鬼は外福は内 oni wa soto fuku wa uchi Devils Go Out Fortune Come In
This is a philological study of the Setsubun bean-throwing call, 鬼は外福は内 (oni wa soto fuku wa uchi). It spans from a Zen abbot's diary entry of 1447, already calling it "this country's way" of an older Chinese rite, through Edo jokes and picture-books, and examines a seven-syllable ritual cry that has never been a four-character idiom or carried a grammatical subject.
Abstract
鬼は外福は内, demons out, fortune in, is the words shouted while throwing roasted beans on the eve of spring, first recorded in 1447 in the diary of Zuikei Shūhō 瑞渓周鳳, a Zen abbot who already called it this country's form of the older Chinese demon-expulsion rite. The call has no author: Shūhō wrote its four Chinese characters himself only to record what he heard, and every Japanese-language witness since writes it in kana. Its two halves have swapped order across the witnesses, but its sense has not moved since the abbot's diary. English has carried the call since Hepburn's dictionary of 1872, as Devils out! Good-fortune in! in Hearn, and as demons out since 1913.
Overview
The sense. The words have meant one thing since 1447 and the rite has hardly changed: at dusk on the eve of spring, roasted beans thrown through the house, the demons ordered out and the fortune in. What the witnesses add is a point of view. The abbot sees it from outside, as a scholar: a lay custom, the rich do it, and it is this country's version of the Chinese rite. The joke-book hears it as a setup for a pun. Santō Kyōden 山東京伝 hears the beans. Fujii Otoo 藤井乙男 counts the calls. The encyclopaedia explains where it came from: the court's 追儺 of the last night of the year, itself Chinese, moved to the eve of 立春 and into the houses.
The words. 鬼, oni, is the demon of the rite, the plague-demon of the court's old year-end exorcism; devils and demons are both used in English, and demons is the usual modern word. は, wa, is the topic particle, not a subject marker: the call has no verb for a subject to belong to, so it reads as for the demons, out; as for fortune, in. 外, soto, is outside; 福, fuku, is good fortune, and in the dictionaries' gloss the god of it, 福の神, who is invited in; 内, uchi, is inside, the house. Seven syllables of Japanese with four kanji in them, not a four-character idiom. Two things vary among the witnesses. The order: the 1447 diary and the antiquarians write 鬼外福内, demons first, while the kyōgen of the 1640s and the 1910 dictionary's gloss say 福は内 first, and the dictionaries today list both. The writing: the diary gives the call as four characters because a Zen monk writing Chinese records seven syllables of Japanese that way; every Japanese-language witness writes it in kana.
The proverb in English. The call was never translated as literature, but it entered English early and as a rite's words: Hepburn's dictionary of 1872 prints it untranslated under oniyarai [1]; Greey's boys' book of 1892 and Hearn's Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan of 1894 translate it, Devils out! Good-fortune in! [2] [3]; Brinkley's dictionary and Aston's Nihongi, both of 1896, carry it [4] [5]; and demons first replaces devils in Harrison 1913 [6]. The English proverb collections mostly pass it by: Buchanan 1965 has it, and David Galef's three Tuttle collections (1987, 2000, 2012), Guy Zona's book of 1996 and Edward Trimnell's of 2004 do not [7].
The historical record
1415. 花営三代記, the shogunal household record, the eighth day of the first month. 節分大豆打役, the officer for the bean-throwing at 節分, with the manner of throwing, from the lucky direction and back to it. The rite, thirty years before the call [8].
1447, the twenty-second day of the twelfth month of 文安 4, which is early 1448 by the Western calendar. Zuikei Shūhō, abbot of 相国寺, in his diary 臥雲日件録. 廿二日。明日立春。故及昏景富每室散熬豆。因唱鬼外福内四字、蓋此方驅儺之樣也。 The twenty-second. Tomorrow is the first day of spring. So at dusk the rich scatter roasted beans in every room, and call the four characters demons out, fortune in; this is our country's form of the demon-expulsion. A Zen scholar describing a lay custom as already established and already Japanese, and comparing it to the Chinese rite he knew from books. This is the 精選版日本国語大辞典's first citation for the call [9].
