Fine Japanese Calligraphy

The Art of Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase

Home › Library › Philology › Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting

How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo 稲妻に さとらぬ人の 貴さよ bashō 芭蕉

Japanese Scroll of Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ Original Scroll by Master Calligrapher Eri Takase

Abstract

Bashō set the verse down in the autumn of 1690, in a letter from Lake Biwa to a disciple in Edo, under a learned monk's warning against half-raw Zen, the conceit of taking oneself for awakened before one is; three modern English editions say the letter faults the disciples in Ōmi for complacency. The earliest printing read, of 1692, writes the last word 貴; the letter, as Ebara Taizō printed it in 1947, spells it たつとさ; across the witnesses it is written six ways. Japanese commentaries of 1783, 1829 and 1932 read the verse three different ways.

A reading

Bashō's admiration is for the person who sees the lightning and is not moved to call it awakening. The verse is Bashō correcting his students, and the correction is the poem. Lightning in the sutras is the emblem of how quickly everything goes, and the half-raw practitioner, seeing it, feels a small thrill of insight and calls the thrill awakening. Above the verse Bashō sets a learned monk's warning against half-raw Zen, which names that fault in its Zen form, and the word なま, half-raw, is exact. He had spent that year among his disciples in Ōmi, by Lake Biwa, and the letter of 1690 that carries the verse faults them, as its modern English editors report it, for complacency and for how they lived. That joining of the letter's complaint to the warning is my reading; the letter, as the scholar Ebara Taizō printed it in 1947, does not spell it out. Hattori Kōseki, in a commentary of 1932, read the verse as a rebuke to the Zen that ties a feeling of impermanence to every flash, and of all the readers I stand nearest him. Hiroaki Sato, in 1983, wrote that Bashō seems to express great wariness of enlightenment. Roland Barthes, as the poet Robert Hass reports him, read the verse as a send-up of the whole system of cultural signification. I do not read it as anti-Zen, as Sato half does, nor as Barthes's send-up of meaning: the headnote is a learned monk's own warning, and in the printed form Bashō says he received it with gratitude; those readings, and the others I do not take, are set out in the historical record below. It is a verse about not flattering yourself, and it is aimed at people he loved.

Share this article:

X Facebook

Overview

The text. The scroll carries 稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ, the 1692 form. Bashō's letter of 1690, as Ebara Taizō printed it in 1947, spells the last word in kana, たつとさよ [1]; the earliest printing read, 己が光 of 1692, writes the single character 貴 [2]. The witnesses after them, each dated in The historical record, write the last word 貴 in the 1692 form's typeset and its Edo reprints [3][4][5][6]; 尊 in a treatise of 1829, which also writes 悟らぬ [7]; 高 once, in an Edo manuscript [8]; 悟らぬ and 尊 in Shiki's manuscript [9]; とうとさよ in kana in 1909 [10]; 貴 again in 1927 [11]; and たふとさよ in kana in 1932 [12]. Ebara's edition prints both forms side by side [1]. Two splits run through the tradition, さとらぬ against 悟らぬ and 貴 against 尊, with 高 once. Of the seventy-nine books a search of the National Diet Library's digitized text layers returns for the verse, counting each form a book prints, so that two books that print two forms each count twice, thirty-nine write 尊, twenty-two spell the last word in the historical kana たふとさよ, eighteen write 貴, one 高, and one, Ebara's edition of 1947, prints たつとさ beside 貴; the 1909 list's とうとさよ [10] falls outside that search [13]. The meter is five, seven, five under either reading of the last word, た・っ・と・さ・よ or と・う・と・さ・よ.

