Tag: Japan

Remember this old fracas a few years ago? In a nutshell, a Japanese muslim found my site Talk Islam and revealed a very ugly side of Japanese nationalism that I had never really known about before. He really got set off y a pretty reasonable comment by Steven, and eventually left promising never to return. Well, he returned, promising a more temperate mindset about the Chinese people. However, he has resumed denying the Nanking Massacre ever occurred, which frankly is new to me. I rank this up with Armenian and Holocaust genocide denial, but the depth to which he as a Japanese nationalist believes that his nation was incapable of such atrocities is astounding. He argues poorly but I’ve seen that same mindset before, in response to 9-11 of course being the main example.

Anyway, just though I’d mention it here, despite it straying uncomfortably close to the political line I try to avoid at all costs.

Here’s a more representative picture of Japan’s muslims, by the way.

Over at Talk Islam, I started a somewhat speculative discussion thread about parallels to the samurai code and islamic values. To be perfectly frank, the idea came to me from watching Samurai 7 – not exactly a divine fount of inspiration, admittedly. What surprised me however was a response in thread by a Japanese muslim, who left a lengthy and quite insightful comment about his perception of what Japanese society has lost since WWII and how Japan as a society has strayed from the ideals of Bushido and how Shintoism has become emptied of meaning. His castigation of superficial pursuits in Japanese culture which in his opinion have dislodged the traditional beliefs is quite moving. It’s worth a read, for a truly unique perspective. I share it with you, not to promote my religion but more for the insights into Japanese culture that I think it provides.

Here’s the full text of the comment: Continue reading “a japanese muslim speaks”