Early 1640s. The kyōgen 節分, in the Ōkura school text of Ōkura Toraakira 大蔵虎明, 1642. ふくはうちふくはうち、おにはそとへおにはそとへ, fortune in, fortune in; demons out, demons out: the other order, and the earliest known witness for it [10].
1623, in a printing of 1658. Anrakuan Sakuden 安楽庵策伝, 醒睡笑, the first Japanese joke collection. A samurai dreams a nest flies into his house; the interpreter, punning on ふく, fortune, and ふくろ, owl, tells him それは目出し鬼はそとへふくろは内へと申ならはして候程に, that is lucky: as everyone says, demons out and the owl in, and is given a robe for it. A pun on the call means everyone knew it [11].
1776 to about 1800. The Edo joke-books and picture-books. おにはそとへふくはうちへとまめをまく in 新落噺初鰹 (1776); 鬼は外へとうつ豆は雨霰のごとく, the beans thrown at demons out fall like rain and hail, in Kyōden's 四時交加 (1798), fiercer, he adds, than Sakanoue no Tamuramaro 田村麿's arrowheads [12].
Edo to Meiji. The antiquarians. From 華実年浪草 through 事言類考, 打聞 and Yashiro Hirokata 屋代弘賢's 古今要覧稿 (printed 1883) to the 日本社会事彙 of 1891, a chain of reference books quotes the diary and says the same thing, and the 1891 sentence was copied word for word into four more by 1902: 惡鬼を逐ふ事は、除夜の追儺の、朝儀の民間に移れる者ながら、炒豆を屋中に撒するは、四五百年以還の俗にて、其より古き物に管見せず、臥雲日件録に…, driving out demons is the court's New Year's Eve rite passed to the people, but scattering roasted beans in the house is a custom of the last four or five hundred years, and I know of nothing older than the 臥雲日件録. That sentence is still true [13].
1910. Fujii Otoo, 諺語大辞典. 【鬼ハ外】追儺の時、福は內鬼は外と、三聲づゝ唱へて豆を打つことあり, at the demon-expulsion one calls fortune in, demons out, three times each, and throws the beans. The manner, recorded [14].
What is not a source. The call has no author and no text behind it; it is a rite's words, and the diary is a witness to the rite, not its origin. The court's 追儺, with its peach bows and drums, is the rite's ancestor, documented in the 延喜式 and 公事根源. The shrines that call 鬼は内, demons in, are regional variants and another matter. There is no Chinese four-character phrase behind 鬼外福内; the abbot made those four characters himself, to write down what he heard.
The dictionaries today. 精選版日本国語大辞典 under 鬼は外福は内: 節分の夜の豆まきのときに唱えることば, with the diary as first citation. デジタル大辞泉 files it under 福は内鬼は外: 節分の夜、豆まきの行事をするときに唱える言葉。幸運を招く福の神は内へ、禍をもたらす鬼は外への意, and the 日国 there adds the season word, winter. The 日本大百科全書 on 節分, by Inokuchi Shōji 井之口章次: the court's demon-expulsion came to be held at 節分 from the Muromachi period on, 室町時代以後; the rite has two forms, a costumed demon chased out and beans thrown from a measuring box; in an ordinary house the head of the household, as the year's man, scatters the beans through the rooms calling 福は内、鬼は外, and each person eats as many beans as their years [15].
The proverb in English
1872. James Curtis Hepburn, A Japanese-English and English-Japanese Dictionary, second edition, under ONI-YARAI. The ceremony of driving out evil spirits at the Setsu-bun, or last evening of the old year, by throwing about parched peas, and crying, oni wa soto fuku wa uchi. The call enters English untranslated, as the words of a rite; the fourth edition of 1888 keeps the entry at page 485 [1] [16].
