Christianity and the intelligence networks in Kyoto

Kyoto is the world’s foremost center of Mahayana Buddhism. It is also a traditional focal point for Shintoists, having long served as the nominal capital of Japan, due to the fact that it was where the Emperor resided from the beginning of the Heian Period through the third year of the Meiji Period. It was the rallying point for the nativists prior to the Meiji Restoration, as they sought to appropriate its symbolic status as the seat of the Emperor as an ideological tool against the Edo Bakufu government.

Thus Kyoto is also a rallying point for those attempting to promote a would-be Shinto theocracy along the lines of a Meiji Period State Shinto polity. Such people include, in my opinion, the former Prime Minister Mori (documented connections to crime syndicates), as well as eminent priests in the Shinto establishment, such as Kuroiwa Akihito, the former head of the national umbrella organization of Shinto Shrines (John Breen, A New History of Shinto, p. 205).

As an expatriate American resident of Kyoto with more than ten years in the city, I take the actions of such sociopaths in the public sphere very seriously, and basically consider them to represent a direct threat to my person and family.

Moreover, I also discovered that there are foreigners collaborating to promote the same agenda as such people, and then realized that those foreigners are officers in the intelligence agencies of their respective countries.

Part of the reason for addressing Christianity on this blog is that the foreign intelligence operatives here in Kyoto try to make the most of religion as a tool for creating divisions in Japanese civil society, and for establishing exclusionary networks, with Christianity serving as one mechanism facilitating infiltration of civil society. Since Kyoto is a religious center, it makes them appear as pious individuals, on the one hand, and provides a modicum of cover, on the other hand, as Kyoto does not have a bustling economy, being a thousand-year old center of religion, culture, and traditional arts.

The overwhelming majority of the individuals deployed by the intelligence agencies of their respective governments here in Kyoto don’t even have a conversational ability in Japanese, let alone literacy. One of the reasons that they are here to dumb down Kyoto, basically, in parallel with the secret society cretins promotion of religion and denigration of education and intellectuals in the USA and the UK.

I already mentioned fallacious and ludicrous writings on Kyoto by Mr. Dougill’s published by what us apparently an MI6 front company operating out of offices in New York City under the guise of an affiliate of Oxford University Press America. I have also mentioned that he is purported to be working on a book about the Hidden Christians in Japan. He is one of a number of Westerners being fraudulently presented as a legitimate intellectual authority on subject matter with which he is not only scantly familiar, but has a government enacted agenda that has nothing to do with the intellectual pursuit of truth and dissemination of knowledge into the public sphere.

Rather, the objectives of such individuals are bigoted and aim to deceive, inculcating false understandings of matters addressed for individuals unfortunate enough to have come into contact with the disinformation disseminated through the front companies operated by what can only be described as sociopaths in the “intelligence community”.

The foreigners operating in Kyoto collaborate not only with the Japanese crime syndicates (for a historical treatment of the post WWII development of these organizations in conjunction with the black market under the administration of Harry Truman see Robert Whiting, Tokyo Underworld…), they collaborate with each other.

While I’m fairly sure that there is a good deal of collaboration between intelligence agencies—especially those of the USA and the UK—it seems to me that these people were not collaborating on an official basis, but as members of a network that was not directly connected to their positions as intelligence officers. These people were all Freemasons.

As far as I can tell, they have a parallel Freemason agenda that they are intent on implementing as they carry on as intelligence officers. In other words, they have basically infiltrated the intelligence agencies of their respective governments and are in effect misappropriating public resources in their capacity as intelligence officers to implement their secret society agenda, which is for all intents and purposes the agenda of a criminal, anti-democratic organization.

Such individuals have made contact with me, generally at the Starbucks, initially—their corporate HQ of choice—and then attempt to infiltrate, attempting to cause a targeted individual such as myself to waste time, be unable to lead a productive life. When they fail at such attempts, they undertake more conspiratorial plans on a grander scale, with several individuals gathering information about a separate area of the targeted individual’s life and attempting to undermine that individuals daily life and goal oriented long term activities in a coordinated manner.

