Nowadays the role of these go-betweens is limited. They simply arrange the meeting of a boy and a girl of marriageable age, without seriously taking into account their compatibility and future development. The two meet as candidates for love. On the arranged date, or miai, the couple is usually escorted by their parents. If they agree to go further, they will have more frequent dates to deepen their acquaintance. Their association may or may not lead to the final goal of marriage. Each one of them has to make that decision at the first meeting or during the period of association. Either side has a right to say no, but again the decision is often influenced by the opinions of parents or other family members. This continuing regulation of marriage by the family may explain why there is much less pairing off of couples in Japan than in the West. Even in the case of a love match, the couple has to find a temporary "go-between" who plays a central role in the wedding ceremony to launch the couple. Interestingly, the statistics show higher rates of divorce for love matches, despite the initial love and enthusiasm of the couple, than for arranged marriages. Many Japanese feel that family assistance in identifying a suitable mate is quite helpful and healthy.
Marriage for Ancestors
Another distinctive feature of marriage in Japan is its role in perpetuating the "family line" for the ancestors. In a sense, this is part of the Japanese ie (family or clan) consciousness, centering on ancestor worship.
A few years ago the following open letter from one young woman appeared in the press:
"There are two daughters in our family and no sons. Our father died when my older sister was eight and I was five. Since that time my poor sister has had to bear the burden of being 'the daughter of one of the oldest families of Edo.' She is now twenty-six and in the teaching profession. She is socially and economically independent. My mother's dearest wish is that she will marry someone as soon as possible so we can adopt him into the family to carry on the family line. The right person has not been found yet. When I think of all the trouble my mother has gone through in raising two children by herself, I cannot make light of her concern for 'the family line.' Still, I want my sister to have a happy marriage, with a husband of her own choice. What is troublesome is the gravity of our ancestors."
This is not a rare case—adoption of a son into a family by marriage. The significance here is that the basis of the Japanese conception of marriage is that a couple serves to carry on the family line. The burden falls mostly on women, who are expected to procreate. In modern Japanese society, blessed with the riches of an advanced material civilization, the number of people who are still seriously concerned with "family lineage" is steadily decreasing. Nevertheless, the family background and educational history of prospective partners are still scrutinized with care and remain a factor in the marital decision. Although love may play a part in it, marriage is, above all, an institution designed to preserve a family's good name.
The mainstay of marriage is love for procreation. At the same time, marriage is for sexual gratification. A newly married couple, whether joining the traditional extended Japanese family or starting one of their own, have a double sex life: procreation and pleasure. This double sexual standard, which leaves men free from the burden of pregnancy and women restricted, is, of course, common throughout the world. As the proverb goes, "Women adventure with men, and men with the world." How is it in Japan? Let us look into the features of married life in the advanced industrial society.
Conjugal Relations
If you are not attractive yourself, it is advantageous for you to go out with someone who is. When a man is seen escorting a good-looking woman, he receives favorable overall ratings from society. Similarly, a man gives a better impression to other people when he has a faithful and helpful wife. Presumably, observers reason that he must have some good qualities to have attracted such a fine woman. The same is true of a woman who has a good husband.
Japanese men and women are very conscious of these effects. However, in the presence of other people, they would never praise their husbands or wives. It is their social etiquette, endorsed by the spirits of Confucianism and bushido (code of the samurai).
In Japanese society, the individual must always adjust his desires to his social environment. People abide by traditional rules that seem, to the Westerner, extremely confining to their emotional life. Strict control of emotion in public is the social duty of every citizen, and husbands and wives as a result are quite shy in their one-to-one relations in public. They tend not to show overt signs of affection in the presence of others. This is, for the most part, a superficial characteristic inherited from an earlier system. We should not fail to notice that there is a strong bond of love between a Japanese husband and wife in spite of their official reserved attitudes.
Controlled Emotion
I was in the departure lobby at the Tokyo Haneda Airport when I suddenly became aware of a woman on the other side of the glass wall. She was sending her farewell to the man standing beside me. They must have been husband and wife, but they were unable to communicate because of the wall and the distance between them. The woman, clad in a kimono, lifted her arm and waved it slightly, her eyes tightly fixed on the man she loved. The man, too, waved his hand slightly in response to her. But their deep love seemed to have penetrated the glass wall and pierced their hearts. The typical shy expressions of love that the couple displayed there concealed the deep affection inside. I was very impressed at the sight. Shyness is an important aspect of human nature and has artistic value, in the sense that there is something hidden behind it.
No matter how good a person's married life is, if he displays his passion blatantly all the time, his flame of passion will probably soon extinguish. A husband and wife would do better to preserve their affection under shyness. I believe this is the art and the secret of success in married life. Saying "something to find," my man took me to the storeroom away from the gathering. He, a soldier tomorrow, embraced me strong, at the night of the farewell party.
This is waka (a traditional Japanese poem of 31 syllables), taken from the Showa Manyo-shu anthology. It was composed by a woman about her husband, who was drafted into World War II. He drew his wife out of the gathering into a dark storeroom and gave her his passionate farewell kiss on departure night. Such controlled emotion is the fundamental quality of conjugal relationships in Japan. The more a couple controls their emotional expression, the more their passion blazes up and ends in gratification when expressed. As a general rule, conjugal attraction is in proportion to the degree of spontaneity between the sexes.
I once lived in Vienna, Austria, next door to a middle-aged couple who seemed very happy. In the morning, before the husband left for work, they hugged each other tightly and exchanged passionate kisses, as if they could not bear their temporary separation. They did it every morning at their doorstep, no matter who was around. "I love you, dear" and "I love you, darling" were the words they exchanged every morning. They probably did the same in the evening when the husband came back home. An ordinary Japanese husband would be worn out if he tried to do the same, even for a week. I often wondered why this couple felt it necessary to express their love so openly every morning and evening. After having lived together for years, any husband and wife should be aware of each other's love and depth of feeling without having to be told in words. A couple should be able to read each other's mind if they are truly married. I thought the Austrian couple's open expression of love was a traditional conjugal greeting. I took it as a cultural habit.