1891 to 1903. The handbooks. Chamberlain's Handbook for Travellers in Japan (1891) has the townspeople scattering beans on the evening of the Setsubun (3rd February) to expel evil spirits, without the call [17]; Greey's Young Americans in Japan (1892) gives a whole chapter, The Ceremony of Oniwa Soto, and the cry, Fuku wa uchi, oni wa soto (Good fortune come in, bad go out) [2]; Lange's Text-book of Colloquial Japanese (1903) sets it as an exercise, the master of the house scatters roasted beans in every direction and says: "Luck in, demons out" [18].
1894. Lafcadio Hearn, Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, volume two, the chapter on the Setsubun. On the eve of the Setsubun, a little after dark, the Yaku-otoshi, or caster-out of devils, wanders through the streets from house to house, rattling his shakujo, and uttering his strange professional cry: Oni wa soto! — fuku wa uchi!, with his own gloss in brackets, Devils out! Good-fortune in!; and of a New Year toy, this comical symbolism of good wishes for the New Year: "Oni wa soto! — fuku wa uchi!" The earliest English translation of the call known, and devils is Hearn's word [3].
1896. Frank Brinkley, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseido, page 877, under oniyarai. Scattering parched peas about in an occupied house to drive out evil spirits, celebrated on the last night of December, or of the early part of January (o.s.), crying aloud the while fuku wa uchi (fortune inside), oni wa soto (devils outside) [4]. The same year, Aston's Nihongi, volume two, page 359, in a note on the court's year-end exorcism: This reminds one strongly of the Japanese formula used on this occasion: "Oni wa soto, fuku wa uchi" — "Devils out, luck in." [5]
1913. Harrison, The Fighting Spirit of Japan, Unwin, page 245. The male head of the family, who goes round the rooms sprinkling peas from a tray which he holds in his left hand, shouting at the top of his voice, "Oni wa soto, fuku wa uchi!" ("Demons out, happiness in!"): the first demons [6].
1958. Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, Japan Travel Bureau, page 44. Fuku wa uchi, oni wa soto. In with luck! Out with …, the last words lost in the text layer, with the bean-scattering drawn as figure 11 and the note that it is done on the night of setsubun (the parting of the seasons) [19].
1959. Sargent, The Japanese Family Storehouse, Cambridge University Press, a note to Saikaku. Setsubun mame: in the old calendar Setsubun (the dividing point between winter and spring) was the night before New Year’s Day, and at this time it was customary for all members of a family to scatter beans about their house as a form of exorcism of evil spirits, shouting at the same time: Fuku wa uchi, oni wa soto! (Luck come in, devils go out!). The custom is still widely observed; the layer reads ucht and ont, read as uchi and oni [20].
1965. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, University of Oklahoma Press, page 154. Fuku wa uchi, oni wa soto: "Good luck inside, devils outside." This formula is used when beans are thrown around the house on "setsubun" (the days of the vernal equinox), to drive out evil influences and bring in good ones. The master of the house, early in the morning, goes from room to room, scattering beans to the four corners while shouting the phrase: "In fortune, out devils." Special services on this day are also held in many Buddhist temples, and crowds gather to catch the beans scattered to them by the priests. The rendering is fair and the temple scene is right. Two things are wrong: 節分 is the eve of 立春, the first day of spring by the old calendar, in early February, not the vernal equinox, which is six weeks later; and the diary of 1447 and the encyclopaedia both put the throwing at dusk, not early morning [7].
1974. Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, fourth edition, page 264, under 福. 福は内！鬼は外！ In with fortune! Out with the demon (evil)! / Fortune in, Devils out! [21].
1984. Mackenzie, The Autumn Wind, Kodansha International, page 120. Issa's hokku, Kakurega ya / Ha no nai kuchi de / Fuku wa uchi, The tucked away cottage — No teeth in the mouth now, But, luck's in the house!, with the note that "Fuku wa uchi" is the cry raised at the "bean scattering" festival of Setsubun [22].