The sense. The flash of lightning is a stock image in Buddhism for how things pass; the Diamond Sutra ends on it [14], and Hattori Kōseki in 1932 quotes the sutra's phrase, 如露亦如電, like dew, like lightning, as the stock words of the fox Zen the verse rebukes, 野狐禅, a practitioner's conceit of enlightenment before it has come [12]. The 1829 book sets it beside 石火電光, the spark from a flint and the lightning, the instant [7]. The readings, each in its own words: the Zen commentary with a preface of 1783 admires one who is 覚りながらさとらぬ, awakened, and yet not awakening [5]; the 1829 book: 稲妻のもろく哀れにして淋しきと見るへきは正直也, to see the lightning as frail, pitiable and lonely is the honest way [7]; Hattori: the person who takes no notice of fox Zen is far more admirable [12]; Miyamori: the verse reproves a superficial realization of the vanity of life [15]; Blyth: Life is not fleeting, life is not eternal; life is life, lightning is lightning [16]; Sato: Bashō seems to express great wariness of enlightenment [17]; Bowers: Bashō is happy not to gain transcendence from a flash in the sky [18]; and Barthes, as Robert Hass's note reports him: a send-up of the whole system of cultural signification on which haiku, and cultures in general, are based [19].

The words. 稲妻 inazuma, lightning, the autumn season word; literally the rice's spouse, from the old belief that lightning ripened the ears [20]. さとらぬ satoranu, does not awaken, the negative of 悟る, the verb of Buddhist enlightenment; in the letter and the 1692 printing it is in kana, and later printings write 悟らぬ. 貴さよ tattosa yo, how admirable, the noun of 尊い / 貴い, noble, precious, to be revered, with the exclamation よ. The scroll carries 貴, the form of the 1692 printing; about half the later printings write 尊; the letter writes the word in kana. As words the line says: lightning; and a person it does not enlighten; how admirable. The word has two readings, and both were in the language long before Bashō: tōtoshi is the form the dictionaries enter for the classical たふとし, which the Man'yōshū writes, and tattoshi is, in デジタル大辞泉, a sound change (音変化) of たふとし, and in the 精選版 日本国語大辞典 a word changed from it, its first example there the 康頼宝物集 of about 1179 [20]. The headnote's 智識, rendered here a learned monk as Fitzsimons renders it, is in the 精選版 日本国語大辞典 a Buddhist word for one who teaches the Way and leads people to it, a monk of high virtue, and its example there is this headnote as the 1692 printing gives it [20]. Bashō's letter, as Ebara prints it, spells it たつとさ [1]; the 1783 commentary glosses its own 貴 with the kana タフト [5], a verse list of 1909 spells it とうとさ [10], and the 1932 commentary spells it たふとさ [12]. Of the English editions, the complete ones by Jane Reichhold and Andrew Fitzsimons and David Landis Barnhill's selection romanize tattosa; Miyamori, Bowers and Michael Haldane romanize tōtosa, Blyth tôtosa, and Sato and Sam Hamill totosa. The split does not follow the headnote a translator prints: Barnhill, Reichhold and Fitzsimons print the 1692 headnote and date the verse by the letter, and Sato, who prints the letter's headnote, romanizes totosa.

The verse in English. The earliest English rendering in the sources searched is Miyamori's, in his anthology of 1932 [15], romanizing tōtosa. Blyth rendered it in 1942, and again in 1949 and 1952, the words the same but for the last: lightning-flash in 1942, lightning in 1949, lightning flash in 1952 [16][21]. Sato in 1983 romanized it totosa [17]. Hass in 1994 gave the house's title line, and in his note a literal version built on Robert Aitken's reading of the central phrase [19]. Bowers in 1996 printed a rendering of his own, romanizing tōtosa [18]. Hamill in 1998 romanized it totosa [22]. Barnhill in 2004 romanized it tattosa [23]. Haldane's rendering of 2006 romanizes tōtosa [24]. Reichhold in 2008 romanized tattosa [25]. Fitzsimons in 2022 romanized tattosa [26]. The house's title is Hass's 1994 line in his words, with its own punctuation; Hass's line shares the words How admirable and life is fleeting with Blyth's of 1942.

