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lady_ganeshJust a note before we begin: This is from the perspective of an English-speaking Westerner and primarily deals with Western English-language fandom, as that's what I know best. Japanese fandom may well treat this subject quite differently. My knowledge of Japanese culture is, of course, imperfect, but I've tried to do my best. If you're unfamiliar with anime and manga, please note that all manga panels are read right to left. (Also note that this post is image-heavy.) There are some notes at the end about Japanese culture and Buddhism that newcomers might find helpful, as well!
My eternal gratitude to my LJ flist for their patience, suggestions, and encouragement.
~
Once in a while in Saiyuki fandom, the question of Genjyo Sanzo's virginity comes around. For those of you unfamiliar with Saiyuki, it's a cracked-out, funny and surprisingly emotional retelling of the classic Chinese tale The Journey to the West. There are four lead characters: Genjyo Sanzo, a short-tempered, spiritually powerful Buddhist priest; Sha Gojyo, a gambler and ladies' man; Cho Hakkai, polite to a disquieting fault; and Son Goku, the 'kid' of the group, sweet, energetic and openhearted. Here's a rundown of the canon. This essay contains minor spoilers right up to the latest chapters of Saiyuki Reload Blast.
Of the four leads, we know that Goku hasn't had sex; we know Gojyo and Hakkai have. That leaves Sanzo, and where there's a question, fans and ficcers will speculate.
There's more to the fascination over Sanzo's quantum virginity than an unanswered question, though.
For one thing, the word 'priest' sets off a complicated series of cultural associations for Westerners, with 'celibacy' being near the top of that list. (I know not all priests are celibate, but there's cultural associations for you.) We expect a certain level of what we associate with purity with the word 'priest,' and while Sanzo breaks almost all of those 'rules' (he smokes, drinks, and kills), we've got no evidence that he fucks.
Sanzo's very nature also leaves the question open to debate. He's not demonstrative, and generally only shows one particular range of emotions, running the gamut from irritation to flat-out rage. When the stakes get high, Sanzo's often all but unreadable.
So various theories go around-- he's celibate, he's a virgin, he's almost certainly had sex, he's almost certainly having sex with one of the ikkou right now-- with varying levels of certainty, speculation, and emotional investment.
You can, in fact, make a pretty good case for Sanzo being asexual; he certainly doesn't seem to give much time or thought toward sex. Let's poke in a little further about what we do know, or might be able to fairly speculate.
Sanzo, while being a grade A asshole and generally taking any excuse to call resident lech Gojyo disgusting, doesn't seem to condemn others for their sexual choices. He appears sympathetic toward Shunrei, and Hakkai, not Sanzo, is the one with the most catty remarks aimed toward Gojyo's womanizing. He's never seen judging Hakkai's incestous relationship with his sister. It's hard from these facts to imagine a Sanzo who is disgusted or upset by sex in itself, though it's certainly plausible that he might simply be disinterested, or disgusted when or if he's involved.
While it's never explicitly stated, it's probable-- judging from historical accounts of many a Buddhist monastery, the way the monks behave around Sanzo when he's a child, and Minekura's general attitude toward sexuality-- that there's at least some sex going on in the Buddhist temples where Sanzo grew up. Koumyou seems to have had the least respect for the nominally 'holiest' temples, and he certainly transmitted that disdain to his son. It's important to remember that in Buddhism non-attachment doesn't necessarily mean celibacy or lack of sexuality, especially not in the Zen tradition that seems to inform Saiyuki most directly.
Koumyou seems to have done an adequate job of sheltering Sanzo from potential creeps and abusers, so we'll say he was most likely a virgin until 13.
After that he might well have had sex, whether he was interested or not, out of curiosity or an attraction he thought might be worth exploring further. He was essentially on the run from 13 to 17, We have very little of his early days at Keiun temple, where he settles as a young adult, but the monks who spoke of him as an 'ornament' not so many months before still seem uncomfortable with Sanzo's presence when Goku arrives, and Sanzo's not confident enough at first, even as head of the temple, to bring Goku in the door openly. A man who hides the kid he found in a storage shed until he gets the Three Aspects' advice on what to do with him doesn't have a lot of friends or confidantes. (My friendsmillaraaq also points out that Sanzo might have worried about being accused of pedophilia, as his mentor/father figure Koumyou was.) The monks seem not much more comfortable with Sanzo, much less Goku, three years later, when Hakkai and Gojyo begin visiting Keiun.
