Do you have an impression that Yoritomo was cold-blooded? In Japan, many people do, especially due to the episodes of Yoshitaka Kiso and Yoshitsune Minamoto. When the two brothers, Yoritomo and Yoshitsune, are compared, many people are more sympathetic to Yoshitsune than Yoritomo, and Yoshitsune has been much more popular character in popular novels, storytelling, theaters, and arts, while Yoritomo is not necessarily a very popular figure, despite his remarkable achievements in the history of Japan. In Japanese, there is even a special expression “hogan-biiki,” meaning “sympathetic feelings towards those who are in the weaker position.” The term “hogan” originates in the nickname of the position held by Yoshitsune, saemon-shojo.

Before I started to write this story, I also had the same impression. Even now, I think it is not false to say that Yoritomo was a person who always made his decisions rationally, not based on his emotions but based on his rational calculations. He was, indeed, an excellent politician.

At the same time, however, now I personally feel that Yoritomo may not have been a cold-blooded person. I want to introduce one episode to show you why. It is known that, when Yoritomo returned from the Mutsu province after his successful military operations against the Fujiwara clan, he decided to establish one Buddhist temple called Yofuku-ji in Kamakura. It has been often argued that one of the reasons why he decided to do so was his impression on the culture of Hiraizumi, the capital of the Mutsu province. The long-lasting economic prosperity of the Fujiwara clan in the Mutsu province, supported by the rich goldmines in the region, led to many impressive religious buildings. Yoritomo was particularly impressed by one Buddhist temple called Daichoju-in, a gorgeous temple with two floors. He realized that Kamakura was much lagged-behind Hiraizumi, and he wanted to catch up.

According to one historian, however, the true purpose of the construction of Yofuku-ji was to heal the souls of the people who lost their lives during the conflict (Akiyama 2017: 141). This included not only those who died during the conflict on the side of Yoritomo but also those who died on the opponent side. Indeed, Azuma-no-kagami, the most important primary historical source for this period, states that Yoritomo decided to construct Yofuku-ji because he killed Yoshitsune and Yasuhira Fujiwara for his personal intentions even though they were actually not the enemy of the Imperial Palace (Akiyama 2017: 142). From this historical document, we can see the sense of guilt felt by Yoritomo, can’t we?

So, it seems that Yoritomo did feel guilty when he was conducting his military operations against the Fujiwara clan in the Mutsu province. He was not a cold-blooded person who did not feel anything even if he killed his own brother for his political purposes. I guess, he still decided to treat Yoshitsune as a criminal after the victory over the Taira clan and to initiate his military operations against the Fujiwara clan based on his rational calculations on the benefits, costs and risks associated with available options. In this sense, he was primarily a good politician, after all.

This temple Yofuku-ji functioned as the most important temple for the shogun of the Kamakura government. It was visited frequently by not only Yoriie and Sanetomo but also subsequent shoguns. Unfortunately, however, this temple was later abandoned and ruined after the collapse of the Kamakura government, and we do now know precisely how it looked like. There have been some archeological findings from the site that is estimated to be the place of Yofuku-ji, and you can have a rough idea about how the temple looked like. If you are interested and can read Japanese, I recommend Akiyama (2017).