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苦は楽の種 ku wa raku no tane No Pain, No Gain

苦は楽の種 (ku wa raku no tane), hardship is the seed of ease, is a proverb that lives as one half of a pair. Hakuin, about 1752, already tells of an old master who brushed the pair for everyone who asked. This study follows it into a list of nine household precepts, the lords whose names that list carried, and English.

Japanese Scroll of No Pain, No Gain (ku wa raku no tane) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
No Pain, No Gain苦は楽の種ku wa raku no tane

Original art by Master Calligrapher Eri Takase

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Abstract

苦は楽の種, hardship is the seed of ease, is a proverb that lives as a pair, 楽は苦の種、苦は楽の種, and it first appears as calligraphy: the Zen master Hakuin reports, about 1752 and again in his autobiography of 1768, an old master who brushed the pair for everyone who asked him for a piece of writing. A comic novel of 1774 has it as a sermon commonplace, and the dictionaries cite it from there. From the 1840s the proverb heads a list of nine household precepts, the same nine in nearly the same order in every copy, credited to the shogun Yoshimune, to a wise lord, by 1863 to Tokugawa Mitsukuni, and in 1888 to 加藤清正; the name on the list is a tradition, and the proverb is older than any version of the list known. English set its equivalents beside it from 1882, and Hearn gave it the seed in 1899.

Overview

The sense. One sense from 1774 to today: sow hardship now, reap ease later, and the pair adds that ease sown now is hardship later [1][2]. What the record adds is a pedigree. From the 1840s the proverb heads a list of nine household precepts, the same nine in nearly the same order in every copy, and the copies disagree about whose they are: an Edo manuscript gives them to the shogun Yoshimune for his heir [3]; the 1843 farmers' reader gives them to a wise lord [4]; by 1863 a book of maxims prints them as Mitsukuni's house precepts [5], and the Meiji books call them his wall-writing, his autograph, his testament, his house precepts, though a manuscript of 1880 still passes them on with a hedge (so the world says) [6][7][8][9][10]. A collection of 1888 gives the same list to 加藤清正 [11]. Another manuscript of the 1890s prints a different list under Hideyoshi's name and notes in the margin that it agrees with 西山公's writing [12]. The precept list is real and old; the name on it is a tradition that had settled on Mitsukuni by the last Edo years and never settled entirely, and the proverb is older than any version of the list known. A Buddhist tract, undated, gives the pair a third life as the doctrine of a sect (尼乾子経) that taught ease now means suffering hereafter, which is the pair read as karma [13].

The words. 苦 (ku) is hardship, toil, suffering; the dictionaries paraphrase it 苦労 [2]. 楽 (raku) is ease, comfort, 安楽; the same character read tanoshimi is pleasure, and one early witness has that word instead [14]. 種 (tane) is a seed, and the seed is the whole figure: hardship is not a price paid for ease but the thing ease grows from. The proverb lives as a pair, 楽は苦の種、苦は楽の種, ease is the seed of hardship, hardship the seed of ease, and 精選版日本国語大辞典 says under the shorter headword that it is used 「楽は苦の種、苦は楽の種」と続けて, continued into the pair [2]. The second half is the half that consoles. The old printed form is 樂 for 楽 and the witnesses below keep it.

The proverb in English. Hepburn's 1872 dictionary does not head it [15]. A phrasebook of 1882 sets it beside Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet [16], a dictionary of 1885 renders the other half pleasure is the seed of trouble [17], and a lexicon of 1888 gives it as the Japanese of Ad astra per aspera [18]. Brinkley's dictionary of 1896 heads it under 苦, pain begets pleasure [19], and Hearn gives the pair in 1899 as pleasure is the seed of pain; pain is the seed of pleasure [20]. From there the English runs through Kin 1955, Okada 1958, Blyth 1960, Buchanan 1965, Zona 1996 and Galef 2000 and 2012, in two wordings, the seed (Hearn, Okada, Buchanan) and the source (Kin, Zona, Galef), with the dictionaries' equations beside them, no cross, no crown in Kenkyūsha 1983 and no pain, no gain in the Kodansha kanji dictionary of 2013 [21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30].