There are only a few moments in canon where someone approaches him sexually, and one is a rape attempt when he was thirteen.
Years ago, I read an essay that speculated that might be enough to put Sanzo off sex for life, but I don't believe it; in the flashbacks that follow about the incident, it clearly haunts him, but as 'the first time I killed,' rather than 'that time some asshole tried to rape me.' This image talks more about Sanzo's own guilt than anything else.
The second time is straightforward and ends quite simply: with Sanzo shoving his gun in a man's face and telling him to fuck off.
Sanzo's clearly not interested in this guy, he's clearly an asshole, and canon has shown us Sanzo's touchy about his looks (it never ends well when someone tells him he looks like a girl). Gojyo, later in the arc, all but throws himself at Sanzo, and he's merely rebuffed; the offer and refusal are both tied up in Hakkai's escape, and neither of them appear to take it too seriously. (Sanzo is remarkably good at reading people and their intent, and has some minor psychic ability; this also no doubt helps him filter just how acceptable-- or not-- any given offer is.)
The last time is with Hazel Grosse, and Sanzo clearly finds it 'disgusting.' But it's still not a clear indication of Sanzo's feelings on sex, 'cause...it is disgusting. In the panels leading up to this scene, Sanzo's been asking Hazel for information, and his increasingly aggressive questions lead to:
It's especially inappropriate if you keep in mind that Sanzo is asking these questions because Goku almost died. That attack fucked Sanzo up, so much that he left the ikkou in an attempt to protect Goku (from Nii Jiyani surely, but also from his own inability to protect his ward). He's sulky and difficult and even less likely to respond to any sort of advance. (You can draw your own conclusions about why Hazel might not take this into account-- or why Hazel might be deliberately putting Sanzo off asking questions. Here's the look they give each other immediately after. There's more to this conversation than sex.)
So what you have, in canon, is Sanzo rejecting or shrugging off some pretty shitty offers-- and not getting raped this one time when he blew a guy's head off instead. This is not really a great body of work to judge whether or not a guy's had sex.
But it's still pretty interesting to talk about Sanzo's possible experiences with sex-- or lack of experience-- because it ties into the delicate and complicated dance Sanzo has with intimacy.
One of the very few Buddhist teachings Sanzo ever talks about is non-attachment. Sanzo talks about this a lot, especially in light of how little he seems to care for the rest of Buddhist teaching.
He also proves himself to be pretty much shit at it, at least as he chooses to define it. (It's important to note that Buddhist concepts of non-attachment relate more to the fleeting nature of life than a disdain for love, companionship and friendship; Here's a longer, and better, discussion of Sanzo's actions and their relationship to Buddhism.)
Even when Saiyuki begins, Sanzo's attached up to his eyeballs; he's got a ward/companion he's literally obligated to look out for, he runs one of the largest and most distinguished temples in China, and he's responsible for the mental health, or at least the behavior, of yet another person. (And that's just a list of the people he's attached to.)
Sanzo connects deeply more than broadly; very few people grab his attention, but when they do, they stick. He himself notes that he ends up with 'other people's shit added to his pile' when he does make a connection. He is, as one wry story noted, the Sanzo who walks by himself-- except when he doesn't.
When his master/father/mentor Koumyou pulled him from the Yangzte, he found one person he could care for, and in flashbacks he's seen chiding Kouymou for staying up too late and drinking too much. After Koumyou's death, it was several more years-- filled with violence and guilt-- before he could accept anyone back into his life, and years beyond that before Sanzo himself accepted there were people in his life he actually cared about. It can be said that meeting Goku changed Sanzo, profoundly, and it certainly did; but it's also true that meeting Goku brought Sanzo back closer to the person he always had been. It's only when Sanzo begins to take on attachments again-- the temple in his Burial arc, Goku and Hakkai, then Gojyo by extension-- that he becomes more and more himself.
At the conclusion of Even a Worm, he's finally embraced his position in the "Sanzo party," and even he's realized that his memories are important to him. As Saiyuki Reload Blast begins, there seems to be less tension between him and the rest of his party (even as he threatens to leave anyone sleeping late behind). Witness the dynamic between the group when Saiyuki Reload begins:
And contrast it with their body language nine volumes later, at the beginning of Saiyuki Reload Blast:
Here, Sanzo's discomfort seems to be much more from weeks without a bath than any proximity to Gojyo.