The historical record

Before 1690. The sutra's image. The Diamond Sutra ends on the flash of lightning as the figure for how everything passes: 一切有為法，如夢、幻、泡、影，如露亦如電，應作如是觀, all conditioned things are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow, like dew and like lightning; see them so, in Kumārajīva's translation [14].

1690, the sixth of the ninth month. The letter to Suganuma Kyokusui 曲水. The date is 7 October 1690 by Barnhill's conversion [23]; Reichhold alone writes winter [25]. Bashō, living at Gichū-ji 義仲寺 on the south shore of Lake Biwa, wrote to Kyokusui, his host in Ōmi, a high-ranking warrior of the Zeze clan in Reichhold's words [25], who was then in Edo [23][26]. Of all Bashō's surviving letters, the most are to Kyokusui, Reichhold writes [25]. Three modern English editions, Barnhill's selection of 724 verses and Reichhold's and Fitzsimons's complete ones, say the letter criticizes the disciples in Ōmi: for complacency in poetry and questionable behavior in their daily life (Barnhill [23]), for complacency and corruption (Reichhold [25]), for the complacent conventionality of their poetry and their dissolute social lives (Fitzsimons [26]); Reichhold alone adds that it praises Kyokusui's sincerity and strong character [25]. In it Bashō sets down something a learned monk had said and, under it, this verse. The letter's headnote, as the 1947 edition prints it: ある智識のゝ給ふなま禪なま佛是魔界, a learned monk said: half-raw Zen, half-raw Buddha, that is the demon realm. The verse follows, 稻妻にさとらぬ人のたつとさよ, the last word in kana. The letter is quoted here as Ebara Taizō printed it in 1947, under the tag 曲水宛消息, letter to Kyokusui [1]; the 1956 printing of 芭蕉講座 vol. 7 lists, in its note on the reprint, a letter to Kyokusui of the sixth of the ninth month of that year, held by 和田久左衛門 [27].

1692. 己が光. Two years after the letter, the verse was printed in the anthology 己が光, compiled by 車要 of Osaka [27]; this is the earliest printing read here, and Ebara in 1947 notes the verse also in 浮世の北, やどりの松 and 泊船集, which are not read [1]. In its autumn section the headnote ある智識ののたまはく なま禅大疵のもとゐとかや いとありかたく覚えて stands over 稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ, signed 翁; the last word is the single character 貴, written as the same book writes 貴 in another verse, ことたらぬこそ貴けれ [2].

十論為弁抄. Named only by Shiki's tag as the headnote's home, Shikō's 支考 treatise; the treatise itself is not read [9].

1774. 芭蕉翁発句集. 蝶夢's collection of Bashō's verses reprints the verse with a variant of the 1692 headnote, as いなつまにさとらぬ人乃貴さよ, the first word in kana and the last word 貴 [4].

1783. 俳諧第一義集. Its compiler's preface is dated 1783; the library's record gives the printing as 1790 [5]. A Zen reading of the whole haikai canon, this sets the verse first under the heading 翁示門人六章, six verses the master showed his disciples, and glosses it: the admirable one is 覚りながらさとらぬ, awakened, and yet not awakening, who has become 赤子の心, the mind of an infant [5].

1829. 『俳諧正語抄』, a haikai treatise printed under the name of Rōka 浪化 (1672–1703). Rōka's dates are the 日本人名大辞典's [28]. A few lines after its account of Bashō's deathbed, in a run of his verses each with a comment, the book reads this one as a warning against 張臂, flexing the arm at the flash and calling that right seeing; the honest way to see lightning is as frail, pitiable and lonely [7]. The book's preface is dated 1829 in the library's record, a hundred and twenty-six years after Rōka's death; it was printed from a manuscript said to have been kept at the house of Zushi Rogan 図司呂丸 at Haguro, and Shida Gishū 志田義秀, in a dictionary of 1933–34, calls it 僞書であらう, probably a forgery [28]; the reading is the 1829 book's.

