Beauty of WABI—SABI

【Abstract】： WABISABI is a kind of idea， a sort of art， a kind of world view. It is not vocabulary that directly translated from Japanese to English， and the backside of the idea cannot immediately changed to the people they never knew it simply， WABISABI means a visual of life， it emphasis to find the perfect from imperfect and learn to accept the cycle of live to die of nature. The best way to understand WABISABI is to accept this idea， and start to put more attention to the examples of our personal life.

【Keywords】： WABISABI;tea ceremony;esthetics

WABI-SABI means WABI and SABI， WABI-SABI is the integration of these two words. So the word， WABI-SABI， has the whole meaning of these two single words. It was transformed when translated into Chinese as WABI-SABI.

Okakura Kakuzō， Japanese aesthetician in 19th century， had translated WABI into IMPERFECT in his famous work named of BOOK OF TEA. It tends to be the imperfect of appearance in esthetics of WABI. The most famous master of tea， Sen no Rikyu created tea of WABI in Japanese Warring States period and WABI came into being in that way. It fused the beauty of spirit and tea and was called as rough. The word WABI has a origin in Japanese that means rough outside with perfect inside.

WABI is usually used to express the beauty of tea ceremony. The whole system from the Hermitage tea of Murata Juhikaru to the accepted top of tea ceremony， tea ceremony of Rikyu ， is called as tea of WABI. WABI started to be a theory of tea ceremony at Edo Period and it marks the arising of tea of WABI. The word WABI in tea ceremony doesn’t mean only rough but the pursuit of texture and beauty under the common surface. Idiomatic phrase like WABI Suki is used to express the meaning of WABI， intending to describe those kind of tea that high-quality but light and people who like to enjoy that kind of tea. Tea masters of WABI are described as who don’t hold anything but possess consciousness， practice and technology these three things. That type of people were also called as tea masters of scarcity.

The center of WABI is Zen and WABI is the expression in esthetics of the negative spirit of subject. The idea of there is nothing of Zen denied all the existing forms of beauty. Meanwhile， the idea of there is all hide in the nothing of view of Zen got possibility to create forms of art leisurely and carefree. In a word， WABI got new affirmative from the negative.

SABI use to be written as tarnish with meaning of abrasion and rustiness. It was generated from Chinese too. But Basho Matsuo， a renowned Haiku poet， sublimed aesthetic perception from the expanding of NOH. Then SABI means a sort of beauty that reveal from the shabby appearance of used staff so it has aesthetic feeling full of charm of time. Even the appearance of mottled nor bleak of fading cannot stop the shock of the beauty but may strengthen the beauty.

This word didn’t have any beautiful concept at the beginning. It was written as the heavy smell of old books in those ancient books like Tsurezuregusa and that fact confirmed the sense of appreciating the beauty of archaic things. This concept was quite valued in the world of Haiku and being used in forms of NOH and commenced to be theorized. Moreover， SABI became the center of Matsuo Basho’s late Haiku though Matsuo Basho did not leave any evaluating or mark about the word of SABI.

Terada Torahiko regarded SABI as a sort of beauty like filtering from inside of old staff and it does not have any business with outside such as a stone covered with moss. No one could resist the power of the nature to make the stone covered with moss and color of green. Japanese esteem this as what distribute from inside of the stone itself so it attracts our attention.

When it came to 14th century， WABI-SABI got more positive assess and fused into Japanese Aesthetic consciousness. That phenomenon may be influenced by theory of the Chan sect. now WABISABI is the antonym of rich， dignity， gorgeous， luxurious， sumptuous，colorful， plump and tedious. Moreover， it can be simplified by words like poverty， destitution， naive， prudence， temperance， cold， thin， withered， decrepit， lonely， clumsy， dark， quiet， rustic or natural.

WABISABI is a kind of idea， a sort of art， a kind of world view. It is not vocabulary that directly translated from Japanese to English， and the backside of the idea cannot immediately changed to the people they never knew it simply， WABISABI means a visual of life， it emphasis to find the perfect from imperfect and learn to accept the cycle of live to die of nature. The best way to understand WABISABI is to accept this idea， and start to put more attention to the examples of our personal life.

Canadian psychologist Richard Powell mentioned several kinds of spirit of WABISABI in new age in his book WABISABI SIMPLE. He mentioned that attaching importance to nature， subtle， openness， flexibility， seasonality， natural and made by hands these seven characteristics response the feel of WABISABI. Many types of handicrafts’ making observes the attitude of subtle. It feels like passivity， humility and retreat but it will be the expression of ultimate craft of refining and lofty even to show the insisting on little details when we look inside of that. This is what called exiguity by Masayuki Kurokawa in his eight points of Japanese aesthetic consciousness. So many Japanese crafts don’t only care about forms and functions but also have soul. The souls are gave buy craftsman’s skill when they making those crafts. We can also say that is the interaction between craftsman and material created a new kind of life that cannot easily described by words.

Reference

[1]Okakura Tenshin，《BOOK OF TEA》[M]

[2]Mark Reibstein，Ed Young，《WABISABI》[M]