It doesn't really answer the question whether or not Sanzo fucks-- or if he's a virgin-- but Sanzo's complicated relationship with emotional intimacy is so close to the core of what Sanzo is it should be addressed. My guess is that if Sanzo considers sex merely a physical act, he's not a virgin-- but if he's something of a romantic, he probably is...probably.
Notes:
What happens when Sanzo does connect: a long essay on the Snow Drop arc in Saiyuki and Sanzo's relationship with Yakumo, a character who appears for only one arc, but whose connection with Sanzo echoes almost to the end of Saiyuki Reload.
Sexuality in Buddhism, with a small but informative section on how the Japanese Buddhist tradition has a history of priests who married and had families. Buddhist priests also left and re-entered monastic life (and still do).
A scholarly article on homosexuality in the Japanese Buddhist tradition.
An enjoyable character profile of Sanzo (translated from Japanese).
EDIT TO ADD: A wonderful overview of the bishonen (pretty boy) in Japanese culture, including the romantization/sexualization of boys in temple culture, from The Hooded Ultilitarian. (NSFW)
My eternal gratitude to my LJ flist for their patience, suggestions, and encouragement.
~
Once in a while in Saiyuki fandom, the question of Genjyo Sanzo's virginity comes around. For those of you unfamiliar with Saiyuki, it's a cracked-out, funny and surprisingly emotional retelling of the classic Chinese tale The Journey to the West. There are four lead characters: Genjyo Sanzo, a short-tempered, spiritually powerful Buddhist priest; Sha Gojyo, a gambler and ladies' man; Cho Hakkai, polite to a disquieting fault; and Son Goku, the 'kid' of the group, sweet, energetic and openhearted. Here's a rundown of the canon. This essay contains minor spoilers right up to the latest chapters of Saiyuki Reload Blast.
Of the four leads, we know that Goku hasn't had sex; we know Gojyo and Hakkai have. That leaves Sanzo, and where there's a question, fans and ficcers will speculate.
There's more to the fascination over Sanzo's quantum virginity than an unanswered question, though.
For one thing, the word 'priest' sets off a complicated series of cultural associations for Westerners, with 'celibacy' being near the top of that list. (I know not all priests are celibate, but there's cultural associations for you.) We expect a certain level of what we associate with purity with the word 'priest,' and while Sanzo breaks almost all of those 'rules' (he smokes, drinks, and kills), we've got no evidence that he fucks.
Sanzo's very nature also leaves the question open to debate. He's not demonstrative, and generally only shows one particular range of emotions, running the gamut from irritation to flat-out rage. When the stakes get high, Sanzo's often all but unreadable.
So various theories go around-- he's celibate, he's a virgin, he's almost certainly had sex, he's almost certainly having sex with one of the ikkou right now-- with varying levels of certainty, speculation, and emotional investment.
You can, in fact, make a pretty good case for Sanzo being asexual; he certainly doesn't seem to give much time or thought toward sex. Let's poke in a little further about what we do know, or might be able to fairly speculate.
Sanzo, while being a grade A asshole and generally taking any excuse to call resident lech Gojyo disgusting, doesn't seem to condemn others for their sexual choices. He appears sympathetic toward Shunrei, and Hakkai, not Sanzo, is the one with the most catty remarks aimed toward Gojyo's womanizing. He's never seen judging Hakkai's incestous relationship with his sister. It's hard from these facts to imagine a Sanzo who is disgusted or upset by sex in itself, though it's certainly plausible that he might simply be disinterested, or disgusted when or if he's involved.
While it's never explicitly stated, it's probable-- judging from historical accounts of many a Buddhist monastery, the way the monks behave around Sanzo when he's a child, and Minekura's general attitude toward sexuality-- that there's at least some sex going on in the Buddhist temples where Sanzo grew up. Koumyou seems to have had the least respect for the nominally 'holiest' temples, and he certainly transmitted that disdain to his son. It's important to remember that in Buddhism non-attachment doesn't necessarily mean celibacy or lack of sexuality, especially not in the Zen tradition that seems to inform Saiyuki most directly.
