There are several types of marriages performed on Japanese brides. The main article is about the marriages between a Japanese woman and a foreign man. Most of the marriages in Japan are arranged marriages, but there are some exceptions. Sometimes a relationship is started purely for friendship or love and nothing else.
In this article we are discussing the main article that pertains to the marriages of a male Japanese woman and a foreign man. Most of the time the marriage is arranged by the families of both persons. They have their own wedding ceremony, which can take place in any city in Japan. But if it is not possible they will be married in the hometown of their parents. A local restaurant or temple will usually be the place where the marriage takes place.
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There are several reasons that led to the formation of such forms of marriages. It is mainly due to the Japanese culture and the idea of filial piety. Many times when two persons who belong to different races and cultures get married, it is to preserve the family blood and to uphold the honor of the family. A marriage contract is very important and the wedding will be celebrated with great pomp and pageantry.
Most of the times in the early part of the twentieth century, many young Japanese men were shipped overseas to live with their families. Once back home, they had to adapt to life as a normal Japanese and raise their families. The wives of these men would often accompany their husbands back from their faraway homes. They would stay with their husbands and start to immerse themselves in the Japanese culture. This is one of the many reasons why the formation of a filial piety life for Japanese women was necessary.
After several years of hard work, the husband eventually retired and had no children of his own to take care of. This left his wife with six to eight kids to take care of. To accommodate her situation, many Japanese women made mei eki as a solution to marrying a man without any children of their own.
Ichi eki was originally a ritualistic marriage ceremony performed in early twentieth century Japan. Two monks, designated as banyan banzai, entered into a room with a small bowl full of rice. A Buddhist priest then poured sake into the bowl and waited for the two banyan to exchange rings. When the ring was exchanged, the priest would fling the rice bowl over the person of honor and tell him he was now legally committed to marry the woman. This was considered to be a great honor since it meant that her love for him was superior to any other. Meiji civil code was also written around this time to support this new marriage ritual.
In addition to this ancient marriage service, there was another marriage code within the Meiji Period, which served as a form of security for women wishing to marry a Japanese male. The Meiji Period had just ended and life on the Japanese islands was starting to return to normal while a new set of rules had been implemented. Women living in family registrations were not allowed to marry men outside their family since this would violate the family registration law which stated that all persons living in a family are related by blood. The new regulations in family registration also stated that only the mother of the bride could marry the son of the groom thus ensuring that their relationship was above blood.
Since the Meiji Period, Japanese married couples went through a somewhat slow period when compared to those within the Western countries. This may have something to do with the fact that the number of marriages became fewer because of the shift within Japan’s culture. The number of women willing to get married also decreased, which may have been caused by stricter family registration requirements. Today, there is still more of a push within Japan towards the nuclear family and despite the strict rules governing this marriage, there are still more families than there are males, making it one of the most common types of marriage in Japan.