One such individual dispatched to infiltrate an aspect of my life related to cultural pursuit and religious study here goes by the name of Brian Schultz, as well as Brian Uneme, and claims to be from South Africa.

Brian was in Kyoto ostensibly to study shakuhachi with a Kyoto teacher well-known among foreigners, and introduced himself to me while I was practicing by the river one day, which is something I’ve been doing continuously for about nine years. He then bumped into me at the Starbucks, and I invited him over to look at some shakuhachi and have a drink.

We became drinking buddies of a sort, though he sometimes interjected malignant thoughts regarding Daoism or some other lofty topic, which immediately called his credibility and motives into question.

We were Facebook friends for a time, but after he’d invited me to a barbeque (technically not allowed at the pleasant banks of the Kamogawa—bento should be the order of the day!), which was sponsored by an Englishman whom shall remain unnamed for the time being, he abruptly cut off communications and closed his Facebook account (changed his last name to Uneme and defriended me!).

The reason he did that is apparently because there were numerous intelligence operatives at that barbeque, mostly British, including a couple that were doing graduate work in the sciences at Kyoto University, and their photos were on his Facebook page from the barbeque.

One thing that I’ve noticed and found extremely disturbing is the infiltration of academia by the intelligence agencies. They apparently infiltrate academia to recruit students (and teachers?) to act against their own country as an agent of the CIA, by Lisa Moran. Lisa Moran is a former CIA officer who has detailed aspects of the basically anti-social activities that the CIA is apparently engaged in even in friendly countries in a series of videos, including the following, related to a book she has published.
http://www.videojug.com/interview/the-mind-of-a-cia-spy-2

http://www.videojug.com/interview/cia-personnel-2

In the case of an allied country like Japan, this amounts to subverting the education system, and inculcating a criminal mentality in the students (and teachers) that the sociopaths in such intelligence agencies manage to recruit.

In other words, instead of spending money on study abroad programs to help student of the UK interact in an academic environment and civil society in a context free from interference by the state, the UK and other countries are apparently more interested in expending tax payer funds to send spies to infiltrate academic institutions in allied countries.

This basically amounts to a blatant attempt by the state to subvert and colonize civil society.

In all fairness, in the case of Japan, the policy of the Japanese government not to offer Monbusho (Ministry of Education) scholarships to potential graduate students that aree over 35 years of age is rather open to question with regard to the reasoning for such a policy. Why wouldn’t the decision to award a scholarship be based on anything other than merit at the graduate level? Especially in the case of the field of humanities, learning enough about the long and complicated history of Japan takes many years of study, so it is almost as though the Japanese government itself were trying to exclude aspiring Western scholars of Japanese history, culture, religion and the like from participating in high-level academic pursuits within Japan.

Back to the issue of Christianity, Brian Schultz/Uneme is one of several foreigners I suspect of being intelligence officers here that have become rent-a-priests who perform Christian wedding ceremonies on the weekends. Now I have nothing against the ceremonies, per se, just the fact that these people are not the types that would become priests, generally speaking. I don’t know whether the Church (any denomination) would approve of such activity. Then again, judging on the missionaries of the pre-modern period, maybe that is open to question! I would imagine that Jesus himself would consider them to be similar to the Herodians, false priests with a conspiratorial bend and suspect intentions and dispositions with regard to religion per se.

Finally, further mapping out and bringing to a circle the Dougill Schultz/Uneme connection, Brian once invited me out to a Butoh dance/music performance at a local club. I went along and was socializing and trying to have a good time, and Brian suddenly disappeared, making an early exit seeing that I was apparently having a good time. However, then I got into a conversation with a guy from Ireland who was among the folks at the bar, and the conversation somehow turned to the shakuhachi and Japanese music. He became somewhat curt with me as I tried to give him some background information, telling me that his Japanese friend knew all about it. That would have been fine except for the fact of the guys attitude, and the fact that the shakuhachi friend he was talking about was a total novice who was a friend of Brian’s that I had noticed recently sort of practicing at the river. He was so uninspiring a player that I could only imagine he was a yakuza plant or something trying to reclaim the river from me or something with respect to the shakuhachi.