The historical record

About 1752. 白隠's 於仁安佐美, Horse Thistles, a letter of instruction to the abbesses of two imperial convents. Hakuin reports the pair as an old master's calligraphy: 近來さる老宿の許へ人來りて、法語又は墨跡など請ひ求むる者あれば、樂は苦の種、苦は樂の種、といへる六語を書して與へられける由、其語鄙俗に似たりといへども當代の學者の爲には相應の靈劑なるべし, they say that lately, when people come to a certain old master asking for a word of the Dharma or a piece of his calligraphy, he writes out for them the six words "ease is the seed of hardship, hardship the seed of ease"; the words may sound common, but for the students of our day they must be just the medicine [31]. Waddell dates the work about 1752 [32].

1768. 白隠, 壁生草, his autobiography. On his early years at Shōin-ji Hakuin tells it again, and names the old man: 昔仙臺小島老漢、尋常人あり墨跡を願ふ時は、樂苦種苦樂種の六字を與へ玉ひける由、寔に貴とき寶墨ならずや, long ago, whenever anyone asked old Shōtō of Sendai for a piece of calligraphy, he is said to have given them the six characters 樂苦種苦樂種; were those not precious inscriptions indeed [33]. The six characters are the pair in Chinese, ease, the seed of hardship; hardship, the seed of ease. Norman Waddell's English of 1999: Years ago, Shōtō Rōkan of the city of Sendai was constantly besieged by requests for specimens of his calligraphy. He always obliged petitioners by writing the same six characters: "Pleasure is the seed of suffering. Suffering is the seed of pleasure." Those inscriptions in ink were treasures greatly to be cherished; his note says the old man has not been identified, that the line was perhaps a popular saying of the time, and that a similar phrase with slightly different wording is in the Blue Cliff Record, case 83 [34]. In two tellings sixteen years apart, the pair is a calligrapher's stock line before it is in any printed story. Hakuin's recorded sayings, in the same translator's English of 2014, have him tap his staff on the high seat and give the pair before a word about the locust plague [35].

1774. 『笑談医者気質』, a comic novel of doctors' manners (Osaka, preface dated 安永三年), book five. The dictionaries' earliest citation for the pair [1]; Hakuin's two reports are older. The chapter is about a doctor's wife delighted by her neighbors' talk, and it opens on a sermon: 樂は苦の種苦は樂の種。惡人程うるさき者はあらねど。善人を見出すの種なれば善惡は水波の如しと, ease is the seed of hardship, hardship the seed of ease; nothing is so tiresome as a bad man, but since he is the seed by which the good one is discovered, good and bad are like water and its waves [36]. In the 1895 collected edition of the kishō novels the book's preface is dated 安永三きのへ午の春, spring of 1774 [36]; the 1774 printing itself is not digitized at the National Diet Library.

1793. 並木五瓶's kabuki play 『五大力恋緘』, final act. The dictionaries' citation for the short form, in other words: これ、小万さん、其やうにくよくよと、もし、苦は楽みの元といふぞえ, now, Koman, don't fret so; they say hardship is the source of pleasure, you know. That is 精選版日国 quoting the 評釈江戸文学叢書 edition [2]. The 1928 『日本戯曲全集』 typeset of the play prints the speech differently: コレ、小万さん、其やうにクヨ〳〵と……併し、苦は樂しみの元ぢやなア, … but hardship is the source of pleasure, isn't it [14]. The kotobank page that dates the citation 1793 also gives the play's premiere as 1794 (寛政6) at the Naka theater in Osaka [2]. Either way the play is later than the novel and says it in different words.

Undated, Edo. 『故花菴備忘録』, a manuscript miscellany (三木維清 comp.). The proverb as the second of nine precepts, and the earliest form known of the list that the later witnesses attach to Mitsukuni, here under another name: 有徳大君より長福君へ進せられし御譬書 一欲と酒と色とは敵と知るへし 一苦は楽の種楽は苦の種と知るへし 一主と親とは無理なるものと思ふへし 一下人は足らぬものと知るへし … 右九ヶ条, the admonitory writing presented by the shogun Yoshimune (有徳院) to his heir Ieshige (長福丸): know that desire, drink and lust are enemies; know that hardship is the seed of ease and ease of hardship; think of master and parent as unreasonable; know that servants fall short … the above, nine articles [3].

