A shame-based culture
Issues relating to shame and honour permeate Japanese culture, strongly affecting the way people relate to each other
At the beginning of this year, NHK’s Taiga Dorama, a historical drama that screens on Sunday evenings over the course of a year, was delayed by two weeks. The cause of the delay was that last November, one of the leading actresses, Erika Sawajiri, had been found in possession of the drug ecstasy, and so they reshot all her scenes using a replacement actress. One can only imagine the trouble and expense that entailed.
This demonstrates Japan’s zero-tolerance policy towards drugs. But it also reflects the fact that Japanese society is very much a shame-honour culture. A reputable broadcaster such as NHK couldn’t risk being associated with an actress whose drug use had become public knowledge. Sawajiri’s reputation will be permanently tarnished, and her acting career may never recover. This is in stark contrast to the guilt–innocence culture of the West, where an offender’s debt to society is usually considered to be paid once they have paid a fine or served a prison sentence.
Two books dealing with shame
Two Japanese novels that I read recently have driven home the shame aspect of Japanese culture. In both novels, shame wasn’t restricted to the offender but enveloped their immediate family.
The first book was Tegami by Keigo Higashino.1 The older brother of the main character broke into a house to steal some money, thinking that the old woman who lived there was out. When she discovered him, he panicked and killed her. Not surprisingly, he was sentenced to a long prison term. The rest of the book is about the discrimination his younger brother experienced because of his older brother’s crime.
Despite doing all he could to distance himself from his brother and to make a life for himself, the younger brother was unsuccessful. He lost two jobs and was demoted in another job, was forced to leave a band when it started becoming successful, and was rejected by his girlfriend’s family, so that they ended up separating. He was ostracized by neighbours, who had been friendly until they discovered his secret. The breaking point for him was when his young daughter was shunned by other children.
The second book was Nozomi by Shūsuke Shizukui.2 The book opens with the discovery of a high-school student’s murder and that three fellow students have been missing since the night of the murder. The book focuses on the family of one of the missing students. Even while police were still investigating the case and it wasn’t clear whether their son was one of the perpetrators or another victim, the family experienced discrimination from others in the community. The husband, an architect, was informed by the builder whom he had been working with for years that he would no longer accept work from him. A couple whose house he had started designing, phoned up to say they were going to hire another architect. And his older brother told him that if his son turned out to be guilty, he would break off all relations.
Both novels depict how the shame of a crime can powerfully impact a person’s life in Japan, even if they were an innocent party.
A ministry book about honour and shame
Another book I’ve found incredibly enlightening for understanding shame-based cultures and how they differ from guilt-based ones is Ministering in Honor-Shame Cultures: Biblical Foundations and Practical Essentials.3 It has three sections.
The first section considers how the lens of honour and shame colours relationships and how actions are viewed through this lens. The second section gives a brief biblical theology of honour and shame and notes that cultures in biblical times were honour-shame based. A highlight for me was the retelling of the parable of the prodigal son through an honour-shame lens, which brought out many new insights that tend to be hidden from those who live in a guilt-based culture. The last section suggests practical considerations for ministering in honour-shame cultures. I plan to write more about this book in future articles.
The good news of the gospel is not just that Jesus has forgiven us our sins and given us his righteousness, as wonderful as that is; he has also lifted us out of our shame and bestowed unimaginable honour on us who deserve to be shamed eternally. That’s terrific news for me, as I often feel like I’m drowning in shame. And it’s terrific news for Japanese people, who are much more sensitive to honour and shame than those of us who grew up in guilt-based cultures.
1. 東野敬語 手紙 (文藝春秋 2016). Keigo Higashino, Tegami (Bungeishunjū, 2016).
2. 雫井脩介 望み (角川 2016). Shūsuke Shizukui, Nozomi (Kadokawa, 2016).
3. Jayson Georges and Mark D. Baker, Ministering in Honor-Shame Cultures: Biblical Foundations and Practical Essentials (IVP Academic, 2016).