Abstract

He wrote history, poetry, literary criticism, philosophical commentaries, treatises on language, translation, even on strategy, but Ogyū Sorai is mainly remembered today for his writings about the Way of the Ancient Kings. Those constitute – since for him the Way was the set of institutions that make the good society – what we now call a political or moral theory. Of this theory scholars, from his contemporaries to ours, have offered various interpretations, and few issues illustrate this diversity better than the understanding of the place and function of gods, spirits and heaven in his exposition of the Way. This aspect of his thought is the subject of the present chapter.