A PURE GOLDEN LAND

ANJE CHIMURA-Fourth Year, Philosophy and Media Studies

Praise my noble name.

SPOILERS FOR UMINEKO NO NAKU KORO NI AND PURE LAND BUDDHISM!

I am a huge fan of Ryukishi07’s visual novel Umineko no Naku Koro ni. The ways in which Umineko appeals to my interests are often both philosophically and historically rich. Examples of this are how the nature of fiction, love, and magic are treated in respect to the characters, the coy nature of which could be compared to Christopher Nolan’s brilliant treatment of his “subjective” and “objective” characters in Oppenheimer. However, what I wish to discuss today draws more from the historical side of Umineko’s influence than the philosophical. Specifically, while reading this story, I couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the symbolism used towards Beatrice, the Golden Land, and otherworldly power overall bears a striking resemblance with Buddhism, specifically the school known as Pure Land Buddhism.

To condense a lot of history into very few words, Jōdo bukkyō, or Pure Land Buddhism, is a specific offshoot from the teachings of Buddhism which arrived in Japan in around the 7th century. A distinct aspect of Pure Land Buddhism includes a focus on achieving rebirth in a Pure Land after death, which is often done through repeating the name of the principal buddha of this religious school, Amida nyorai, as a form of salvation. Other prominent features of Pure Land Buddhism involve the mappō theory, which states that cycles of time and human history are cyclical, which meant that ages of enlightenment and ignorance would endlessly beget each other. The final prominent trait of Pure Land Buddhism is the conflict between the beliefs of “self-power” and “other power”, which reflect the conflict between Pure Land Buddhism’s two main schools. “Self-power” represents the thought that human beings are able to save themselves from bad karmic rebirths, while “other power” represents the idea that human beings cannot control anything and must resign themselves to the fate that Amida decides for them. These three aspects (a focus on rebirth in a “pure land”, a cycle of human history, and a conflict between “self-power” and “other power”) might sound familiar to Umineko fans. Each one of these features have a very clear correlation with certain symbolism in the game, which I’ll go over. Firstly, characters like Maria and Kinzo believe strongly in the events of the game not mattering, due to their idea that everyone is to be reborn in the Golden Land anyway. Secondly, the ways in which these characters express their affection for the principal witch Beatrice often shows up through some form of saying her name (take for example, Kinzo’s numerous and heavily memeable wails). Thirdly, through the nature of the different episodes and different games, it would be fair to categorize the looping structure of Umineko’s story as extremely similar to the mappō theory, with certain games swaying towards Battler’s or Beatrice’s favor interchangeably. Finally, the “self-power” and “other power” ideologies clearly show their influence in Umineko’s conflicts of rejecting or believing in magic. The human side, which rejects magic, believes that they can save themselves through their human ability to deduce logically; while the witch side, which embraces magic’s otherworldly power, believes that they can create instances that are impossible to explain without magic being present.

This is really interesting, isn’t it? All three of these core thematic Pure Land Buddhist elements appear in some interpretation in the world(s) of Umineko, and are actually able to do a fantastic job at representing the source material. It should come as no surprise that Ryukishi07 was able to use these elements without diminishing their effects, but considering how often he cites other influences on his work internally or externally, the fact that he held off on mentioning this aspect shows a level of restraint that I compliment him for. Umineko’s “Golden Land” is a clear analog for the Buddhist “Pure Land”, and the way it was portrayed was nothing less than masterful.