42「山水にあたりて立たぬ岩声こそ清くことふる人もなければ。」- 植芝盛平
Original Waka
山水に
植芝盛平 (Ueshiba, 1977)
あたりて立たぬ
岩声こそ
清くことふる
人もなければ
Translation
“Where the mountain waters strike the steadfast rock standing not, its voice precisely pure—worn out proclamations by anyone—there is none.” – Morihei Ueshiba
Waka Translation
In mountain waters,
a striking unarising,
rock’s voice—precisely
pure—oft worn out announcements
by anyone—there is none.
Morihei Ueshiba
歴史的仮名遣い（語構成を明示）1
山水に（さんすいに）
当りてて立たぬ（あたりてたたぬ）
岩聲こそ（いわこゑこそ）
清くことふる（きよくことふる）
人も無ければ（ひともなければ）
植芝盛平
Bungo Romanization
sansui ni
atarite tatanu
iwa‑koe koso
kiyoku koto‑furu
hito mo nakereba
Ueshiba Morihei
Notes
1 Because Line 3‘s ことふる can plausibly be read as 言古る (to make [it] old by over‑telling) and as 事触る (to proclaim), reading it as a deliberate kakekotoba honors classical waka technique and elegantly explains the culminating contrast: the rock’s “voice” is pure precisely where no one proclaims it and where no one talks it into cliché.
Translation, Notes, Commentary, and Research by Latex G. N. R. Space-Coyote
Ueshiba, M. (2025). 植芝盛平道歌–042: No one to proclaim it (L. G. N. R. Space-Coyote, Trans.; OpenAI ChatGPT-5 Pro, Ed.). Shugyokai.org. (Original work published 1977) https://shugyokai.org/nhf9
山（さん / やま; san / yama）— mountain.
水（すい / みず; sui / mizu）— water.
山水（さんすい / やまみず; sansui / yamamizu）— mountains and waters / rivers; in Japanese poetic usage, often the natural landscape of mountain streams; nature and its beauties.
山水に（さんすいに / やまみずに; sansui ni / yama mizu ni）— “amid mountain waters / mountains‑and‑waters (landscape)”; evokes mountain streams and, more broadly, classical “mountain–water” landscape ideal central to East Asian aesthetics.
あたりて / 当りて（atari‑te）— (連用形 + 接続助詞) → “striking / impinging, and …”, “upon encountering / being in the presence of” (i.e., when in the presence of the mountain waters).
立たぬ（tata‑nu）— (未然 + 打消) → “(a rock that) does not move/stand up (i.e., stands fast, unbudging)”; grammatically, 立た + ぬ, the 未然形 of 立つ plus the negative auxiliary ぬ in its attributive form, so as bungo it means “not standing / not rising / not moving”, modifying a following noun; not the perfective ぬ of a form like 立ちぬ; register carries more than bare physical “standing”; in Kojiki-related diction it can also suggest emergence or grounded emplacement, so the negation here reads as steadfast groundedness rather than simple absence (see Space-Coyote, 2026).
岩（いわ; iwa）— rock, boulder; crag, cliff; anchor.
立たぬ岩（たたぬいわ; tatanu iwa）— (“the rock that does not [a]rise / move / stand”); more idomatically, “the voice of the rocks (i.e., the sound of rocks in the mountain stream) which does not stand (i.e., remains unmoving, still); suggests immovable, immovability, steadfast, and steadiness, resonant with 不動心 (fudōshin) in budō: an unwavering, centered mind; the grammar is the attributive −ぬ (classical negation) modifying 岩; the negative 立たぬ emphasizes that the sound is not theatrical, not forced, but natural and inherent.
声（こゑ; koe）— voice, sound; tone; intonation, punctuation; accent.
岩声 / 岩聲（いわこゑ; iwa koe）— “the rock’s voice” personifies natural sound, common in Shinto-inflected poetics where nonhuman things are animated with spirit and “voice.” Here it’s the sound of water meeting rock.
こそ（koso）— classical kire-ji in upper phrase, giving emphasis and cutting effect: “it is precisely that…”.
岩声こそ（いわこゑこそ; iwa‑koe koso）— (強意係助詞こそ) → “indeed the rock’s voice …”.
清（きよ; kiyo）— cleanly; purely.
清く（きよく; kiyoku）— (形容詞連用形) → “purely / clearly / with purity”.
岩声こそ清く（いわこゑこそきよく; iwa‑koe koso kiyoku）— personifies the sound of water striking stone; こそ gives emphatic focus: “indeed the rock’s voice (is) pure …”. The purity is adverbial 清く, modifying what follows.
ことふる / 言古る / 事降る（koto‑furu）— two classical homophones (言古る “to become worn by being oft‑spoken” vs. 事触る “to proclaim / spread a notice”). 言古る (ことふる) “(words) become ‘old’, hackneyed by being oft‑repeated,” i.e., to be talked into cliché; cf. 言古る／事古る in major dictionaries. 事触る (ことふる) “to proclaim, to spread (a notice / message)” — attested nominal 事触れ (ことぶれ) “proclamation, circulating announcement”; both senses fit “since there is no one to (koto‑furu)”: no one to proclaim and no one to talk it to death—hence purity; kakekotoba is a standard device in waka to layer meanings in minimal on; 事降る: literally “things descend / events fall”. In Buddhist or Shinto poetic usage, “事降る” could mean “the spiritual matter falls down / manifests”, or “the event happens”. Could also be read as “koto furu” = “sound falls (as a matter)”.
人も（hito mo）— “even a person / anyone”.
なければ（nakere‑ba）— (已然 + 接続助詞) → “since there is none / because there is no …”.
