This article discusses the experiences of Dokuryū Shōeki 独立性易, Ingen Ryūki 隠元隆琦, and Tōkō Shinetsu 東皐心越, three monks who came to Japan during the Ming-Qing transition. Their experiences of Japan, then still in isolation from the rest of the world, have been argued as having been a kind of retreat （閉関）, but actually they were placed under house arrest. In contrast to the traditional understanding that Dokuryū’s “retreat” was for the purpose of practice, the truth about the “retreat” of Ingen and Tōkō, who were actually under house arrest, has been argued by scholars.
This article compares the “retreat” of these three figures, and through a comparison of their common points, investigates the fact of Dokuryū’s “retreat,” coming to the following conclusions. The punishment they received was mainly that of not being allowed to contact the outside. The reason was that they moved without the permission of the shogunal government, violating the foreigner management policy implemented in Japan at that time. The people they regarded as whistleblowers were actually acting according to their relevant duties.
This article reveals the situation in which the fate of the Chinese who came to Japan was tossed about by the changes of the times due to the turmoil of the overall East Asian situation, and the shogunate took a cautious attitude. It also supplements the situation of these three people being imprisoned, showing the actual situation of law enforcement at that time.
