TEAISM AS A WORLD CULT

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 220, 17 September 1938, Page 6 (Supplement)

TEAISM AS A WORLD CULT

ONE Okakurrf-Kakuzo, a Japan' eie of some literary renown, was responsible, between the years 1862 and 1913 for writing an essay on "The Cup of Humanity." It is in praise of tea, that amber-coloured liquid which began as a medicine and ended up as a beverage, and which has since become our national drink. Th« Chinese, during the eighth century, brought it into the realm of poetry, while the Japanese during' the 15th century elevated it into a religion of •esthetielNm which they called Teaism. Many indeed are the frank confession* that are made over the tea cup. Mutual confidence# from the inner sanctum of the soul are exchanged between men, and especially women, oyer a cup of tea. It has become a medium for that indispennable spirit of hospitality which docs so much to smooth the way of human intercourse. Indeed, if that spirit could be clothed with flesh, it would verily be seen to be armed with a teapot, and not with a cocktail-shaker, a# some vainly suppose. People meet for the first time. Conversation has to Iks forced, but just a* soon n« the cups begin to jingle and the kettle starts to Miijr, nil barrier* seem to fall. There in nothing furtive about a teapot as there is about a bottle in a cellar. Tea ism as * religion#, cult was founded on the "adoration of the beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence.* It* careful preparation, from the nn-

IJ -- - Tht REV. C. W. CHANDLER

locking of the china cupboard, to the warming of the pot and the infusing of the tender leaf buds with freshly-boiled water, then onward to the gentle pouring of the beverage partakes of the nature of » ritual. It is a 1 wave done in the same way, save that the Easterner doe# not adulterate the precious fluid with any product of the cow. This idea is purely Western. West of Suez people have a passion for adulteration, nor does their _ common religion escape the force of this indictment. Our Christianity is deeply tinged with paganism. This ritual which has grown up around the preparation of the beverage adds delight in the form _ of anticipation, before even the steaming liquid is sipped. It ie worthy of note that men quaff their beer, drink their whisky, while people always sip their tea, as they would wine from a chalice. Teatam. as a cult of the refined and the beautiful, is not without its devotees in the drawing rooms of the West; indeed, afternoon tea, like Matins and Evensong, is an established custom, save that the former has gained the pre-emi-nence. When the Japanese want to describe a man who is Unsusceptible to the influence of the romantic and adventurous in daily life they say that he has "no tea in him." In the essay, to which reference has already been made, Okakura-Kak^jo

aajti "In the worship of Bacchus we have sacrificed too freely; and we have even transfigured the gory image of Mars. Why not consecrate ourselves to the queen of the camellias, and revel in the warm stream of sympathy that flows from her altar? In the liquid amber within the ivory-porcelain, the initiated may touch the sweet reticence of Confucius, the piquancy of Laotse. and the ethereal aroma of Sakyamuni himself." Nor has the influence of Teaism failed to invade the very precincts of the Christian Church. The tea meeting is a time-honoured institution, and the parson .himself has become notorious for the readiness with which he accept* an invitation to partake of the cup that cheei s without inebriating. Thus the West has fallen beneath an Eastern spell in this master of drinking tea, which the author remarks has none of the "arrogance of wine, the self-con-sciousness of coffee, or the simpering innocence of cocoa." Impossible would it be to calculate how far this all-but-indispensable-beverage ha« influenced the best that we have in the realm of literature and art. In the preparation of the greatest sermons it has plaved an all important pert. Henrv Lawson, when speaking to the writer of the work of one of his contemporaries said, "His are whisky verses; mine are beer verses." While that may or may not have been so, the author of "While the Billy Boils" knew quite a lot about the bushman and his tea. Samuel Johnson spoke of himself as "a hardened and shameless tea drinker, who for 20 years

diluted hie meals with only the infusion of the fascinating plant; who with tea, amused the evening, solaced the midnight, and with tea welcomed the morning."' i "European imperialism," says Oka-knra-Kakn/.0, "which does not disdain to raise the al>surd cry of the Yellow Peril, fai I*s to realise that Asia may also awaken to tlie cruel sense of the White Disaster. You may laugh at us for having 'too much tea,' but may we not suspect tliat you of the Wes£ have 'no tea' in your constitution." By this Kakuzo surely means that we are lacking in vision and imagination, and cannot see beyond the flesh-pots of the West anything better or nobler than a Yellow Peril rising in the Kast. Nevertheless, the only place where all humanity has yet been able to meet has been in the tea-cup. It is the only really Eastern custom that has won universal esteem. While we have scoffed at the religion of the Asiatics we have accepted their brown beverage without hesitation. Therefore there is in a clip of tea a true symbol of world unity and peace. Tn the quickly vanishing coils of steam which rise from the cup we can see as in a veil (he coolies plucking leaf buds "neath the tropic sun. Tn the fastidious care which is taken with the blending of the leaves we can reminded of the equal care which we should be taking in the blending of the common faiths and hopes of all mankind, until there is distilled that soul-quenching draught of love, which alone can lead to a*ir permanent friendship. How many petty human quarrels hare been dissolved in the teatftip?

If the nations of the world could foregather in an atmosphere like that engendered by the pouring out of this ligation, how much nearer should we be to the possibility of a common understanding.

There is, nevertheless, another side to the picture. Along with the dissolving of quarrels in the cup there have gone west many honest reputations. Teaism does not go far enough. Good fellowship is not religion. Conviviality is not friendship. In -spite of all the friendliness of this Eastetn rite, it does not partake of tlie nature of a sacrament. We do not fall upon our knees to sip from the steaming cup. Strange as it may seem, but true it is that the mind does not rise very far above the level of merely human cares and occupations until the body assumes a prayerful attitude. We stand to drink a toast. We sit to drink our tea. We kneel to partake of the Sacrament. Religion goes deeper than philosophy, because the philosopher remains in anerect position, in that he does not kneel. Unless lie is something more than a philosopher his philosophy begins and ends in himself, whilst with the religionist his wisdom begins and ends in God. Bodily attitude has everything to do with mental outlook. There is a Chinese legend which telle of one Bodliidkarma who went to China from India on a missionary expedition in the year A.D. 543. He vowed that he would contemplate the virtues of Buddha through nine unsleeping years. At the end of three yearn lie fell asleep, and his anger at his weakness was so prent that he cut off his eyelids and flung them on tli e ground beside him. After a further five years of wakefulness a fit of drowsiness again overcame him ; then, plucking some leaves from a nearby shrub he found stimulation to complete his nine rears' contemplation. This shrub was called cha or tea.