1843. 『農家心得種』, a farmers' reader (手塚敬義). 賢君の御壁書の御教に ○苦は樂の種樂は苦の種と知るべし ○主と親とはむりなるものと思へ下人は足らぬものと知べし ○子ほどに親を思へ子なきものは身にたくらべて近き手本にすべし ○掟におぢよ火におぢよ … ○欲と色と酒とは敵と知べし ○朝寝すべからず … ○分別は堪忍にありと知べし, from the teaching of a wise lord's wall-writing: know that hardship is the seed of ease … [4]. The lord is 賢君, a wise lord, and not named. The proverb heads the list.

1841. 『役者舞台扇』, a book on kabuki actors (四文舎我笑・百文舎外笑, 河内屋太助), the opening. The pair as a commonplace one can string with others: 楽は苦の種苦は楽の種早牛も淀遅牛もよどまぬ水の流るゝごとく, ease the seed of hardship, hardship the seed of ease; fast ox or slow, like water that never stands still [37].

1863. 『三省録後編』, a book of maxims (原義 comp.), the appendix, leaf 3. The list under Mitsukuni's name, with no hedge: ○水戸光國公の御家訓に云 苦は樂の種樂は苦の種と知べし 主人と親は無理なる者と思へ下人はたらぬものと思へ 子ほどに親を思へ子なき者は身にくらべて近き手本とすべし 欲と色と酒とは敵と知べし …, Lord Mitsukuni of Mito's house precepts say: know that hardship is the seed of ease and ease of hardship … [5]. The attribution is in print five years before the Meiji era begins.

1875 and 1880. A proverb for 福沢, a wall-writing for the Shingaku readers. 福沢諭吉 reaches for it as a plain proverb in 『文明論之概略』: 譬ヘバ諺ニ苦ハ樂ノ種ト云ヒ。良藥口ニ苦シト云フヿアリ, as the proverb says, hardship is the seed of ease, and good medicine is bitter to the mouth [38]. A Shingaku reader of 1880 prints the list as ○水戸黃門光國公壁書 一苦ハ樂ノ種樂ハ苦ノ種トシルベシ, the wall-writing of Lord Mitsukuni, the Mito chancellor [6].

1880. 『諸家随筆ぬきがき』, a manuscript of extracts (白井光太郎), fascicle 5, leaf 43. 水戸黄門光國卿御作のよし世に云傳ふ書あり 苦ハ楽のたね楽ハ苦の種と知るべし 主人と親とハ無理成ものと知べし 恩を忘るへからず 子ほど親を思へ …, there is a writing the world hands down as said to be by Lord Mitsukuni of Mito: know that hardship is the seed of ease … [7]. In this manuscript the name comes with a hedge, 御作のよし世に云傳ふ, said to be his, so the world passes it on.

1893. 『善悪合鏡』, a Shingaku lecture (蕉雨逸人, 心学 series), first fascicle. The nine articles again, credited to Mitsukuni's own hand: 又同卿自筆九ケ條の寫に云く 一苦は樂の種樂は苦の種としるべし 一主と親とは無理成物と思へ …, and a copy of the same lord's autograph nine articles says …; the 同卿 is 水戶黄門光圀卿, named a few lines on [8].

1894. 『明治節用大全』, a household encyclopedia (博文館), the section of maxims. ○苦は樂の種樂は苦の種と知るべし(以下九則水戶西山公の遺訓) ○主と親とは無理なるものと思ひ下人は足らぬものと知るべし … ○分別は堪忍にありと知るべし, … (the following nine rules are the testament of Lord Nishiyama of Mito). 西山公 is Mitsukuni's name in retirement [9].

