Young or old, it is not a question of years — one is young or old from birth to death, it all depends on how and what one feels and thinks.

Bashō no yōna, 2022

Yoshida Kenko

Yoshida Kenko, 兼好, early 14th century Buddhist monk, poet and essayist, remarked, quoting someone else, that if you have not learned an art by the time you are 50 you should give it up. There is not time enough left in one’s life to make the pursuit worthwhile.

Kenko himself retired from public life and became a hermit. His attitude was that it was painful to see men over 50 mixing with society. Rather, one should retire to a leisure life. For those who are still young, ask if you wish to know. But once having grasped the facts clearly enough to understand, pursue the question no further. The ideal in the first place is not to desire to know.

Matsuo Basho, 松尾 芭蕉, 17th century poet, born in 1644, died in November of 1694, having lived 49 full years. Basho had begun to withdraw from society. First, moving from the bustling city center of Edo, the capital, to the more remote Fukagawa district, and his simple cottage. Then, to begin his various wanderings over the Japanese landscape. Basho was poet and artist, and he continued to write and draw up until the time of his death.

On the subject of Yoshida Kenko, Basho wrote this:

秋の色糠味噌壷もなかりけり
aki no iro/ nukamiso tsubo mo/ nakari keri

not even a bowl
in autumn colors
for fermented miso

Matsuo Basho, Autumn, 1691

Notes on Translation

Nukamiso, Nukazuke. Fermented miso. Boiled or steamed vegetables, pickles, cabbage, cucumbers, carrots, eggplants, etc., placed in a miso sauce, then fermented in vinegar and sake. Aki no iro, autumn colors of the vegetables. Tsubo, a simple wooden bowl. As a devout Buddhist monk, Kenko had few possessions, typically only one bowl in which to beg for his daily meal. Nakari keri, saying something does not exist. Thus, the overall meaning of the haiku is that in autumn colors, his wooden bowl does not match the colorful pickled vegetables.

Basho, who suffered from stomach ailments throughout his life, ate pickled vegetables for relief.

The begging bowl used by Buddhist monks has a long association with the Buddha himself. According to one legend, when he began meditating beneath the Bodhi Tree, a young woman presented him a golden bowl filled with rice, believing he was the divinity of the tree. The rice he divided into 49 portions, one for each day until he would be enlightened. The precious bowl he threw into the river.

The author, Bashō no yōna, does not agree with Kenko on the subject of aging, as for some, life begins at retirement.