The Folklore of the Stranger: A Consideration of a Disguised Wandering Saint

Abstract

THE folklore of Japan is full of references to the mysterious figure of a Stranger, who wanders into a village from an unknown 'outside' world. The word for a Stranger in Japanese, ijin or 'different person' has a wide connotation. An ijin can be a traveller, for example, whose way of life is wandering, in contrast to the static agricultural life of the village. He may be a wandering woodcarver or tinker, a travelling priest or strolling player. An ijin can also be a foreigner from another country 'outside' Japan, a Dutchman, Portuguese, Chinese or Englishman. And he can also be an avowedly supernatural being, outside the human race. The Wardens of certain pools, for example, who are believed to be snakes, and to be ready to lend lacquer cups and bowls to those who wish to borrow them for a party, are referred to as ijin. So are the uncanny yamabito or 'mountain people', said to be seven or eight feet tall, to be covered with hair or leaves, to have supernaturally glittering eyes, and to live deep in the mountains beyond human habitation. The word is thus used in a variety of ways to signify people who come into 'our' world from an alien space outside a certain invisible barrier. Whether the barrier surrounds the village, the country, or the human race itself, the space beyond resolves into what Edward Said called imaginative geography; a world devoid of myth, meaning and recognisable cohesion, and on which we are therefore free to project whatever images or fantasies our culture may suggest. The person coming amongst us from this outside world, from which the known distinctions of life are obliterated, can never be of us. He is excluded from the network of relationships and hierarchies which comprise our community; he must therefore refract round it, either above or below. Our instant reaction is to see him as a threat, bringing perilous pollutions from his alien land, and to expel him from our midst. But a moment later we perceive that at the same time he possesses strange occult knowledge, magic or medicine, beyond our experience. We therefore refrain from expelling him, with curses and stones, and instead disarm him with hospitality; we treat him with all the ritual of a guest, which will elicit from him blessings rather than harmful enchantments. The Stranger is therefore an ambivalent figure. He is at the same time a saviour and a threat; at the same time superior to us, noble, highborn and possessed of helpful magic power, and below us, base, polluted, magically weakening, to be driven out.' In Japanese folklore this ambiguity is often expressed by the symbolic device of disguise. The Stranger is noble, royal or holy, possessed of powerful magic, but he is disguised as a filthy beggar. Be careful therefore how you treat strangers as they pass through your village. Do not be rude to filthy beggars or throw stones at them, because they may be princes or powerful priests in disguise. The subject of my remarks here is one of the many legends found all over Japan and testifying to the passage, long ago, of a noble Stranger through the place. The Stranger is disguised, and woe betide the village that treats him with the contempt and rudeness