人もなければ / 人も無ければ（ことふるひともなければ; hito mo nakere‑ba）— “neither is there a person (who)…”; i.e., no one to praise / appreciate it.
ことふる人もなければ（ことふるひともなければ; kotofuru hito mo nakere‑ba）— uses older verb sense of kotofuru (“to speak”; “to announce”; “to celebrate”). With no human speech—no proclamation or praise—the sound remains 清く (kiyoku, “pure/clear”). This aligns with wabi–sabi sensibilities: unadorned nature unsullied by human ornament or ego.
Syntactic note (kakarimusubi). The emphatic particle こそ classically links to an 已然形 ending later in the sentence; here that function is satisfied by なけれ in なければ. This is normal bungo usage.
Bungo morphology. Negative attributive 立たぬ, connective あたりて, emphatic こそ with 已然形 resolution at なければ—all canonical features of classical grammar.
Historical kana. Forms such as 岩聲(いはごゑ) reflect pre‑1946 orthography and Heian‑based phonology used in literary diction.
31‑on target with tolerance. Presenting the text in five verses may yield a single ji‑amari (line 3), which remains within historically attested latitude for waka composition and reception.
Waka framing. The kami‑no‑ku / shimo‑no‑ku split captures the classical pivot between scene‑setting (nature image) and reflective turn (moral/spiritual statement), aligning with standard waka pedagogy.
Pivot‑word poetics. Reading ことふる as a kakekotoba is squarely within Heian‑style techniques to compress layered meanings into the on‑budget.
Nature as vehicle of ethos. Personifying 岩声 (“voice of the rock”) resonates with long‑standing waka practice of letting landscape carry ethical or affective insight.
Shintō/omoto background. Ueshiba’s religio‑philosophical milieu drew on Shintō concepts and Ōmoto influences (via Deguchi Onisaburō). The poem’s image—water striking rock whose voice is pure—is legible against misogi (purification by water) and the idea that nature articulates divine order (kami presence) without human mediation.
Kotodama (word‑spirit): The ending clause ことふる人もなければ plays with the power (and danger) of human koto (words). In Shintō discourse, words are efficacious; purity often entails restraint of verbal interference—letting the world “speak” unforced. Scholarly treatments survey kotodama as belief and rhetoric in Japanese religion and culture.
Aikidō dōka as ethical instruction. Dōka (poems of the Way) in Ueshiba’s corpus articulate budō ethics in a classical register; this specific poem is transmitted in modern aikidō collections and commentaries. Read thus, purity of the rock’s voice suggests authentic principle revealing itself when egoic proclamation ceases.
The yoin (余韻) is present. The final line “人も無ければ” leaves a lingering emptiness, inviting the reader’s reflection, which is typical of classical Japanese poetic aesthetics (c.f. Kornicki, 2017).
解説; Commentary
第42首は「山水に／あたりて立たぬ／岩声こそ／清くことふる／人もなければ」──批判的口語訳にすれば、「山の水がぶつかっても微動だにしない岩の“声”は、まさに澄んでいる。だって、それを言い立てて（ことふる）古びさせる人が誰もいないから」という趣旨です。ここでことふるは、ページの注が示すように「言古る（言い古す）／事触る（布告する）」の掛詞で、「誰も称揚も布告もしていないからこそ純度が保たれる」を導きます。またこそ…なければの係り結びが「清く」の焦点を高め、立たぬ岩の像は武道で言う不動心の比喩として読める、と本ページは丁寧に解説しています。
この読みは、六つのプライマーの糸にそのまま通ります。プライマーの第一原理〈武＝宇宙原理〉は「自然の理（岩声）が人為の喧噪（ことふる）を要せず自ずと明らかになる」座標を与え、プライマーの第二原理〈人との合気〉は「相手の力（山水）を受けても騒がず、中心（岩）にいて響かせる」実践を示します。プライマーの第三原理〈心魂一如〉は立たぬの無隙な統一、プライマーの第四原理〈和合美化〉は称揚よりも実質の清さを価値基準に、プライマーの第五原理〈体＝道場、心＝修業者／修行者心／学び手〉は日々の稽古で“音を立てずに響く”身づくりを促し、プライマーの第六原理〈「至愛」の源に順う〉はことば以前の清明さを拠りどころに据えます。つまりこの一首は、「語る前に、澄んで在る」という運用原理を六つの導入章で運転可能にした形です。
直前の三首とも噛み合います。第39首が説く「言向け勧め／愛の剣」は言葉の力を最後に用いる倫理であり、第41首は「物見で“や”と自拍を立て、他人の拍に移るな」と内なる拍を護る戒め、第40首は「月の出没を“本当に知る者”はいない」という謙虚さを据えました。第42首はその底面で、過剰な宣言や自慢（ことふる）を退け、静かな不動の中心から“清い声”を立ち上げよと締めくくります。稽古での翻訳はシンプルです──まず澄む（プライマーの第六原理）／ぶれない（プライマーの第三原理）／合わせて導く（プライマーの第二原理・プライマーの第四原理）／日々で体化（プライマーの第五原理）、そして必要以上に語らない（第39~41首）。そのとき、技も場も「清く」響く、とこのページは教えています。
口語要約のひとこと
「山の水が当たっても動かない岩の声こそ澄んでいる――だって、それをわざわざ言い立てる人なんていないからだ。」
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Appendix I: Change Modification Log
14 MAR 26 - Added notes on 立た.13 JAN 26 - Fixed Asia for Educators reference.21 DEC 25 - Phase V styling applied to waka.07 NOV 25 - Phase IV completion; commentary added.14 OCT 25 - Phase III completion.14 APR 20 - Initial notes loaded.