to repent of its own wrongs even when the wrongs remain unknown to others.

Put differently, when one refuses to apologise, even though the sin is as scarlet, it does not matter if one seeks to project oneself as steeped in Christian culture and tradition, for an honest seeker of the eternal truth will not be convinced of the superiority of the guilt culture, as implied by Benedict.

Therefore, it is no surprise for me to read of Francesco Sisci, who apparently is pleased with the ability of the West to face up to its own mistakes, all thanks to Freudian analysis and the Christian concept of confession, writing, “… Chinese, and possibly East Asians in general, just want to bury them and never mention them again… There is no culture of confession like that which held sway in the West for hundreds of years”.

If Sisci is right, I guess I would be forgiven for scratching my head over the failure of the British government to apologise to the Chinese for the opium trade and other crimes against humanity committed during the heydays of the British Empire (with the Monarch being the Defender of the Faith), and the refusal of John Howard (leader of a largely Christian nation) to acknowledge the past sin against the aborigines.

Benedict’s exposure of the Japanese mind is brilliant, but not without flaws. First, her most celebrated work exemplifies the common mistake of many a politico-sociologist by dichotomizing the complex issue of national responsibility, ie. The guilt culture and the shame culture, and these two are apparently not compatible with one another.

However, it is no secret that guilt and shame often go together: one is often ashamed of the sin one has committed against others. Japan has indeed failed to address the WWII issue categorically, and the act by the rightwing politicians to whitewash the nation’s dark history is deplorable. Be so as it may, it does not mean that Japan as a nation has no sense of guilt, as implied by Benedict. It does. The only difference is that the Japanese choose to deal with the guilt feeling in a manner that will only bring the nation more shame and historical burdens.

External circumstances

Secondly, Benedict appears to have taken a condescending view of nations, and seen them in totality. As Ian Buruma, a Dutch writer of Jewish origin, puts forward in his book Wages of Guilt (2), such mechanistic view of human behaviour often glosses over the many exceptions that may exist in a nation, for there are neo-Nazis in Germany who are chagrined by the incessant reminder of Adolf Hitler, while some Japanese are resolute in fighting against the rightwing, revisionist agenda of the politicians in Tokyo, such as the late Saburo Ienaga, Professor Nobuyoshi Takashima and, of course, my good friend Shizuko.

Moreover, there are always external circumstances at play that prompt a nation or a country to come clean with or deny its own mistakes, either partially or fully. The pressure to win back the trust of the European nations, coupled with the thoroughness of the US-led Allied Powers in purging ex-Nazi leaders in all sectors as well as in prosecuting their war crimes, have enabled Germany, a big nation located in the heart of Western Europe, to deal with the WWII issue in as clean a manner a possible. Moreover, the resistance movement, represented by those like Colonel Claus Schenk von count Stauffenberg and Konrad Adenauer, made a complete regime change possible in post-Nazi Germany.

No such conditions were available in Japan. Although the Supreme Command of the Allied Powers put in place a reform agenda to rid the Japanese political system of the remnants of the previous regime, the initiative also created a growing unionist movement that was interpreted in Washington as a surge in leftwing forces. The fall of China to the communists in 1949 alarmed the Americans greatly and all political purges were abruptly ended in 1951, with pre-war conservatives flooding back into active politics and government in Tokyo.

One must also bear in mind the fact that Douglas MacArthur absolved Emperor Hirohito of the latter’s war responsibility, in the course of which he “hurt the chances of a working Japanese democracy and seriously distorted history”, in the words of Ian Buruma (p. 173).

I wouldn’t say Benedict’s book is now past its sell-by date, but I certainly will encourage others to read also Wages of Guilt, by far the most superb and in-depth writing on the different historical reflections of Germany and Japan. The author took the trouble to visit significant places like Auschwitz, Nanjing and Hiroshima in order to have a fuller grasp of why the two WWII perpetrator nations have trodden on different paths of national atonement. It is also in this book that I have found some answer as to why, although Japan as a nation is still mired in the war issue, my friend Shizuko has been able to free herself from the historical burden and apologized for the atrocities that she was not responsible for.

Note :

1. Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, Tokyo: Tuttle Publishing, 1989.
2. Ian Buruma, Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan, London: Vintage, 1995.