1896. 岡谷繁実『名将言行録』(牧野書房 ed.), book 46, Tokugawa Mitsukuni, pp. 280–281. The great Meiji compendium of the lives of commanders: 光圀の家訓に曰く、苦は樂の種、樂は苦の種と知るべし。主人と親とは無理なるものと思へ、下人は足らぬものと思へ。子程に親を思へ、子なき者は身に校べて近き手本とすべし。掟に恐れよ、火に恐ぢよ、無分別者に恐ぢよ。欲と色と酒とは敵と知るべし。朝寐すべからず。物言すべからず。被官は家を定めよ、主人は被官に慈悲をせよ。分別は堪忍にありと知るべし。九分は善し十分は必ずこぼるゝと知るべし, Mitsukuni's house precepts say: know that hardship is the seed of ease and ease of hardship; think master and parent unreasonable, servants wanting; love your parents as you would a child, and if you have no child measure by your own body and take a near example; fear the law, fear fire, fear the thoughtless; know desire, lust and drink for enemies; do not sleep late; do not talk idly; a retainer should settle his house and a master be kind to his retainers; know that judgment lies in patience; nine parts is good and ten will surely spill [10]. The same book's own first edition (玉山堂, 1869) is digitized only through book 30.

1888. 『言行彙鑒』, a collection of sayings (西田北洲 ed.), page 54. The same list under a fourth name: 加藤清正之壁書 ○樂ハ苦ノ種苦ハ樂ノ種ト知ルヘシ ○主ト親トハ無理ナルモノト思 …, the wall-writing of 加藤清正: know that ease is the seed of hardship and hardship of ease; think master and parent unreasonable … [11].

Between 1890 and 1900, a commonplace. A rakugo-style sermon of 1894 plays on the pair (鍬樂の種, a hoe is the seed of ease, a pun on 苦は) [39]; a Kanazawa savings bank's advertisement in an 1894 city guide prints 苦は樂の種 beside 塵も積もれば山となる [40]; two haiku anthologies of 1893 use it in verses (苦は樂の種と畑打つ主哉, "hardship the seed of ease," says the master, tilling) [41]. In the National Diet Library's next-generation full-text search the proverb is in 732 digitized books in the short form and 489 in the pair [42]; the library's own full-text index, which reaches its periodicals and later books as well, returns 6,959 items for 苦は楽の種 and 4,371 for 樂は苦の種 [43].

The dictionaries today. デジタル大辞泉: 現在の苦労は、将来の幸福のもとになるということ. 精選版日国 for the pair: 楽をすると、あとで苦を味わわなくてはならないし、苦を忍べばあとで楽ができる, take it easy and you will taste hardship later; bear hardship and ease comes after. ことわざを知る辞典: 苦労しておけば、後々楽になる, with the note for the pair that 苦楽は相伴うもので、どちらか一方だけということはない, ease and hardship go together; you never get just one [2][1].

What is not a source. Galef pairs the proverb with 禍福はあざなえる縄の如し, good and bad luck are twisted together like rope strands; Buchanan pairs it with 楽あれば苦あり [24]. Both are kin, not sources, and so is the Blue Cliff Record's 苦中樂，樂中苦, pleasure within suffering, suffering within pleasure, in 雪竇's verse on case 83, the parallel Waddell names [44][34]. The nine-precept list is a use of the proverb, not its origin, since Hakuin reports the pair as an old master's calligraphy about 1752; and the 1793 play's 苦は楽みの元 is the same thought in other words, not the proverb's first form.

The proverb in English

1882 to 1888. The phrasebooks and the dictionaries. A three-language phrasebook of 1882 sets 苦ハ樂ノ種 in its Japanese column beside Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet and La patience est amère, mais son fruit est doux [16]. A Japanese-English dictionary of 1885 gives, under Raku 樂, 樂ハ苦ノ種, pleasure is the seed of trouble, the other half, with the seed kept [17]. The appendix of foreign phrases in an English-Japanese lexicon of 1888 glosses Ad astra per aspera as 艱難ニ因テ天漢ニ至ル, through hardship to the heavens, and then as 苦ハ樂ノ種 [18].

1896. Frank Brinkley, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, page 772. Under 苦: Ku wa raku no tane, 苦ハ樂ノ種, pain begets pleasure, marked as a proverb, and at once its reverse, Raku areba ku ari, 樂アレバ苦アリ, where there is a pleasure, there is a pain, men have both pains and pleasures [19]. The first dictionary opened for this page to head it under 苦, and it drops the seed.

1899. Lafcadio Hearn, In Ghostly Japan, page 188. Number 73 of his Buddhist proverbs: Raku wa ku no tane; ku wa raku no tane. Pleasure is the seed of pain; pain is the seed of pleasure [20]. The seed kept, the pair whole, and the wording the proverb books use for sixty years.