This may sound trivial and juvenile, but the further point is that the Irish guy, whose name is Michael Lambe, runs an over overproduced blog 

http://www.deepkyoto.com/

doing a lot of suspect marketing and the like, and features none other than John Dougill as one of his resident experts.

The point is that these people try to mutually support the activity that each of them is engaged in as an intelligence officer, creating an exclusionary, nepotistic network that in my opinion amounts to a criminal infiltration of Japanese civil society.

Not only do they not facilitate interaction between private citizens of respective countries, but attempts to propagate a false cultural model that is apparently aimed at subverting the indigenous models, on the one hand, and stimulating demand for consumption related to entities affiliated with the model that the intelligence agencies are trying to covertly introduce in what can only be characterized as a neo-colonial activity, a type of societal espionage.

Jesus and Modernity - revisiting the Christian Missionaries in Asia topic

Historical Jesus

Jesus’ status as a religious figure, that is to say, as the namesake of Christianity, perhaps occludes some of the import of his contribution to the development of modern society.

A significant contribution that Jesus as a historical figure bequeathed to mankind adheres in his act of recognizing the legitimacy of the state while not relinquishing his religious beliefs.

Jesus of Nazareth was a Jew from a society with theocratic origins, and that theocracy was a key background feature in respect of which many of his actions in Judea were oriented.

On the basis of his presumed knowledge of scripture, it can be assumed that Jesus was literate, and considering that the literature and thought of Ancient Greece had been introduced into Jewish society at least 200 years before he was born, it is probably safe to assume that Jesus was familiar with Hellenic culture and society.

As Ancient Greek society was not a theocracy, having been founded and sustained by the institution of democracy as a collective decision making process, thereby prioritizing reason in the political decision making process, the people in the city states of Ancient Greece had no need to articulate in an explicit manner the necessity that religion and the state be separated.

That is to say, given the preeminence of reason in the collective decision making process, the political system in Ancient Greece presumed such a separation, even though the religious culture of Ancient Greece was profound, widespread, and diverse. Nonetheless, it should be acknowledged that even democracy in the polis did not stop the persecutors of Socrates from citing his communing with strange gods as one of the reasons for his being brought before the court. Perhaps this is evidence of the political influence of the demagogic sophists of whom Socrates was highly critical.

At any rate, Jesus was born into a Jewish society under Roman administration. Jesus was born into a somewhat conflicted society which the historian Josephus characterized an earlier period as beset with the conflict between Hellenism (in the time of Jesus represented by the Roman Republic) and Judaism.

In coping with the conflicted social situation, as portrayed in the Bible with respect to the story of Jesus confronting the moneychangers in the temple, on the one hand, and of being accosted by agents of the priest caste, on the other hand, Jesus manages to call attention to key tensions inherent in the relationship between collective government and individual rights, including the freedom of conscience/religion, the relationship between religion and the state (and politics), economics and religion, and economics and the state.

These issues would subsequently inform the articulation of the concept of public and private spheres of human activity, a prevalent concept of modern political philosophy and social theory.

Economic activity:

The Bible contains a dramatic description of Jesus being appalled at finding the temple, an institution for public religious practice, being used for private economic gain. It goes without saying that Jesus was not opposed to economic activity in general, but to the activities of the moneychangers and the sellers of sacrificial animals in the precincts of a “house of prayer”. This incident would appear to indicate that Jesus perceived a conflict of interest between the normative goal of promoting the public interest through facilitating religious practice, on the one hand, and the acquisitive goal of exploiting religion for private gain.

I’m not aware of a temporally define sequential relationship between these two incidents depicting in the Bible, not having read that volume recently, but who were the agents that accosted Jesus with the taxation related questions? The relevant passages of the Bible indicate that they were “Pharisees and Herodians”, and “spies” sent by “teachers of the law and the chief priests”. That “Pharisees and Herodians” would be collaborating would appear to be somewhat remarkable, considering that they were mutually antagonistic factions of the priest caste, with what can be generally characterized as mutually opposite goals vis-à-vis religion and the state.

