Social harmony in Japan is created by factors connected with the way that people relate to others, for example feelings of consideration and shame. In order for people to coexist and harmonize with one another, norms based on absolute values are employed in monotheistic societies, but such norms do not arise in a polytheistic country such as Japan where gods have traditionally been thought to exist in nature and in things themselves. The key to obtaining harmony so as to facilitate coexistence between people is consideration for others. For Japanese people, who have an aversion to shame, who value harmony, who place importance on obligation, and who, in generalized terms, take joy in the fusion with nature, it is precisely this distancing with things and with nature that provides an important norm under which they can lead their lives.

As in the case of relationships between people, things, sounds and pictures are arranged in such a manner as to place importance upon their mutual distancing. This is considered to be the way in which harmony can be obtained through the world as a whole. The space required for obtaining this harmony is known in Japanese as ma.

Ma is created by those appearances that one might refer to as “consideration” or “allure” that appear in the vicinity of people, things, sounds and pictures. The sense of shame and harmony gives rise to the appearances generated by people. These appearances respond to the appearances of other people, things, sounds and pictures and harmonize with them. This concept of ma is unlikely to emerge in the Western world, where absolutism is the dominating principle.

	The names, the existence, and the periphery of separate parts of the world are unclear. It is not clear precisely where a mountain ends. People possess a sense of appearances and territory in their vicinity, and there are no clear borders existing between people and things. Ma results from this gathering together of appearances on the periphery.
	Where a person’s bottom ends is unclear. The bottom is vaguely linked to the back. The beauty of a woman’s body lies in this sense of ma projected by this vagueness of meaning.
	In his picture entitled “Pine Forest” (Shorin-zu), Hasegawa Tohaku sets out in parallel two pine forests with vaguely delineated peripheries, with the result that the empty space between them gives rise to a mysterious sense of space. This is the power of ma.