Is the World Getting Worse?

 

Japan Culture "Girl's Day" symbol of peace

Is the world getting worse?

The morning news is filled with reports of war. Another tense day begins.
The intensity of that tension varies, but daily life is undeniably shaped by it.

The stability of modern society—built on the reflections of World War II—shows signs of unraveling in many places. Nations that once created order now struggle desperately to reorganize it. For ordinary people who simply wish to raise children, pass on culture, and live in peace, this reality feels harsh and fragile.

Japan, too, has experienced repeated cycles of collapse and reconstruction. Within that history, there remain precious records of how ordinary people lived through such times. One of them is Meigetsuki, the diary of Fujiwara no Teika, a 13th-century poet who lived during the transition from an aristocratic society to a warrior-led one.

Teika left records spanning nearly sixty years, from the age of nineteen to seventy-nine. Born into a low-ranking noble family, he devoted his life to waka poetry. In the noble hierarchy, the emperor stood at the pinnacle, followed by court nobles—a rank his father long aspired to attain.

As the power balance shifted toward the samurai, what did Teika think, and how did he live?
In Meigetsuki, he records daily events with remarkable calmness, even persistence. His physical existence—fatigue, illness, routine—is quietly embedded in these entries. This, I believe, is the diary’s enduring power.

Teika lived amid famine, natural disasters, and epidemics, in a world where ethical norms could not firmly anchor everyday life. What, then, is different today? One cannot help but question whether those who hold power truly possess ethical responsibility.

Meigetsuki has survived for a thousand years through the wisdom of those who preserved it. The writer Yoshie Hotta (1918–1998), who came of age during the Pacific War and later continued his career in Spain, held close a line from Teika’s first Chinese poem, written when he was nineteen. Its meaning is simple and severe:
No matter how chaotic the world becomes, do not be swayed by it. War is not my concern.

These words resonate with the sentiment of Satoshi Nakamura of the Peshawar Association, who said, “Do not be swayed by world events. Do what you can for the people in front of you.”

Reading this, I feel I can understand the heart of a writer who clung to words while facing conscription—then, and now.