Koumyou seems to have done an adequate job of sheltering Sanzo from potential creeps and abusers, so we'll say he was most likely a virgin until 13.
After that he might well have had sex, whether he was interested or not, out of curiosity or an attraction he thought might be worth exploring further. He was essentially on the run from 13 to 17, We have very little of his early days at Keiun temple, where he settles as a young adult, but the monks who spoke of him as an 'ornament' not so many months before still seem uncomfortable with Sanzo's presence when Goku arrives, and Sanzo's not confident enough at first, even as head of the temple, to bring Goku in the door openly. A man who hides the kid he found in a storage shed until he gets the Three Aspects' advice on what to do with him doesn't have a lot of friends or confidantes. (My friend
smillaraaq also points out that Sanzo might have worried about being accused of pedophilia, as his mentor/father figure Koumyou was.) The monks seem not much more comfortable with Sanzo, much less Goku, three years later, when Hakkai and Gojyo begin visiting Keiun.There are only a few moments in canon where someone approaches him sexually, and one is a rape attempt when he was thirteen.
Years ago, I read an essay that speculated that might be enough to put Sanzo off sex for life, but I don't believe it; in the flashbacks that follow about the incident, it clearly haunts him, but as 'the first time I killed,' rather than 'that time some asshole tried to rape me.' This image talks more about Sanzo's own guilt than anything else.
The second time is straightforward and ends quite simply: with Sanzo shoving his gun in a man's face and telling him to fuck off.
Sanzo's clearly not interested in this guy, he's clearly an asshole, and canon has shown us Sanzo's touchy about his looks (it never ends well when someone tells him he looks like a girl). Gojyo, later in the arc, all but throws himself at Sanzo, and he's merely rebuffed; the offer and refusal are both tied up in Hakkai's escape, and neither of them appear to take it too seriously. (Sanzo is remarkably good at reading people and their intent, and has some minor psychic ability; this also no doubt helps him filter just how acceptable-- or not-- any given offer is.)
The last time is with Hazel Grosse, and Sanzo clearly finds it 'disgusting.' But it's still not a clear indication of Sanzo's feelings on sex, 'cause...it is disgusting. In the panels leading up to this scene, Sanzo's been asking Hazel for information, and his increasingly aggressive questions lead to:
It's especially inappropriate if you keep in mind that Sanzo is asking these questions because Goku almost died. That attack fucked Sanzo up, so much that he left the ikkou in an attempt to protect Goku (from Nii Jiyani surely, but also from his own inability to protect his ward). He's sulky and difficult and even less likely to respond to any sort of advance. (You can draw your own conclusions about why Hazel might not take this into account-- or why Hazel might be deliberately putting Sanzo off asking questions. Here's the look they give each other immediately after. There's more to this conversation than sex.)
So what you have, in canon, is Sanzo rejecting or shrugging off some pretty shitty offers-- and not getting raped this one time when he blew a guy's head off instead. This is not really a great body of work to judge whether or not a guy's had sex.
But it's still pretty interesting to talk about Sanzo's possible experiences with sex-- or lack of experience-- because it ties into the delicate and complicated dance Sanzo has with intimacy.
One of the very few Buddhist teachings Sanzo ever talks about is non-attachment. Sanzo talks about this a lot, especially in light of how little he seems to care for the rest of Buddhist teaching.
He also proves himself to be pretty much shit at it, at least as he chooses to define it. (It's important to note that Buddhist concepts of non-attachment relate more to the fleeting nature of life than a disdain for love, companionship and friendship; Here's a longer, and better, discussion of Sanzo's actions and their relationship to Buddhism.)
Even when Saiyuki begins, Sanzo's attached up to his eyeballs; he's got a ward/companion he's literally obligated to look out for, he runs one of the largest and most distinguished temples in China, and he's responsible for the mental health, or at least the behavior, of yet another person. (And that's just a list of the people he's attached to.)
Sanzo connects deeply more than broadly; very few people grab his attention, but when they do, they stick. He himself notes that he ends up with 'other people's shit added to his pile' when he does make a connection. He is, as one wry story noted, the Sanzo who walks by himself-- except when he doesn't.