Wikipedia has the following quote on a related page:

 Henry David Thoreau writes in Civil Disobedience:

Christ answered the Herodians according to their condition. “Show me the tribute-money,” said he; — and one took a penny out of his pocket; — If you use money which has the image of Caesar on it, and which he has made current and valuable, that is, if you are men of the State, and gladly enjoy the advantages of Caesar’s government, then pay him back some of his own when he demands it; “Render therefore to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God those things which are God’s” — leaving them no wiser than before as to which was which; for they did not wish to know.

Use of the currency of the state (i.e., the republic/empire) indicates a public dimension to economic activity insofar as transactions are conducted in the recognized medium of exchange, the public currency established by the state. The state had established a mechanism of exchange for use throughout the empire, which is a form of social infrastructure, and which requires continual expenditure on the part of the state to maintain. The use a taxes for supporting social infrastructure is a commonplace today, but perhaps a relatively modern concept.

Considering that Rome had not objected to Herod’s refurbishing and building the Jewish temple to a substantially more grandiose scale, and that the temple subsequently flourished for many years under the Romans, it must be assumed that some factions of the priest caste must have profited from temple activity.

So that begs the question as to why they would be engaged in conspiratorial activities targeting a teacher like Jesus. Was it because of the confrontation with the moneychangers? Or was it perhaps related to a more widespread issue relating to underlying social tensions that Jesus had sensed and was addressing, resulting in insecurity on the part of various factions of the priest caste with respect to their position in an evolving society.

The agents of the priest class chided Jesus about being a servant of the truth, and so on, and this can only be because he was a teacher renowned among the people across the social strata, probably the foremost Jewish luminary of his time. In that regard, the greater his reputation and following among the general populous, the more likely he would have been perceived as a threat to priestly authority that claimed an exclusive privileged relationship to the truth.

If Jesus was attempting to “save”, or liberate his people, the Jews, it may well have been in the capacity of a pious intellectual exerting himself for the purpose of guiding the people toward a degree of enlightened self-emancipation from en exploitive, corrupt, and conspiratorial priest caste.

Theocracy

Though the confrontation with the moneychangers is charged and physical, Jesus is generally depicted as being compassionate, considerate to others, and of moderate demeanor.

The Bible quotes Jesus as answering the Roman magistrate that his “Kingdom was not of this world”, which would seem to further support the notion that Jesus was not in favor of theocracy.

The Christian missionaries to East Asia espousing and disseminating the teachings of Jesus and the church formed in his name would use the Bible in a manner that placed them in a privileged position with respect to the truth in the world at large. Truth was thereby equated with the province of the established Christian church, which had ascended to a mantel of privileged access to the truth and as final arbiter of the truth, was in effect elevated above the state by its missionaries.

The state—any state—could be equated with that of Rome depicted in the Bible, and portrayed as persecutor of the people in many ways, one of which could even be the denying the people access to the privileged truth of the teachings of the Bible.

Accordingly, if the leaders of any of a state, such as Japan, that had once permitted Christian missionaries the privilege of disseminating their teachings in their state then subsequently revoked that privilege in response to negative effects on social cohesion in that state, which may have been brought about by the successful instilling of an entitlement mentality in the newly cultivated followers of the church vis-à-vis the state, then you arrive at a scenario in which the teachings disseminated by the missionaries become a self-fulfilling prophecy of a sort.

Such a scenario is easy to represent accurately as an attempt to usurp legitimate political authority by deceiving segments of the population of a country lacking a degree of education that would enable them to have adequate scope to evaluate such teachings with respect to other religious teachings, as well as political philosophy. It clearly represents a threat to the sovereignty of the state.

A mechanism by which such “missions” serve to unravel the social fabric is by circumventing the question of political legitimacy of state authority, replacing such issues of general and universal concern with the introduction of the notion of a completely alien notion of the truth, elevated to a false privileged status.

record of documents faxed to the Department of Justice of the USA

seeing as there are limited avenues of communication and the decision would seem to be in a significantly delayed status, i'm posting this in notification of the number of pages and dates on which i have faxed documents to the department of justice at fax number (202) 307-1379.

on september 4, 2011 i sent four faxes, consisting of 5 pages, 5 pages, 11 pages, and 28 pages, respectively

on october 20, 2011 i sent two faxes, consisting of 18 pages and 12 pages, respectively.