1900. Lafcadio Hearn, Shadowings, page 127. In the essay on women's names, a footnote on the name Raku: The name seems curious, in view of the common proverb, Raku wa ku no tane, — "Pleasure is the seed of pain" [23].

1906. Hirose and 佐久間信恭, An Intermediate Japanese-English Dictionary, page 585. Under Ku 苦: 苦は樂の種, After storm comes calm [45].

1955. Dictionary of American Proverbs, page 192. Under pleasure, after No pleasure without pain: Pleasure is the source of pain; pain is the source of pleasure [21]. The source wording, forty years before Zona and Galef repeat it word for word.

1958. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, page 97. Ku wa raku no tane. Pain is the seed of pleasure. "No pleasure without pain." "No pain, no palm; no thorns, no throne; no gall, no glory; no cross, no crown." —William Penn. The reverse is expressed in the proverb: Raku areba, ku ari [22]. Penn's line is the title of his book of 1669, and the equation Kenkyūsha prints in 1983.

1960. R. H. Blyth, Japanese Life and Character in Senryu, page 306. A senryū by 周魚 that turns the proverb over: Ku wa raku no tane de nakatta kafu no shiwa, The troubles were not the seeds of happiness, — the wrinkles of this widow [25].

1965. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, p. 169. Raku wa ku no tane, ku wa raku no tane: "Pleasure is the seed of pain, pain is the seed of pleasure." English parallel: Rest comes from unrest, and unrest from rest [24]. The entry above it, Raku areba ku ari, gets No pains, no gains. Buchanan keeps the seed and gives the pair whole, in Hearn's words.

1983. Kenkyūsha's New Collegiate Japanese-English Dictionary, page 338. Under く⁴ 苦: 苦は楽の種. No cross, no crown [29]. Penn's equation, from Okada.

1996. Guy Zona, Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain, page 98. Pleasure is the source of pain; pain is the source of pleasure [26], the 1955 dictionary's line.

2000 and 2012. David Galef, Even a Stone Buddha Can Talk, no. 21, and Japanese Proverbs, no. 121. The entry gives the English equivalent in the book's own square brackets: Raku wa ku no tane, ku wa raku no tane. Pleasure is the source of pain; pain is the source of pleasure. You have to take the rough with the smooth. The 2012 note: The idea behind this maxim is both Buddhist—things of this world that delight also cause sorrow—and psychological—true joy comes only after some hardship is overcome [27][28]. Galef's source is Kin's and Zona's, and his note adds the Buddhist reading the undated tract above actually holds.

2013. Jack Halpern, The Kodansha Kanji Dictionary. Under 苦: 苦は楽の種 くはらくのたね No pain, no gain [30]. The house title's equation, in a kanji dictionary.

Today. ことわざを知る辞典 gives There is no pleasure without pain [2]. EDRDG at jisho: one cannot have pleasure without pain; no pain, no gain [46]. The house title, No Pain, No Gain, is the English proverb the Japanese sits nearest, and it loses the seed; the house explanation's literal line, pain is the seed of comfort, keeps it. A rendering must keep the seed, and should give the pair once, since the scroll's half is the consoling half of a saying that cuts both ways. The English proverbs the equations reach for have their own dates: no pains, no gains from 1577, there is no pleasure without pain from Tudor English, take the rough with the smooth from about 1400 [47][48][49].

A reading

A proverb with a seed in it, and the seed is what to keep: not that pain buys gain, but that ease grows from hardship, and hardship from ease. The pedigree the Meiji books gave it, first of Mitsukuni's nine precepts, is a tradition with four names on it and the proverb older than all four, since Hakuin had already met it as an old master's calligraphy. In English the seed held from Hearn to Buchanan and gave way to a source in 1955; the Japanese never lost it.