When his master/father/mentor Koumyou pulled him from the Yangzte, he found one person he could care for, and in flashbacks he's seen chiding Kouymou for staying up too late and drinking too much. After Koumyou's death, it was several more years-- filled with violence and guilt-- before he could accept anyone back into his life, and years beyond that before Sanzo himself accepted there were people in his life he actually cared about. It can be said that meeting Goku changed Sanzo, profoundly, and it certainly did; but it's also true that meeting Goku brought Sanzo back closer to the person he always had been. It's only when Sanzo begins to take on attachments again-- the temple in his Burial arc, Goku and Hakkai, then Gojyo by extension-- that he becomes more and more himself.
At the conclusion of Even a Worm, he's finally embraced his position in the "Sanzo party," and even he's realized that his memories are important to him. As Saiyuki Reload Blast begins, there seems to be less tension between him and the rest of his party (even as he threatens to leave anyone sleeping late behind). Witness the dynamic between the group when Saiyuki Reload begins:
And contrast it with their body language nine volumes later, at the beginning of Saiyuki Reload Blast:
Here, Sanzo's discomfort seems to be much more from weeks without a bath than any proximity to Gojyo.
It doesn't really answer the question whether or not Sanzo fucks-- or if he's a virgin-- but Sanzo's complicated relationship with emotional intimacy is so close to the core of what Sanzo is it should be addressed. My guess is that if Sanzo considers sex merely a physical act, he's not a virgin-- but if he's something of a romantic, he probably is...probably.
Notes:
What happens when Sanzo does connect: a long essay on the Snow Drop arc in Saiyuki and Sanzo's relationship with Yakumo, a character who appears for only one arc, but whose connection with Sanzo echoes almost to the end of Saiyuki Reload.
Sexuality in Buddhism, with a small but informative section on how the Japanese Buddhist tradition has a history of priests who married and had families. Buddhist priests also left and re-entered monastic life (and still do).
A scholarly article on homosexuality in the Japanese Buddhist tradition.
An enjoyable character profile of Sanzo (translated from Japanese).
EDIT TO ADD: A wonderful overview of the bishonen (pretty boy) in Japanese culture, including the romantization/sexualization of boys in temple culture, from The Hooded Ultilitarian. (NSFW)
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no subject
Date: 2010-09-01 03:54 am (UTC)And one further note, that I failed to mention when we were last discussing this --
Sanzo might have worried about being accused of pedophilia, as his mentor/father figure Koumyou was
-- considering how Sanzo does not exactly take pains to Make Friends and Influence People (unless it's influencing them to SHUT UP AND GO AWAY NOW), doesn't give a damn if people think he's a bad priest for drinking, killing, keeping his hair, etc., I suspect it may not even be so much that he's worried that people will judge him negatively for being a pedophile, but rather that it would bother him greatly if people thought he was molesting a devoted young ward "just like his master did". Koumyou's reputation, even long after his death, is something he might very well feel far more protective of than his own.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-01 01:40 pm (UTC)Because he's trying so hard to pretend he's not, he is in unusually sucky form when Kami starts telekinetically pitching beads all over the place. Mind, so's everyone else - Gojou's exhausted and hasn't eaten, Hakkai doubtless hasn't slept since Gojou vanished, and Gokuu's borne the brunt of Sanzou's captain cranky act. And Kami cheats. XD; It's no one person's zomgfault that the first runaround with Kami goes so damned badly. The teamwork's been disrupted so everybody faceplants.
And then...THE MAHJONG GAME! This and its sequel cover it way better than I ever could. XD (I still giggle at the fact that one of Hakkai's hands is this type because I am a nerd) They snap out of it, realize that they need to do this as a group, together, dammit - and Sanzou smiles. It's a stealthy one - he's got his hand and cig obscuring it - but if you look at his eyes, it's very apparent.
...That had very little to do with the post at hand :B Oh well. I blame the weather being grody!
no subject
Date: 2010-09-05 02:11 pm (UTC)I love those moments when he smiles. God.
NO THIS IS GOOD it's all part of that attachment dance.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-02 02:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-05 02:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-05 03:32 pm (UTC)I also loved how you've showed the growing intimacy, friendship (Sanzo, don't shoot) and just simple connection between the four. I'm not up to the new series, but I really liked the picture you chose for comparison. They seem, well, an unit.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-05 07:30 pm (UTC)Things are heating up fast, heh. And man, the art just keeps getting better.