Late Edo, undated. 萍花謾筆. An essay by 桃花園 naming the verse Bashō's; the library's record dates it only as late Edo, and its opening leaves carry no date [6].

Edo, undated. 鶯宿雑記. Komai Norimura's 駒井乗邨 manuscript copies the verse twice: one writes the last word 高さよ [8], the second writes the first word 稲つま, read at the leaf, and the last word 尊 in its text layer, 稲つまにさとらぬ人の尊さよ, as it writes 稲つまや for Bashō's 稲妻や顔のところが薄の穂 two columns before [29].

About 1889–90, and 1891. Masaoka Shiki 正岡子規. In about 1889 or 1890, by the library's record, Shiki copied the verse into his manuscript anthology under 稲妻 with its headnote [9]. In 1891, in a letter explaining a verse of his own against readers who over-thought it (諸君の御義解を伺ふにいづれも深く考へ過ぎ給ふ), he set the pilgrim's no-mind of his verse beside this one, これのみ, this alone, and added 草木國土悉皆成佛, grass, trees, land and earth all attain Buddhahood [30].

1909. 芭蕉句選. A typeset verse list spells the last word out, とうとさよ [10].

1921 and 1927. Fujii Otoo 藤井乙男, in 1921, alludes to the verse in his own phrase, 「稻妻に悟らぬ人の」をかしさよ, rather than quoting it [31]. A 1927 anthology prints it whole, 稻妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ [11].

1932. Hattori Kōseki 服部畊石, 芭蕉句集新講. Hattori names the target outright: 野狐禅, fox Zen, which likes to tie a feeling of impermanence to every flash, as in "like dew, like lightning"; the person who takes no notice of any of that is far more admirable [12].

1934. 日本俳書大系. Prints the verse as the 1692 anthology does, under its headnote, which differs from the letter's, in the typeset's spelling ある智識ののたまはく、なま禪大疵のもとひとかや、いとありがたく覺て, a learned monk said that half-raw Zen, they say, is the root of great flaws, and I received it with deep gratitude, then 稻妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ, signed 翁, the old master [3]. なま, raw, unripe, half-done, is the word for a beginner's Zen.

1947. Ebara Taizō 潁原退蔵, 新校芭蕉俳句全集. Ebara's edition gives both forms of the verse side by side, both headnotes, and notes that the verse also appears in 浮世の北, やどりの松 and 泊船集 [1].

1956. 芭蕉講座 書簡篇. This volume, in its printing of 1956, lists in its note on the reprint, as entry 一三, a letter (同年) 九月六日附曲水宛, to Kyokusui, the sixth of the ninth month, the same year, 和田久左衛門氏藏, the year being that of entry 一一, (元祿三年), and names 車要 as the compiler of 己が光 [27].

The attribution. Bashō's, in the letter as Ebara prints it and, signed 翁, in the earliest printing read; no witness read gives it to anyone else.

What is not a source. Barthes's reading of the verse, as Hass reports it, as a send-up of cultural signification is a reading, not a witness [19].

The verse in English

1932. Miyamori, An Anthology of Haiku Ancient and Modern, Maruzen, p. 149. Romanizes tōtosa. How noble he who realizes not, / From lightning-flashes, life is vain! [15] Miyamori's note: This verse, needless to say, reproves a superficial realization of the vanity of life, and Most critics do not set a high value on such didactic haiku as this.

1942. Blyth, Zen in English Literature, Hokuseido Press, p. 372. How admirable, / He who thinks not, "Life is fleeting," / When he sees the lightning-flash [16]. Blyth's comment: Life is not fleeting, life is not eternal; life is life, lightning is lightning.

