Takamasa Okuni

Japanese: 大国隆正 - おおくに・たかまさ

Year of death: August 17, 1871 (October 1, 1871)
Year of birth: 29 November 1793 (11 January 1793)
A scholar of Japanese classics in the late Edo period. His given names were Takamasa, Hidefumi, and Hidekiyo, and his pen name was Kocho. He was commonly known as Ichizo, Takumisaku, and Nakaei, and was also known by the pen names Kien and Sakinoya. He was born in the Edo residence of the Tsuwano (Yamaguchi Prefecture) domain's samurai Imai Hideka. In Bunka 3 (1806), he entered the school of Hirata Atsutane, and also entered the Shōheizō Academy, where he became headmaster, but left in the following year. During this time, he followed the painter Masuyama Sessai, the lord of the Nagashima domain, under the pseudonym Dai Xue, and was associated with Kikuchi Gozan and others in poetry and calligraphy. He then studied under Murata Shunmon, and studied the Norinaga school. In Bunsei 1 (1818), he traveled to Nagasaki to study Western and Sanskrit books, and mastered Chinese calligraphy. After returning to the east, he turned his attention to Imperial studies. He became the domain's chief storehouse officer in charge of arms, but found it difficult to give up his academic ambitions, and in the following year he left the domain. He changed his surname from Imai to Nonokuchi. After being forced out of his home in a great fire in 1834, he moved to Kamigata. He subsequently taught as a guest teacher in the Ono, Himeji, and Fukuyama domains, and in 1851 he returned to Tsuwano. As a professor at the domain school, Yorokan, he proposed that the university should focus on national studies, which was approved. He then traveled between Edo, Kyoto, and Tsuwano, meeting with Tokugawa Nariaki in Mito, and keenly felt the advance of the great powers into Asia. He developed his own theory of revering the emperor and expelling the barbarians, which was comparable to the maritime defense theories of Confucian scholars, centering on the theory that the emperor is the sovereign emperor of all nations. In 1862 he found the ancient site of Okuninushi no Mikoto in Iwami Province, restored the shrine, and changed his own surname to Okuni. In 1867 he wrote New True Public Law, a critique of Grotius's Public Law of All Nations. After the Meiji Restoration, he also worked as a missionary advisor for the government, and died in Tokyo. He established the view of the four great masters in the history of Japanese classical literature (Harumitsu, Mabuchi, Norinaga, and Atsutane), but this can also be seen as a way of criticizing the epigones of the Motoori and Hirata schools. His many works include "Nose Comparison Saushi," "Hongaku Kyoyo," and "Gakuto Benron." <Works> "Okuni Takamasa Complete Works," 7 volumes in total <References> "Okuni Takamasa," by Osaki Katsuzumi; "Hirata Atsutane, Tomo Nobutomo, and Okuni Takamasa," edited by Haga Noboru et al. (Nihon Shiso Taikei)

(Miyazaki Shuta)

Source: Asahi Japanese Historical Biography: Asahi Shimbun Publications Inc. About Asahi Japanese Historical Biography

Japanese:

没年：明治4.8.17(1871.10.1)
生年：寛政4.11.29(1793.1.11)
幕末の国学者。名は隆正,秀文,秀清,字は子蝶,通称は一造,匠作,仲衛など,号を葵園,佐紀乃屋などという。津和野(山口県)藩士今井秀馨の子として江戸藩邸に生まれる。文化3(1806)年平田篤胤門に入り,また昌平黌にも入学し舎長となるが,同7年に退塾。この間,画を長島藩主増山雪斎に従って戴雪と号したり,菊池五山らと詩書の交わりを持つ。次いで村田春門に教えを受け宣長学を考究。文政1(1818)年には長崎に遊学して洋書や梵書を繙き,中国書法を体得。東帰後は翻って,皇朝学にいそしんだ。藩の大納戸武具役になるが学への志捨て難く同12年に脱藩。姓を今井から野之口に改める。天保5(1834)年大火で焼け出されて上方へ移住。以後小野藩,姫路藩,福山藩に賓師として教授し,嘉永4(1851)年津和野に復籍。藩校養老館教授として国学をもって本学とすべきを上申し認可される。その後は江戸・京都・津和野間に奔走し,水戸の徳川斉昭に会見したりしながら列強のアジア進出を痛感,儒者らの海防論に比すべき独自の尊皇攘夷論を,天皇万国総帝説を主軸として展開した。文久2(1862)年には石見国に大国主命の古跡をみつけて神社を復興し,自ら大国と改姓。慶応3(1867)年にはグロチウスの『万国公法』への批判書『新真公法論』を著す。維新後は政府の宣教師御用掛としても働き,東京にて没。国学史上の四大人(春満,真淵,宣長,篤胤)観を確立したのも彼だが,これはむしろ本居派・平田派のエピゴーネンを批判する方便ともいえる。著作は『鼻くらべのさうし』『本学挙要』『学統弁論』など多数。<著作>『大国隆正全集』全7巻<参考文献>大崎勝澄『大国隆正』,芳賀登ほか編『平田篤胤・伴信友・大国隆正』(日本思想大系)

(宮崎修多)

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