Murata Jukō — Father of Wabi-Cha and 'Blurring the Boundary Between Wamono and Karamono'

Murata Jukō — Father of Wabi-Cha

Murata Jukō (ca. 1422-1502) is called the father of wabi-cha, a mid-Muromachi tea master. As a clear reaction against the 200 years of “lavish tea” seen in the previous article [Tōcha and Shoin no Cha], he opened a new aesthetic — wabi.

After taking the tonsure at Shōmyō-ji in Nara, he practiced Zen under Ikkyū Sōjun (1394-1481) at Daitoku-ji in Kyoto, opening the path in which the awakening of Zen and the way of tea are united. Critical of the lavish shoin no cha (with its taste for karamono), he proposed a “grass-hut tea” combining wamono in a small four-and-a-half-mat room.

His thought was transmitted through his disciple Sōju and, in the following generation, through Jūshiya Sōgo and Sōchin, to Takeno Jōō and Sen no Rikyū. Jukō’s status as “father” of wabi-cha means, not that he directly completed it, but that he stood at the starting point of a lineage running through 150 years to Sen no Rikyū.

The Life of Jukō

Year	Event	Note
ca. 1422	Birth	Nara, possibly of a merchant family
ca. 1430	Takes the tonsure at Shōmyō-ji	Jōdo sect
1440s	Studies Zen at Daitoku-ji under Ikkyū	Details uncertain
1460s	Begins the grass-hut tea	Four and a half mats
1470s	Serves Ashikaga Yoshimasa?	Later tradition
ca. 1480	Gives “Kokoro no Fumi” to Furuichi Harima	Transmits the thought of tea
1502	Dies at 81	Kyoto

Jukō’s life has many uncertainties, and distinguishing later tradition from historical fact is difficult. The stories of receiving the Engo bokuseki from Ikkyū and of guiding Yoshimasa in tea have not been securely verified. Because of his symbolic place as “father of wabi-cha,” later canonization and legend-making advanced.

Kokoro no Fumi — The Starting Point of Wabi-Cha

The message “Kokoro no Fumi” (“Letter of the Heart”), which Jukō gave to his disciple Furuichi Chōin (Harima-no-kami, a warrior of Nara), is regarded as the oldest document expressing the thought of wabi-cha (ca. 1490).

A key passage:

Kono michi, dai-ichi waroki koto wa kokoro no kaman kashiyō nari. Kōsha wo sonemi, shoshin wo anadoru koto, ichidan kuse-goto nari.

Paraphrased: “On this way, the very worst is arrogance and self-clinging. To envy the masters before you and to despise the beginner — this is greatly to be shunned.”

“Blurring the Boundary Between Wa and Kan”

The core thought of “Kokoro no Fumi” is “blurring the boundary between wa and kan” — the fusion of wamono and karamono. This is a criticism of the karamono-only bent of shoin no cha, and an insistence that beauty could be found also in the plain wares of Bizen or Shigaraki.

Not only the “flashy karamono” but also the “unassuming wamono” have their own beauty — this recognition became the aesthetic foundation of 500 years of chadō.

The Four-and-a-Half-Mat Grass Hut

Jukō is said to have set a four-and-a-half-mat tea room into Doroan, a sub-temple of Shōmyō-ji in Nara. The four-and-a-half mats are the same size as Ashikaga Yoshimasa’s Dōjinsai (in the Tōgudō of Ginkaku-ji), but rather than an elaborate shoin fitting, it is said to have been in a rustic style with mud walls, bamboo mesh, and thatched walls.

This became the origin of the current toward Rikyū’s later two-mat tea room. The turn to finding positive beauty in “smallness” and “simplicity.”

Ikkyū — The Heretical Zen Monk

Ikkyū Sōjun (1394-1481) was the heretic of Daitoku-ji, a Zen monk who openly practiced sake, women, and antinomianism while showing deep enlightenment. Jukō studied under him for years and is said to have reached the recognition that “the meaning of tea is the meaning of Buddha.”

Ikkyū criticized the formalized authoritarian Zen and embodied the paradox of “breaking the form to reach the form.” Jukō’s turn from “lavish tea” to “wabi” resonates spiritually.

Reception of the Engo bokuseki

As a token, Ikkyū gave Jukō the calligraphy (bokuseki) of Yuanwu Keqin (1063-1135), a Song-dynasty Chinese Zen monk.

This Engo bokuseki is a fragment called “Nagare Engo” which, after the fall of Osaka Castle, was scattered and eventually came to be held in the Tokyo National Museum (National Treasure). It became the highest of treasures for tea masters after Jukō.

The tradition of hanging Zen calligraphy in the tea room begins here. In the tea room, the bokuseki as scroll (kakemono) becomes valued above karamono utensils — a turning point.

The Aesthetic of “Chilled and Withered” — The Source of Wabi-Sabi

Jukō’s aesthetic is expressed by the phrases “hie-karete” (chilled and withered) and “reitō-jakko” (cold, stillness, quiet, withered) — the beauty of departure from splendor, of chill and wither.

Concretely:

• A halo around the moon, or a clouded moon
• Bare trees under a light dusting of snow
• The wabi-like bearing of a countryside dwelling
• The plain surface of Bizen ware

This is the aesthetic akin to “hie-sabi” in renga (Shinkei and Shōtetsu’s poetic theory). Jukō did not invent wabi-cha alone but, in response and resonance with contemporary renga, ink painting, and Nō, brought “wabi” — an aesthetic shared across cultural fields — into tea.

Jukō and Ashikaga Yoshimasa — Tradition and History

Later tradition holds that Jukō became tea master to the shogun Yoshimasa and served tea in the Dōjinsai of the Silver Pavilion. But no reliable contemporary source exists; this is likely later embellishment in Edo tea books such as [Nanpōroku].

Still, that Jukō was active within the cultural currents of Yoshimasa’s age, contiguous with the Higashiyama spirit, is certain. “An inept shogun produced Higashiyama culture, and alongside it the embryo of wabi-cha arose” — the devastation of the Ōnin War and the birth of an inward aesthetic in the same era: an irony.

After Jukō — The Jūshiya of Sakai

Jukō’s tea was passed to his son Sōju, to his disciples Matsumoto Jusai, Murata Sōju, Jūshiya Sōgo, Jūshiya Sōchin, and others.

“Jūshiya” refers to a shop of that name in Sakai, and thus the Sakai tea masters developed Jukō’s wabi-cha.

From this Sakai line came Takeno Jōō (1502-1555), and thence to Sen no Rikyū (1522-1591). The 150-year lineage Jukō → Jūshiya → Jōō → Rikyū raises wabi-cha to a world-class art.

Jukō’s Three Achievements

To summarize, Jukō’s contribution to the history of chadō stands on three legs:

1. Grass-hut tea — Four-and-a-half mats, wamono, rustic design. A clear break from shoin no cha
2. Blurring the boundary between wa and kan — A new aesthetic of the fusion of wamono and karamono
3. The practice of tea and Zen as one — Through Zen practice under Ikkyū, the introduction of Zen spirit into tea

These three form the basic skeleton of the “wabi-cha” that Jōō and Rikyū would deepen and complete.

From This Article to the Next

We have traced Jukō, the starting point of wabi-cha. The next article turns to the two who deepened his thought and led wabi-cha to completion — Takeno Jōō (1502-1555) and Sen no Rikyū (1522-1591). How the two Sakai merchant-born tea masters deepened and completed the philosophy of “wabi,” and Rikyū’s dramatic life culminating in his suicide in 1591 at the command of Hideyoshi — the completion of wabi-cha follows.