The expression of prohibited ways of setting stones in Sakuteiki and the Old Testament

Abstract

Sakuteiki is Japan’s oldest treatise on creating a garden. The Old Testament is an important scripture for followers of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Both books deal with the concept that stones have a significant influence on people. This i s why these books contain “prohibitions.” This study examines how prohibited stone settings are described in these books. The concept of “basic pattern,” which is the key idea of this study, is introduced. The basic pattern is rhetorical: the censorious words “do not do this” appear first, followed by a description of the negative consequences if the prohibition is not heeded. The sentences that display this pattern and their related expressions are all extracted and listed in a table. In this experiment, the Japanese Old Testament was used, and the following results were revealed. Sakuteiki used a caption meaning “prohibition,” which indicated that the following sentences depicted the prohibited ways of setting stones. Under this caption, the basic pattern was develo ped through several variations, but they did not describe actual misfortunes that had happened. On the other hand, The Old Testament displays the following rhetorical pattern: the prohibited ways of setting stones are depicted in several ways, using the basic pattern, before the old Israelites see the actual stones. This is described as a prophecy. Then, historical writings are presented, attesting to the authenticity of the prophecy, and the basic pattern is precisely executed, showing the benefits of strictly observing the prohibition.