1949, 1952. Blyth, Haiku vols. 1 and 3, Hokuseido Press, vol. 3 p. 72. Romanizes tôtosa. The 1942 rendering, its last line ending When he sees the lightning! in vol. 1 and When he sees the lightning flash! in vol. 3 [21]. In vol. 3 Blyth sets Whitman beside it: let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes.

1983. Sato, One Hundred Frogs, Weatherhill, p. 131. Romanizes totosa. Someone not enlightened by lightning / —how venerable!; headnote Undigested Zen and undigested Buddhism—they are hell, the letter's form [17]. Sato writes that Bashō, in his only hokku that directly bears on the subject of Zen, seems to express great wariness of enlightenment.

1994. Robert Hass, The Essential Haiku, Ecco, p. 24; note p. 259. How admirable! / to see lightning and not think / life is fleeting. Note: As Robert Aitken observes, the central phrase … can be translated as "one's not being enlightened, or experiencing satori", and on that Hass builds How noble / the person not enlightened / by lightning [19]. In the same note Hass writes that Bashō's headnote suggests the verse was directed against Zen faddists, and that Barthes, in Empire of Signs, suggests it is a send-up of the whole system of cultural signification on which haiku, and cultures in general, are based: what is enlightened is to see nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

1996. Faubion Bowers (ed.), The Classic Tradition of Haiku: An Anthology, Dover, p. 16. Romanizes tōtosa, and the second line satorenu. Bowers's own rendering, signed with his initials: A flash of lightning / but still benighted / Oh worthy man! [18]. His note: "Lightning" suggests the sudden enlightenment (satori) achieved by Zen masters. Here Bashō, in haikai's perverse fashion, is happy not to gain transcendence from a flash in the sky.

1998. Hamill, The Essential Bashō, Shambhala, p. 111. Romanizes totosa. How very noble! / One who finds no satori / in the lightning flash [22].

2004. Barnhill, Bashō's Haiku, SUNY Press, no. 508 p. 116; note p. 230. Romanizes tattosa. Headnote, the 1692 form: A virtuous monk once said, "Superficial Zen is the root of grave flaws," and I appreciate his words. lightning, / yet unenlightened: / so admirable [23]. His note: the letter criticized disciples in Omi who showed complacency in poetry and questionable behavior in their daily life.

2006. Haldane, in Bashō and the Haikuists, Delphi 2022. Romanizes tōtosa. how striking! / those not enlightened / by the lightning [24].

2008. Reichhold, Bashō: The Complete Haiku, Kodansha, no. 685 p. 171; note p. 346. Romanizes tattosa. Headnote, the 1692 form: A high priest says, "a superficial knowledge of Zen causes great harm." I appreciate his comment. with lightning / one is not enlightened / how valuable [25]. Reichhold's note: Basho was criticizing the disciples in Omi for their complacency and corruption.

2022. Fitzsimons, Bashō: The Complete Haiku, U. California, no. 652 p. 242. Romanizes tattosa. Headnote, the 1692 form: A learned monk once said, "Superficial Zen is the foundation of deep flaws," and I am grateful for his words. In a lightning storm / who sees no enlightenment / that's one to admire [26]. His note: the letter criticizes disciples in Ōmi … for the complacent conventionality of their poetry and their dissolute social lives.

Today. The house page's title, How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting, is Robert Hass's 1994 line in his words, repunctuated (How admirable! / to see lightning and not think / life is fleeting.) [19], and the page credits it to him by a reference to that book; Hass's line shares the words How admirable and life is fleeting with Blyth's of 1942 [16].

Share this article:

X Facebook

Japanese Scrolls by Master Calligrapher Eri Takase

Japanese Scroll of Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo) in a block font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよVB3CBlock
Japanese Scroll of Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo) in a cursive font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよVC4BCursive
Japanese Scroll of Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo) in Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase's own style (Eri's Choice)
稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよVD4BEri's Choice
Japanese Scroll of Bashō - How admirable, to see lightning, and not think life is fleeting (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo) in a semi-cursive font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよVS5CSemi-Cursive

Sources not seen

A reader with access to any of these is invited to write to Takase Studios at Tim@Takase.com.