that amounts to a total of 79 pages, which is only a portion of the account of events, but should suffice for the purpose at hand.

a person in charge in the civil rights department that i spoke over the phone yesterday informed me that documents were forwarded up to the criminal division on october the 19th.

so i want to be sure that you have all documents that have been faxed, including the two from october, which consist of two emails to the consulate. and in particular one containing a fairly concise summary (five bulleted paragraphs) of some of the core complaints, that being an email to the consulate dated october 20th, the same day that i faxed it to the civil rights division of the doj..

furthermore, i have since sent three or four further emails to the consulate in osaka, and have other things to post on this blog, as well as observations to describe to the consulate, but have been somewhat overwhelmed with the burden accompanying the filing of a civil suit in relation to a matter discussed in the recent emails to the consulate.

Sketch of early Japanese history

NOW THEN, before moving on with the introduction to Japanese history, I should preface this section with the statement that the basic objective is to provide minimal but adequate context demonstrating that Japan had developed the basic societal traits that lent it to being open to receiving both Confucianism and Buddhism in succession. Though there were numerous conflicts with reactionary elements, such as the Mononobe and Nakatomi, after Buddhism gained favor with the Imperial Court, such conflict gave impetus to Kukai to employ Expedient Means on a grand scale to create the foundational esoteric schema of what would later be called Shinbutsu Shugo (syncretization of the Buddhas and Kami).

The schema and the diverse hermeneutics that it spawned served to energized the Japanese religious milieu, and provided a degree of resilience in times of crisis. The system was there for people to fall back for guidance in trying to recuperate lost equilibrium. In effect, it represents a sort of matrix that is capable of supporting varied modes of pluralism.

The Japanese had put in place a form of social infrastructure that facilitated their being open to giving the Christian teaching a hearing, to see what they could learn from it, how it might further contribute to the development of their pluralistic religious culture.

JAPAN

Japan, which, due in part to its remoteness and natural island defenses, was one of the last countries in the world to develop advanced cultural attributes, such as a writing system. So, though there are no written records from the Japanese themselves until the 8^th century, a fair amount about the early history of Japan can be gleaned through archeological remains, as well fragmentary records from Chinese sources.

Like the Sumerians, Egyptians, Chinese, Ancient Greeks, Celts, and so on, the Japanese emerge from the obscurity of pre-history demonstrating the distinctive modes of culture that had sustained their budding civilization.

To begin with, we know from archeological evidence that the pre-historical (i.e., before records were kept) Japanese of the Jomon period had developed substantial primitive cultural resources by no later than 6,000 years ago (maybe as far back as 14,000BCE). Chinese records include a physiological description which distinguishes the Japanese people as a genotype of sorts, and provide important historical information, particularly with respect to a female ruler named Himiko (the Chinese referred to the country of Japan as “Wa”, and to Himiko’s domain as “Yamataikoku”).

The archeological evidence supports the Chinese observations of the existence of a distinctive set of physical features, such as facial features, and also marks the transition to the same physiological features with respect to modern Japanese, which one would assume to have come about as a result of the intermingling of the genetic pool of the people of Jomon derivation and the people who brought wet-rice agriculture to Japan. 

A hundred years or so before Chinese writing was to be introduced into Japan, along with the Confucian classics, a Chinese source recount a request from Himiko of Yamataikoku for assistance in suppressing some form of internal strife that threatened her rule and the social order of her domain. Her request was granted by the Chinese, and aside from putting down the revolt, the Chinese presented her with some of the ubiquitous bronze mirrors dispersed throughout East Asia that are indicative of the strength of Chinese cultural influence.

The bronze mirrors of Ancient China were formed in a shape resembling the ancient Chinese character for the sun, and were regarded as a symbol of wisdom and represented high social status.

The first government organ established in Ancient Japan after the introduction of written language via the Confucian Classics was a Bureau of Divination, which probably served to predict the dates for sowing and harvesting, etc. and other dates related to the social practices of a sedentary wet-rice farming society.

