In Judaism, a man's obligations toward a woman are written down. Visible.
In Japan, they are hidden. And that is why they are stronger.
Japan operates on the principle of omote and ura.
Omote — what is visible. Ura — what is hidden.
What is hidden is more real than what is visible.
On the surface — the man rules. Shogun, samurai, emperor.
Underneath — the woman controls succession, the budget, information, decisions.
This is not a different mechanism from Judaism. It is the same mechanism — in a different implementation.
Judaism writes the obligations down openly.
Japan builds them into the structure itself — so that the man does not see them.
- Japan's highest deity — Amaterasu — is a woman. The Sun Goddess. Every emperor derives his authority from her. A man rules, but his right to rule comes from a woman.
- Edo Castle contained the Ōoku — inner women's chambers separated by copper walls. The shogun — the most powerful man in Japan — had to ask to be let in. The only passage was called the Bell Corridor. A bell was rung to let him in.
- Japan had eight reigning empresses. Women on the throne. China had one. Europe several. Japan — eight.
- Hōjō Masako — wife of the first shogun. After his death, she declared herself a nun. She ruled the shogunate. They called her “the shogun in a nun's habit.” Formally, she did not rule. In reality — she ruled.
- Kasuga no Tsubone — formally a wet nurse. In reality, she built the Ōoku system, which controlled the bloodline of the shoguns for 250 years.
- During the Heian period, a man who wanted to win a woman had to write poems for months. The woman judged. The woman accepted or rejected. The man had no right to come and take. He had to earn it.
- The husband moved into the wife's home, not the other way around. Daughters were preferred over sons — because through a daughter the clan gained power.
- Modern Japan. A common pattern: the husband hands his earnings to his wife, who manages the household budget and gives him an allowance.
- Japan's suicide rate remains above the OECD average. Men have higher suicide mortality than women.
- Karōshi — death from overwork. Historically, it mainly affected men. A man dies at his desk. For whom did he work 80 hours a week? To support the household managed by his wife.
In Judaism, a man knows that he serves.
In Japan, a man does not know that he serves.
He dies from overwork thinking it is honour.
Which is worse — when you know that you serve, or when you do not know?