References

  1. 「楽は苦の種苦は楽の種」, 精選版 日本国語大辞典 · デジタル大辞泉 · ことわざを知る辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/楽は苦の種苦は楽の種-655824
  2. 「苦は楽の種」, デジタル大辞泉 · 精選版 日本国語大辞典 · ことわざを知る辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/苦は楽の種-482032
  3. 三木維清 輯『故花菴備忘録』, manuscript, National Diet Library pid 11446267, scan 36. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/11446267/1/36
  4. 手塚敬義『農家心得種』, 1843, National Diet Library pid 2536178, scan 36. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2536178/1/36
  5. 原義 輯『三省録後編』附録 卷上, 英屋文蔵 ほか, 文久3 (1863), leaf 3, National Diet Library pid 2599402, scan 4. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2599402/1/4
  6. 『玉石雑話：心学必読』 卷之下, 1880, leaf 24, National Diet Library pid 755148, scan 27. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/755148/1/27
  7. 白井光太郎 編『諸家随筆ぬきがき』5, manuscript, 1880, National Diet Library pid 2576028, scan 45. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2576028/1/45
  8. 蕉雨逸人 述『善悪合鏡：心学講義』, 1893, National Diet Library pid 758805, scan 24. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/758805/1/24
  9. 博文館編輯局 編『明治節用大全：伝家宝典』, 博文館, 1894, National Diet Library pid 898143, scan 278. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/898143/1/278
  10. 岡谷繁実『名将言行録』, 牧野書房, 1896, book 46, pp. 280–281, National Diet Library pid 778868, scan 151. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/778868/1/151
  11. 西田北洲 編『言行彙鑒』, 河井源蔵, 1888, p. 54, National Diet Library pid 755276, scan 39. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/755276/1/39
  12. 蜂屋茂橘『椎の實筆』, manuscript, 1896, National Diet Library pid 2574762, scan 106. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2574762/1/106
  13. 蘆迺屋徳明『角組葦』, undated, National Diet Library pid 2562508, scan 13. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2562508/1/13
  14. 渥美清太郎 編『日本戯曲全集』第六巻, 春陽堂, 1928, p. 70, National Diet Library pid 1883929, scan 41. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1883929/1/41
  15. Hepburn, dictionary of 1872, National Diet Library pid 993689. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/993689
  16. 稲垣才三郎『英仏通弁自在：交際商用』, 競錦堂, 1882, pp. 60–61, National Diet Library pid 1939229, scan 35. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1939229/1/35
  17. 市川義夫 編訳『字彙大全』, 製紙分社, 1885, p. 391, s.v. Raku 樂, National Diet Library pid 903023, scan 200. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/903023/1/200
  18. An English-Japanese Lexicon, Explanatory, Pronouncing and Etymological, revised by S. Sugiura, J. Matsushita and A. Manase, M. Okura, Tokyo, 1888, p. 1065, the list of foreign proverbs s.v. Ad astra per aspera, National Diet Library pid 1677027, scan 549. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1677027/1/549
  19. F. Brinkley, F. Nanjō and Y. Iwasaki, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseidō, Tokyo, 1896, p. 772, s.v. Ku 苦 (the shelved copy). https://archive.org/details/cu31924082117288
  20. Lafcadio Hearn, In Ghostly Japan, Little, Brown, Boston, 1899, p. 188, no. 73 (the shelved copy). https://archive.org/details/inghostlyjapan00hear
  21. Dictionary of American Proverbs, edited by David Kin, Philosophical Library, New York, 1955, p. 192 (the shelved copy).
  22. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, Japan Travel Bureau, Tokyo, 1958, p. 97 (the shelved copy).
  23. Lafcadio Hearn, Shadowings, Little, Brown, Boston, 1900, p. 127, footnote (the shelved copy). https://archive.org/details/shadowings00hear
  24. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, University of Oklahoma Press, 1965, p. 169.
  25. R. H. Blyth, Japanese Life and Character in Senryu, Hokuseido, Tokyo, 1960, p. 306 (the shelved copy).
  26. Guy A. Zona, Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain and Other Proverbs of Japan, Touchstone, New York, 1996, p. 98 (the shelved copy). https://archive.org/details/evenwitheredtree0000zona
