松木精張研究(I) : 『火の縄』の或る技術者の倫理

Abstract

This paper deals with an engineer's ethics in Seicho Matsumoto's Hi no Nawa. The main character, Iganokami Naoie Inatomi(called Iga in this paper) is an engineer who has a genius for a Tanegashima, an old Japanese gun. He served two lords, Yoshiari Isshiki and his wife lyo, and Tadaoki Hosokawa and his wife Tama. Iga had a good relation with lyo who was honest and tender and loved the natural environment around her castle. When they were attacked, Iga kept using his Tanegashima to protect her. He would have been satisfied even though he died with his genius for the gun. But Iga was disliked by Tama who was very egoistic and he disliked her, too. When they were attacked, Iga left her in order to hand down his technique to his posterity. But when he left her, he was called a betrayer who had no ethics, leyasu Tokugawa made him know that Iga was praised for his genius for the gun but he was not treated as an ethical human being. Iga disliked his own genius for the first time but we must not forget he kept using his genius in order to protect lyo to whom he had an affectionate relation and never lost his ethics. We can say that ethics as a mere duty is fragile but ethics supported by love has a power to make an engineer work selflessly as an ethical human being.