Today. The house rendering, Devils Go Out Fortune Come In, supplies the verbs the Japanese leaves out and is a fair one, in the line of Greey 1892 and Hearn 1894, devils and all; demons is the more usual modern English for 鬼 in this rite, since Harrison in 1913. Word for word the Japanese says demons out, fortune in, with no verb. What a rendering must keep: the two halves as a pair, the out and the in, and the sense that these are words shouted, not a maxim.
A reading
The best evidence for the rite's age is one sentence long: in the winter of 1447 the abbot of 相国寺 wrote in his diary that people were scattering roasted beans in every room and shouting demons out, fortune in, and that it was Japan's way of doing what the Chinese did with peach bows and drums.
References
- James Curtis Hepburn, 『和英語林集成』, 2nd ed., American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1872, s.v. ONI-YARAI. National Diet Library pid 993689. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/993689
- Edward Greey, Young Americans in Japan, 1892, the chapter The Ceremony of Oniwa Soto. https://archive.org/details/youngamericansin00gree
- Lafcadio Hearn, Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, volume two, Houghton Mifflin, 1894, the chapter on the Setsubun. https://archive.org/details/glimpsesofunfami02hear
- Frank Brinkley, Nanjō Bun'yū and Iwasaki Yukichika, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseido, 1896, s.v. oniyarai, p. 877.
- W. G. Aston, Nihongi: Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to A.D. 697, volume two, Kegan Paul, 1896, p. 359.
- Harrison, The Fighting Spirit of Japan, Unwin, 1913, p. 245.
- Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1965, p. 154.
- 花営三代記, as quoted in 塙保己一・中山信名『武家名目抄稿』and 屋代弘賢『古今要覧稿』(1883 printing).
- 瑞渓周鳳『臥雲日件録』, as excerpted in 近藤瓶城編『史籍集覧』, 1898, p. 24. National Diet Library pid 769659, scan 15. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/769659/1/15
- 「福は内鬼は外」, 精選版 日本国語大辞典, citing 虎明本狂言 節分 (大蔵虎明, 1642), at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/福は内鬼は外
- 安楽庵策伝『醒睡笑』, 1658 printing of the 1623 text. National Diet Library pid 2554787, scans 39–40. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2554787/1/39
- 富川吟雪『新落噺初鰹』, 1776; 山東京伝『四時交加』, 1798.
- 『日本社会事彙』, 1891. National Diet Library pid 898057, scan 915. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/898057/1/915
- 藤井乙男『諺語大辞典』, 有朋堂, 1910, 【鬼ハ外】. National Diet Library pid 862766, scan 109. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/862766/1/109
- 「鬼は外福は内」・「福は内鬼は外」・「節分」, 精選版 日本国語大辞典・デジタル大辞泉・日本大百科全書 (井之口章次), at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/鬼は外福は内
- James Curtis Hepburn, A Japanese-English and English-Japanese Dictionary, fourth edition, Z. P. Maruya, Tokyo, 1888, s.v. ONIYARAI, p. 485. Internet Archive japaneseenglishe00hepbuoft. https://archive.org/details/japaneseenglishe00hepbuoft
- Basil Hall Chamberlain, A Handbook for Travellers in Japan, 3rd ed., John Murray, 1891. https://archive.org/details/a-handbook-for-travellers-in-japan-1891
- Rudolf Lange, A Text-book of Colloquial Japanese, tr. Christopher Noss, 1903. https://archive.org/details/textbookofcolloq00languoft
- Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, Japan Travel Bureau, 1958, p. 44 and fig. 11.
- G. W. Sargent, tr., Ihara Saikaku, The Japanese Family Storehouse, Cambridge University Press, 1959, note 9 to book four, chapter one.
- Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, 4th ed., Kenkyusha, 1974, s.v. 福, p. 264.
- Mackenzie, tr., The Autumn Wind: A Selection from the Poems of Issa, Kodansha International, 1984, p. 120.