References

  1. Bashō's letter to 曲水, 元禄3年9月6日 (1690), as transcribed in 潁原退蔵 Ebara Taizō 編著『新校芭蕉俳句全集』, 全国書房, 1947. National Diet Library pid 1128353, scan 76. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1128353/1/76
  2. 車庸 (車要) 撰『己か光』, 井筒屋庄兵衛 (Kyoto), 1692, printed copy, University of Tokyo 洒竹文庫, canvas 28 (the verse) and canvas 35 (ことたらぬこそ貴けれ). National Institute of Japanese Literature, 国書データベース, DOI 10.20730/100411341. https://kokusho.nijl.ac.jp/biblio/100411341/28
  3. 『日本俳書大系』第2巻, 蕉門俳諧前集, 春秋社, 1934, p. 434. National Diet Library pid 1194199, scan 241. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1194199/1/241
  4. 五升庵蝶夢 編『芭蕉翁発句集』, 1774, scan 62. National Diet Library pid 2540314, scan 62. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2540314/1/62
  5. 鼻中庵三力『俳諧第一義集』, preface 1783, printed 1790 (天明3自序, 寛政2刊, by the library's record), scan 10. National Diet Library pid 2568263, scan 10. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2568263/1/10
  6. 桃花園『萍花謾筆』, late Edo, undated (江戸後期, by the library's record), scan 21. National Diet Library pid 2533755, scan 21. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2533755/1/21
  7. 『俳諧正語抄』, preface 1829 (文政12序, by the library's record), printed as 浪化's, 泉響園琴而 校, scans 30–31. National Diet Library pid 2540297, scan 31. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2540297/1/31
  8. Komai Norimura 駒井乗邨 編『鶯宿雑記』, ms. National Diet Library pid 10301270, scan 87. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/10301270/1/87
  9. Masaoka Shiki 正岡子規 写『発句類題全集』, about 1889–90 (by the library's record), scan 27. National Diet Library pid 2586419, scan 27. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2586419/1/27
  10. 蓑笠庵梨一『奥細道菅菰抄』, 1909 print, 芭蕉句選, 秋之部. National Diet Library pid 888896, scan 100. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/888896/1/100
  11. 島田青峰 編『芭蕉俳句紀行全集』, 1927, scan 50. National Diet Library pid 1194541, scan 50. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1194541/1/50
  12. Hattori Kōseki 服部畊石『芭蕉句集新講』下巻, 四条書房, 1932, p. 640. National Diet Library pid 1145829, scan 56. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1145829/1/56
  13. The National Diet Library's digital collection, searched for the verse in its text layers (seventy-nine books). The last word in kana, たふとさよ, for example: 角田竹冷『芭蕉句集講義』, 1908–11, National Diet Library pid 875654, scan 34 (https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/875654/1/34); 沼波瓊音 編『芭蕉全集』, 1921, pid 931052, scan 63 (https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/931052/1/63); 潁原退蔵『芭蕉』, 1939, pid 1115844, scan 34 (https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1115844/1/34).
  14. Kumārajīva (tr.), 金剛般若波羅蜜経, closing gāthā. CBETA T08n0235, p. 0752b28–29. https://cbdata.dila.edu.tw/stable/juans?work=T0235&juan=1
  15. Asatarō Miyamori, An Anthology of Haiku Ancient and Modern, Maruzen, 1932, p. 149.
  16. R. H. Blyth, Zen in English Literature and Oriental Classics, Hokuseido Press, 1942, p. 372.
  17. Hiroaki Sato, One Hundred Frogs, Weatherhill, 1983, p. 131.