Chinese historical records bear accounts of tribute being paid by the people of Wa at the Chinese Court of the Han Dynasty, etc. Japan’s suzerainty to China continued up until the manner of address used in a letter to the Chinese Court by Shotoku Taishi which effectively ended that status at the outset of the 7^th century. Japan had come of age at that point, so to speak, and Prince Shotoku had implemented a seventeen point constitution based on Confucianism and Buddhism that was advanced for its time.

Japan had ongoing relations with the Kingdoms of the Korean peninsula over the centuries. Alliance was mainly with Packche, but ties with the others also existed, and cultural influences from Goguryeo are also prominent.

Suffice it to say that a fair amount of the continental culture reaching Japan from the Qin through early Tang dynasties was introduced to Japan via Korea. Japan began to surpass the fractious Kingdoms on the Korean peninsula however, by assimilating culture directly from the Chinese, and developing that culture to the extent that a good deal of what remains to us today of East Asian culture from that period is preserved in Japan. I’ve heard that Chinese students come to Japan today to learn about aspects of Tang Dynasty architecture and the like.

A prominent example of a Japanese individual that excelled to an extent that his achievements stand out among the greatest of East Asian luminaries is Kukai.

Kukai (774-835) was a figure whose career straddled the Nara (710-794) and Heian (794-1185) periods. At that time in history, Nara was the easternmost terminal of the Silk Road, and the treasury of the Shosoin has fine examples of silk textiles preserved from that period made outside of Japan. The dedication of the Great Buddha at Todaiji Temple brought Buddhist luminaries from as far off as Persia. Japan had emerged as a bastion of civilization during the halcyon years of Buddhist influence across Asia.

Upon Kukai’s arrival at the temple in Tang China (805) where he was to undergo training in Buddhism in China, the head monk (Hui-ko) was immediately impressed with his presence, and Kukai eventually was made the leader of the sect, which effectively was transferred to Japan, where it flourished and was further developed by Kukai.

With respect to cultural achievements, though I haven’t heard anyone else articulate this insight before—maybe a first here—it has occurred to me that the development of the phonetic alphabet of Japan, the kana syllabary, in the 7^th century or so was a direct precursor to the development of the Korean syllabary in the 15^th century, nearly 800 years later. I haven’t ever heard anyone characterize that as a case of Japan exporting culture to Korea, but in the final analysis, that is basically what happened, in my estimation, though in an indirect fashion.

The Japanese kana syllabary was developed by reducing phonemes of Chinese characters in a manner such as to use them to represent only the sounds, not the meanings. The Korean syllabary was developed to be graphical representations of the anatomical sound production mechanism of each sound, theoretically speaking. The mechanisms for combining the syllables to make works, however, are very similar. In Japan, one theory holds that the syllabary was developed to enable Buddhist monks to read the Sutras. It was a very time consuming workload to become literate in Chinese at that point, and very few enjoyed the burdensome privilege. The development of the kana syllabary proved an effective vehicle to bring literacy to a wide swath of the Japanese population; in fact, they were one of the most literate populations in the world, the most literate during the Edo period, I believe. The Koreans were of course aware of the situation, and it may have been a catch up effort to develop a similar system for their own population.

Whereas I have been exposed, on the one hand, to a grating cacophony of voices megaphoning bigoted accusations asserting that Japan owes its cultural heritage to Korea, even through long-established English language print media here such as the Japan Times, this is one monumental example that demonstrates that cultural exchange was mutual, and dynamic. Moreover, it demonstrates that, with respect to literacy, Japan has been one of the most advanced, nay, a pioneering country from very early on.

Aside from that basic fact, the efforts of Kukai and others to facilitate co-existence of pluralistic religious culture shows that the Japanese developed a depth of cultural resources for coping with just the sort of monocular and unilateral distortions being leveled by people like Eric Johnston and John Dougill. Japan has produced a number of great scholars and religious figures whose works still inspire to this day. I, for one, have benefited enormously from those works, which represent contributions to the cultural heritage of mankind at large, and I intend to demonstrate that here, at the expense of those who prefer to dwell in the shadows of their secret societies, like Mr. Dougill and Mr. Johnston, as opposed to the light of day.

Due to time limitations, I am going to simply throw out some blocks of text from Wikipedia that demonstrate the degree of ignorance, deliberate deception, and multidimensional bigotry found in the article by Mr. Johnston. 

