Japanese need body remains of Ehime Maru victims

By George J. Tanabe Jr.

If the ship sunk by the USS Greeneville had been American, the Coast Guard search would have ended a while ago. But the Ehime Maru was a Japanese ship, and the Japanese have demanded that the Coast Guard continue its efforts indefinitely, and that the U.S. Navy raise the sunken vessel, which surely contains some, if not all of, the remains of those still missing.

No one, of course, expects to find survivors, and the only issue at stake is the recovery of bodies.

While Americans are fully sympathetic with this tragic loss of life, especially since the Navy has admitted responsibility for the incident, many are puzzled about the strength of the Japanese demands. We do not continue maritime searches for weeks as the Japanese do, long after there is any hope of finding survivors.

We see it as nothing less than honorable to leave the bodies of American sailors entombed in the USS Arizona, even though the bodies could be retrieved more easily than is the case with the Ehime Maru. Japanese visitors to the Arizona Memorial sometimes express their puzzlement about the American treatment of the physical remains of those who died in such pain and suffering.

Clearly there are cultural and religious differences that work against a mutual understanding of how we deal with the dead. The Ehime Maru tragedy places a great strain on an already disquiet relationship between Japan and America, especially in military matters, and it is essential that we respond to Japanese demands with complete understanding of the proper treatment of those whose deaths we have caused.

The Japanese view of the afterlife is rooted in the belief that the dead continue to live with their bodies. Upon completing the funeral service in which the body has been placed in a coffin, the family will go to the crematorium and wait while the body is being burned.

Once cooled, the skeletal remains are brought before the family members, who then pick up the bones with long chopsticks and place them respectfully in an urn. Americans dispose of the body through burial or scattering its ashes, but the Japanese preserve the body by purifying it in the fire of cremation, reducing it to bones and ashes placed in an urn for safekeeping in the home, a temple or a family grave.

While Americans think of the dead as souls without bodies, the Japanese treat the deceased by providing for their bodily need to eat and drink. Offerings made during funeral and memorial rites consist of food, the best of which is incense smoke. Incense has many symbolic meanings, but the most important function it serves is feeding the body/soul that has passed on to another realm of life.

Buddhist texts define the soul as "that which eats incense smoke." During graveside visits carried out on the death anniversary date or during the summer Obon season, family members offer incense, favorite dishes, fruits, drinks and even cigarettes. Memorial rites for feeding the body/soul continue for decades.

Failure to feed the deceased will result in a hungry ghost. Depicted in scroll paintings as demon-like beings with stomachs bloated from malnutrition, hungry ghosts live on in suffering. While there is a special ritual for feeding the hungry ghosts, no one wishes this fate to fall upon their loved ones.

If the bodies of the missing Ehime Maru crew members are not retrieved, they cannot be purified by fire, preserved as ashes, placed in safekeeping and prepared for postmortem care. They will remain in anguish, never resting in peace.

So too will the family members feel that anguish added to their grief. It will haunt them and aggravate the distress they already feel upon being forced to forego the proper treatment of their sons, fathers and brothers.

Every attempt — even if they ultimately fail — must be made to recover the bodies. No other expression of compensation is as important as this.

George J. Tanabe Jr. is professor of religion and the department chairman, Department of Religion, University of Hawai‘i.

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