  18. Faubion Bowers (ed.), The Classic Tradition of Haiku: An Anthology, Dover Publications, Mineola, 1996, p. 16; the rendering and the note are Bowers's own, signed FB.
  19. Robert Hass, The Essential Haiku, Ecco Press, 1994, p. 24, note p. 259.
  20. デジタル大辞泉, s.v. いなずま【稲妻／電】: 稲の夫(つま)の意。稲の結実期に多く起こるので、これによって稲が実ると考えられていた; 精選版 日本国語大辞典 語誌 on the same page: 古代では雷光が稲の穂と結合し、穂を実らせると信じられていた. At kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/稲妻; and s.v. たっと・い【尊い／貴い】: 《「たふとし」の音変化。やや古風な語》; 精選版 日本国語大辞典, s.v. たっと・い【尊・貴】: 「たふとし」の変化した語, first example 康頼宝物集 (1179頃). https://kotobank.jp/word/尊い-561386; and 精選版 日本国語大辞典, s.v. ち‐しき【知識・智識】 ⑤(イ): 仏語。仏道を説いて人を導き、仏縁を結ばせる人。法の上の善友。徳の高い僧。高僧。善知識, example 己が光 (1692). https://kotobank.jp/word/知識-96098
  21. R. H. Blyth, Haiku, vols. 1 and 3, Hokuseido Press, 1949 and 1952, vol. 1 p. 205; vol. 3 p. 72.
  22. Sam Hamill, The Essential Bashō, Shambhala, 1998, p. 111.
  23. David Landis Barnhill, Bashō's Haiku: Selected Poems by Matsuo Bashō, SUNY Press, 2004 (724 of about 980 hokku, by its preface), no. 508, p. 116, note p. 230.
  24. Michael Haldane, in Bashō and the Haikuists, Delphi Classics, 2022 (rendering first published 2006).
  25. Jane Reichhold, Bashō: The Complete Haiku, Kodansha USA, 2008, no. 685, p. 171, note p. 346.
  26. Andrew Fitzsimons, Bashō: The Complete Haiku, University of California Press, 2022, no. 652, p. 242.
  27. 『芭蕉講座』第7巻, 書簡篇, 三省堂, 1956 (fourth printing, by the library's record), scan 161 (車要 and 己が光), scan 189 (the list of letters). National Diet Library pid 1344079, scan 161. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1344079/1/161
  28. 志田義秀, 「浪化」 附說, in 藤村作 編『日本文学大辞典』, 新潮社, 1933–34 (昭和8-9, by the library's record). National Diet Library pid 1235690, scan 1285. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1235690/1/1285. Rōka's dates: デジタル版 日本人名大辞典+Plus, s.v. 浪化: 1672 －1703 … 寛文11年12月17日生まれ … 元禄16年10月9日死去. At kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/浪化-1121169
  29. Komai Norimura 駒井乗邨 編『鶯宿雑記』, ms., a second copy. National Diet Library pid 10301527, scan 94. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/10301527/1/94
  30. Masaoka Shiki 正岡子規, letter of Meiji 24 (1891), in 『子規遺稿』, 1915 print, scan 384. National Diet Library pid 937217, scan 384. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/937217/1/384
  31. Fujii Otoo 藤井乙男『江戸文学研究』, 1921, scan 147. National Diet Library pid 968882, scan 147. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/968882/1/147

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Fable 5.1, Sonnet 5 and Opus 5.5, Takase Studios, LLC)

AI written · Ten wrote the history. Tim Jackowski commissioned it and answers for it.

Checked · Claude Sonnet (Anthropic), 2026-09-14, citations — every claim tested at its address; a handful corrected in the account from the check's findings; the rest resolve

Research depth: step 3 of our 10-step ladder, foundation complete · October 2026

Cite as: Tim Jackowski and Ten, "Philology of 稲妻にさとらぬ人の貴さよ (inazuma ni satoranu hito no tattosa yo)," Takase Studios, 2026, https://takase.com/library/philology/inazuma-ni-satoranu-hito-no-tattosa-yo.