Emperor Kammu

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kammu_of_Japan

Kammu's personal name (imina) was Yamabe (山部^?).^[5] He was the eldest son of Prince Shirakabe (later known as Emperor Kōnin), and was born prior to Shirakabe's ascension to the throne.^[6]According to the Shoku Nihongi (続日本紀^?), Yamabe's mother, Yamato no Niigasa (later called Takano no Niigasa), was a descendant of King Muryeong of Baekje.^[7]

Takano no Niigasa

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takano_no_Niigasa

Takano no Niigasa (高野新笠) (ca.720 – 790) …

…was a daughter of Yamato no Ototsugu…

Yamato no Ototsugu, Niigasa's father, was a noble of Baekje origin/ The Title of Yamato clan had been Yamato no Fubito (和史, lit. "Scribe of Yamato") and later given a new title, Takano no Asomi (高野朝臣). Shoku Nihongi describes the Yamato clan as a distant descendant of an exiled prince of Baekje, son of King Muryeong of Baekje. Nihon Shoki mentions that the prince died in Japan in 513. The Yamato clan had persisted for 200 years by the time of Niigasa's birth, longer than many other aristocratic clans of foreign origin, such as the Kudara no Konikishi clan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kofun_period

Toraijin

渡来人 (hiragana とらいじん, romaji toraijin)

1.     a foreigner who crossed the sea into another country; typically into Japan

Chinese and Korean immigrants who were naturalized in ancient Japan were called toraijin. They introduced many aspects of Chinese culture to Japan. Valuing their knowledge and culture, the Yamato government gave preferential treatment to toraijin. The elements of Chinese culture introduced to the Yamato Imperial Court are very important.^[5] According to the book Shinsen Shōjiroku compiled in 815, a total 154 out of 1,182 noble families in the Kinai are on Honshū Island were regarded as people with foreign genealogy. The book specifically mentions 163 were from China, 104 such families from Baekje, 41 from Goguryeo, 6 from Silla, and 3 from Gaya.^[6] They might be families that moved to Japan between the years A.D.356-645.

Chinese migration

Many important figures were also immigrants from China. Chinese immigrants also had considerable influence according to the Shinsen Shōjiroku,^[6] which was used as a directory of aristocrats. Yamato Imperial Court had officially edited the directory in 815, and 163 Chinese clans were registered.

According to Nihon Shoki, the Hata clan, which was composed of descendants of Qin Shi Huang,^[7]arrived at Yamato in 403 (the fourteenth year of Ōjin) leading the people of 120 provinces. According to the Shinsen Shōjiroku, the Hata clan were dispersed in various provinces during the reign of Emperor Nintoku and were made to undertake sericulture and the manufacturing of silk for the court. When the finance ministry was set up in Yamato Court, Hata Ōtsuchichi (秦大津父) was in charge of accounts as a minister of it.

In 409 (the twentieth year of Ōjin), Achi-no-Omi, the ancestor of the Yamato-Aya clan, which was also composed of Chinese immigrants, arrived with people from 17 districts. According to the Shinsen Shōjiroku, Achi obtained the permission to establish the Province of Imaki. The Kawachi-no-Fumi clan, descendants of Gaozu of Han, introduced aspects of Chinese writing to the Yamato court.

The Takamuko clan is a descendant of Cao Cao. Takamuko no Kuromaro was a center member of Taika Reform.^[8]

Korean migration

Among the many Korean immigrants who settled in Japan beginning in the 4th century, some came to be the progenitors of Japanese clans. According to Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, the oldest record of a Silla immigrant is Amenohiboko, a legendary prince of Silla who settled to Japan at the era of Emperor Suinin, perhaps around the 3rd or 4th century.

Korean immigrants also include the Baekje royal family. King Muryeong of Baekje was born in 462, and left a son in Japan who settled there. According to the historical documents in the Nihon Shoki, his father was sent to Japan as a hostage.^[9]

Language

Chinese, Korean and Japanese wrote accounts of history mostly in Chinese characters, making original pronunciations difficult to trace.

