Blog on the Lillypad
Tuesday, October 07, 2003
 | Wabi
I’ve been reading PERSIMMON WIND lately, a memoir of a martial artist who visits Japan to see his aging master. He talks about the concept of “Wabi,” a word that literally translates from the Japanese language as “poverty,” but it has taken on numerous connotations and nuances as it has been applied to a lifestyle. |
I best understand (and was first exposed to) Wabi in the admiration that I and my classmates felt when we saw the worn, graying, frayed black belt of our lead instructor. Indeed, as I have come up through the ranks, I have known some men who have worn black “tokaido” uniforms (which are ultra heavy weight and last forever) for so long that belt and gi have both worn to gray and are frayed in places.
 | While class etiquette forbad us from wearing anything ripped or torn, there was a lot of respect for things that were neatly mended, or worn with age, or skillfully patched. The training hall was not a place for slovenly or slipshod care. But in the training hall, we prized that which showed age, familiarity, and long use. There was an easy unity of body and clothing in the instructors who had well worn, well mended uniforms. Truly, the uniform made the man. |
Wabi is a style of naturalness, which implies including the effects of time in the value of appearance, mood, and setting. Remove the embellishments. Take away the clumsy grandeur, and you are left with a spirit of natural ease and beauty. The samurai blade, so prized for its purity of steel and refined hammering process, was oiled carefully and wrapped in thinnest tissue. Yet the leather guard and the pommel showed the years of use and training. What warrior, faced with a costly battle for his life, chooses a new sword? The wise warrior takes that which comes easily into his hand, the sword wed to him by time and use, though he has cared for it well.
| Wabi speaks of a respect for what we truly are—creatures of time and space, needing tools, living according to the rhythm of all life. The house with its hardwood floors carefully polished, gives off a soft glow as the sunlight graces it. This is the décor of Wabi: showing the glory of the sun rising and setting. To keep a floor inlaid with gold (so that it shines all the time) is mere artifice. What some view as grandeur, others view as vulgar ostentation. Wabi aesthetics are applied to pottery (especially the pottery used for the ritual of serving tea), painting, architecture, and conversation. Wabi is a way of thought, a means of finding the best by bringing forth what occurs in the environment as part of everyday use and being alive. |  |
The concept of Wabi is best when it infuses the entire life. And it is this concept of Wabi that the Lord Himself gave us when He admonished us to not be concerned with the glories of this world, but instead pointed out how gloriously God has bedecked all nature with beauty. We Christians do well to remember that Christ so valued what was real and natural in His creation that He became a part of it. He left the astounding beauty of heavenly riches to dwell among mortal men because He is our creator and chose to place value on us.
Christ values the true labor and patience that He has put into His creation. All praise and glory are His; all gold and silver, all honors and praise. Yet He valued something more---His own patient work in His own blood-bought children. Like the worn hilt of the sword; or the soft glow of the hardwood, we can give evidence of this great glory by bending before it and being taken up by Him. We can demonstrate to others that a Master has polished us, used us, and may take us up at any time because we are familiar to His Hand.
 | The temptation in Christianity is to amass a following, to live a middle-class life of comfort, to get ahead, to be successful. And yes, I have heard that old refrain: “It’s for my family!” And yet the beauty of Wabi is that the person learns a much deeper and more profound appreciation for beauty, décor, rest, and life itself in discarding outward decoration. A décor, and therefore a mindset, that focuses on a simplicity and naturalness in beauty finds a greater satisfaction, always at hand, in the beauty of everyday life. |