  27. David Galef, Even a Stone Buddha Can Talk, Tuttle, 2000, no. 21.
  28. David Galef, Japanese Proverbs: Wit and Wisdom, Tuttle, 2012, no. 121.
  29. Kenkyūsha's New Collegiate Japanese-English Dictionary, third edition, Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, 1983, p. 338, s.v. く⁴ 苦 (the shelved copy).
  30. Jack Halpern, The Kodansha Kanji Dictionary, Kodansha, Tokyo, 2013, s.v. 苦 (the shelved copy).
  31. 白隠『於仁安佐美』, in 大橋春崖, 上村義秀 編『白隠広録』第1輯, 天眼寺, 1902, p. 111, National Diet Library pid 823443, scan 227 (released under a 文化庁 ruling; the viewer serves it). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/823443/1/227
  32. Norman Waddell, tr., Beating the Cloth Drum: Letters of Zen Master Hakuin, Shambhala, 2012, the glossary s.v. Horse Thistles (Oniazami) (the shelved copy's text layer, without page numbers).
  33. 白隠『壁生草』 卷之下, in 大橋春崖, 上村義秀 編『白隠広録』第2輯, 天眼寺, 1902, p. 37, National Diet Library pid 823444, scan 164 (the viewer serves it). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/823444/1/164
  34. Norman Waddell, tr., Wild Ivy: The Spiritual Autobiography of Zen Master Hakuin, Shambhala, 1999, the Shōin-ji chapter and its note 38; the original 壁生草 printed at Shōin-ji, 1768 (the shelved copy's text layer, without page numbers).
  35. Norman Waddell, tr., Poison Blossoms from a Thicket of Thorn, Counterpoint, 2014, the address on the locust plague (the shelved copy's text layer, without page numbers).
  36. 博文館編輯局 校訂『校訂気質全集』, 1895, pp. 362–363, National Diet Library pid 1882651, scan 437. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1882651/1/437
  37. 四文舎我笑・百文舎外笑『役者舞台扇』, 河内屋太助, 1841, National Diet Library pid 2554748, scan 4. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2554748/1/4
  38. 福沢諭吉『文明論之概略』 卷之五, 1875, National Diet Library pid 993903, scan 46. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/993903/1/46
  39. 伊東洋二郎『説教心の種』, 1894, National Diet Library pid 818471, scan 58. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/818471/1/58
  40. 『金沢市街独案内』, 1894, National Diet Library pid 764578, scan 64. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/764578/1/64
  41. 大淵渉 編『新撰発句拾万集』, 1893, National Diet Library pid 875160, scans 35 and 69. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/875160/1/35
  42. National Diet Library Digital Collections, next-generation full-text search on 苦は楽の種 (732 books) and 楽は苦の種 (489 books). https://lab.ndl.go.jp/dl/
  43. National Diet Library Digital Collections, full-text index on 苦は楽の種 (6,959 items) and 樂は苦の種 (4,371 items), all years. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/
  44. 『佛果圜悟禪師碧巖錄』 卷九, case 83, 雪竇's verse and 圜悟's comment, T48n2003_p0209a28–b09, at CBETA. https://cbdata.dila.edu.tw/stable/juans?work=T2003&juan=9
  45. T. Hirose and 佐久間信恭, An Intermediate Japanese-English Dictionary for Assisting Students in Conversation & Composition, Ikubunsha, Tokyo, 1906, p. 585, s.v. Ku 苦. https://archive.org/details/anintermediatej00sakugoog
  46. EDRDG (JMdict), 苦は楽の種, at jisho.org. https://jisho.org/search/苦は楽の種
  47. F. P. Wilson, The Oxford Dictionary of English Proverbs, third edition, Oxford University Press, 1970, p. 572, s.v. No pains, no gains, quoting Grange 1577 (the shelved copy).
  48. Morris Palmer Tilley, A Dictionary of the Proverbs in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, University of Michigan Press, 1950, P420 (the shelved copy).
  49. Bartlett Jere Whiting, Proverbs, Sentences, and Proverbial Phrases from English Writings Mainly Before 1500, Belknap Press, 1968, R220, p. 496 (the shelved copy).

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Fable 5.1, Takase Studios, LLC)

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

Checked · grok-4.6 (xAI), 2026-09-06, citations

Cite as: Tim Jackowski and Ten, "Philology of 苦は楽の種 (ku wa raku no tane)," Takase Studios, 2026, https://takase.com/library/philology/ku-wa-raku-no-tane.