While writing was largely unknown to the indigenous Japanese of this period, the literary skills of foreigners seem to have become increasingly appreciated by the Japanese elite in many regions. The Inariyama sword, tentatively dated 471 or 531, contains Chinese-character inscriptions in styles used in China at the time, leading to speculation that the owner, though claiming to be a Japanese aristocrat, possibly could have been an immigrant.^[10]According to the book of John Cater Covell published by the Korean company, "Inariyama sword, as well as some other swords discovered in Japan, utilized the Korean 'Idu' system of writing." The swords "originated in Paekche and that the kings named in their inscriptions represent Paekche kings rather than Japanese kings." The techniques for making these swords were the same styles from Korea.^[11]

Haniwa

The cavalry wore armour, carried swords and other weapons, and used advanced military methods like those of north-east Asia. Evidence of these advances is seen in Haniwa(埴輪), the "clay ring" placed on and around the tomb mounds of the ruling elite. The most important of these haniwa were found in southern Honshū—especially the Kinai region around Nara prefecture—and northern Kyūshū. Haniwa grave offerings were made in numerous forms, such as horses, chickens, birds, fans, fish, houses, weapons, shields, sunshades, pillows, and male and female humans. Another funerary piece, the magatama, became one of the symbols of the power of the imperial house.

Introduction of material culture to Japan

Much of the material culture of the Kofun period is barely distinguishable from that of the contemporaneous southern Korean peninsula, demonstrating that at this time Japan was in close political and economic contact with continental Asia (especially with the southern dynasties of China) through Korea. Indeed, bronze mirrors cast from the same mould have been found on both sides of the Tsushima Strait. Irrigation, sericulture, and weaving were also brought to Japan by Chinese and Korean immigrants who are mentioned in the ancient Japanese histories. For instance, the Hata clan, of Chinese origin, introduced sericulture.

Qin Dynasty

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qin_Dynasty

Religion

Floating on high in every direction,
Music fills the hall and court.
The incense sticks are a forest of feathers,
The cloudy scene an obscure darkness.
Metal stalks with elegant blossoms,
A host of flags and kingfisher banners.
The music of the "Seven Origins" and "Blossoming Origins"
Are intoned as harmonious sounds.
Thus one can almost hear
The spirits coming to feast and frolic.
The spirits are seen off to the zhu zhu of the musics,
Which purifies and refines human feelings.
Suddenly the spirits ride off on the darkness,
And the brilliant event finishes.
Purified thoughts grow hidden and still,
And the warp and weft of the world fall dark.

Han shu, p. 1046

The dominant religious belief in China during the reign of the Qin, and, in fact, during much of early imperial China, was focused on the shen (roughly translating to "spirits"), yin ("shadows"), and the realm they were said to live in. The Chinese offered sacrifices^{[note 15]} in an attempt to contact this other world, which they believed to be parallel to the earthly one. The dead were said to simply have moved from one world to the other. The rituals mentioned, as well as others, served two purposes: to ensure that the dead journeyed and stayed in the other realm, and to receive blessings from the spirit realm.^{[note 16][40][41]}

Religious practices were usually held in local shrines and sacred areas, which contained sacrificial altars. During a sacrifice or other ritual, the senses of all participants and witnesses would be dulled and blurred with smoke, incense, and music. The lead sacrificer would fast and meditate before a sacrifice to further blur his senses and increase the likelihood of perceiving otherworldly phenomena. Other participants were similarly prepared, though not as rigorously.

Such blurring of the senses was also a factor in the practice of spirit intermediaries, or mediumship. Practitioners of the art would fall into trances or dance to perform supernatural tasks. These people would often rise to power as a result of their art—Luan Da, a Han Dynasty medium, was granted rule over 2,000 households. Noted Han historian Sima Qian was scornful of such practices, dismissing them as foolish trickery.^[42]

Divination—to predict and/or influence the future—was yet another form of religious practice. An ancient practice that was common during the Qin Dynasty was cracking bones or turtle shells to gain knowledge of the future. The forms of divination which sprang up during early imperial China were diverse, though observing natural phenomena was a common method. Comets, eclipses, and droughts were considered omens of things to come.^[43]