(1) Merchants' View of the "Kagyo" or the Hereditary Enterprise of the Family and their Education in the Tokugawa Period. : The Family System and Education in Japan's Feudal Age. (1)

Abstract

According to the historical studies the family has its own behavior patterns and human relations. Basically the functions of the family are production and consumption, but beyond that the family also functions in the bringing up and educating of the next generation in such a way that the special characteristics of the particular family are carried forward. In that way it plays its part in the transmission of the culture pattern. To carry out these functions, merchants in the Tokugawa Era created their own system and method of education from the standpoint of their class. The purpose of this article is to determine the educational structure in the merchants' family system, within the confines of feudalism of those days. As a result of uncertainty in politics, the "Ie" or Kinship Origanization in Japan has carried the burden of social security for its members rather than the government, and this has been so since ancient times. This has produced an abnormal attachment to the maintenance and prosperity of the "Ie", we might call it "Ie"-egoism. Through the "Ie" children have learned their manners, have learned to appreciate and maintain the order of status in the family, so that its sole heir would succeed to the family estate, thus maintaining the rights of the head of the house. We can find a concrete expression of the "Ie" in the "Kagyo". It was the "Kagyo" meaning the enterprise or occupation of the family, which was the foundation of existence and embodiment of the Idea of the "Ie". So merchants displayed the utmost concentration and care in the training of the heir of the House, called the "Soryo", and of the other members of the family in order to bring them up to become competent merchants. For their training activities, their methods and the content of instruction, the merchants drew on their worldly wisdom and their strong traits of character, in which they excelled in their class. This we have pointed out in this artcle in our investigation of the apprenticeship established as the training system of merchant guild. We have also examined the ideology of the "Ie" revealed as the principle of discipline in the "Kakun" or family code.