Cultures in Conflict:

Spanish Catholicism Confronts
Feudal Japanese Society
(1549 - 1639)



Shawn Gray
March 30, 1993
Anthropology 202

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  When one culture comes into contact with another for the first time, the results are often very interesting to the anthropologies. One culture may be partially or completely absorbed by the other, or even destroyed altogether, or both cultures may be affected in a variety of ways and borrow ideas or technology from each other. The first European interaction with Japan provides a classic example of cultures in the initial stages of contact.

  The purpose of this paper is to examine the situation of cultural conflict created by the arrival of European missionaries to Japan for the first time. Since the missionaries were the first European advocates of change to come to Japan, the conflict between the two cultures can only be seen in light of the effort to establish Christianity in that country. The conflict came about because the Europeans were generally unaware of the cultural factors they were to face in the Japanese society of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. These factors were created by the feudal system of Japanese government that was in place at the time of the arrival of the first missionaries in the sixteenth century and continued to thwart mission efforts in that country until the modern era.

  Though the first Jesuit missionaries did not arrive in Japan until 1549, some claim that the Nestorian church had already had an impact on the Japanese. Brinkley claims that Nestorian ideas regarding the Incarnation had been brought to the Tang court in China and then found their way into Japanese Buddhism (Brinkley, 192). The Japanese record itself may support these ideas. The ancient Shoku Nihongi makes mention of the arrival in 736 of three “Keijin,” who may have been Nestorian monks (Drummond, 30). Whether or not these men were actually early missionaries, however, is still a big question. “It is conceivable that some Nestorian Christian influence reached Japan by the ninth century… but this is almost entirely conjectural.” (McFarland, 31). If the Nestorians had indeed reached Japan prior to 1549, they had left no recorded indication of the workings of Japanese society to aid their successors.

  Barring this questionable early influence, Christianity was introduced to Japan shortly following the Portuguese discovery of Japan in 1542 or 1543. It seems that the sailors themselves, in discourses with the natives, gave them some idea of what to expect in the new religion, which helped to prepare the Japanese for the cultural exchange that was to follow. “Some knowledge of Christian faith and practice was communicated to at least a few Japanese by Portuguese traders before the arrival of any missionaries.” (Drummond, 30) Three Portuguese sailors traveling in a junk from Spain to Macao had been driven off course and landed at Tanegashima, where they were hospitably received. Noticing the Japanese interest in their firearms, the Portuguese began to exploit the market. This opening of commerce was to have a profound impact on Japanese society over the next century as the introduction of European military technology radically altered traditional methods of warfare that up until that point centered mainly on the sword.

  The Jesuits learned of Japan from Yajiro, a Japanese who had committed a serious crime in Japan and had taken refuge in a Portuguese vessel, whose captain sent him to the priest at Malacca to confess. That priest was Francis Xavier, who was to become the Apostle to Japan (Brinkley, 531). Xavier met Yajiro in December of 1547 and was convinced by him that, owing to their reason and eagerness to learn, the Japanese “king” and nobility would easily become Christians in six months if they were only able to see his work (Drummond, 36). Weary of attempting to convert the people of India, Xavier consented to go to Japan, and on August 15, 1549, he, along with Father Cosme de Torres, and Brother Juan Fernandez, arrived at Kagoshima (Brinkley, 530).

  The missionaries were warmly received by Yajiro’s family and later by Shimazu Takahisa, the lord of Satsuma Province. Shimazu was anxious to trade with the Portuguese, and requested that one ship from Goa and one or two from Macao be sent to his waters each year to engage in commercial activities (Drummond, 36). This interest in trade was to prove to be the motivating factor behind the missionaries’ acceptance in almost every case in the next one hundred years. Although Xavier had been given permission to preach in Kagoshima, his “aggressive intolerance” quickly alienated the local Buddhist priests, and when the Portuguese ships went to Hirado to trade instead, Xavier was ordered to leave and it was made a capital offence to become a Christian in Kagoshima (Brinkley, 531). It can be clearly seen from this that the Japanese were interested in the missionaries only in so far as they brought foreign trade with them.

  Xavier left Kagoshima and went to Hirado, where Matsuura, the local baron, noticed the Portuguese reverence to him and ordered attention to his teachings, resulting in 100 converts in the first ten days. Because they anticipated trade, the Japanese attitude here was favorable, and Xavier sought to take advantage of this by gaining an audience with the Emperor in Kyoto. After traveling two months on foot in winter conditions, Xavier was denied audience by both the Emperor and the Shogun. Disappointed, Xavier resorted to street preaching, but this was unsuccessful due to the language barrier (Brinkley, 531).

  It was there that Xavier began to realize the cultural factors that were causing him difficulty in Japan. In this land of group mentality in which a few feudal lords made decisions for the unquestioning masses, he came to the realization that to make an impact he must be sanctioned by the rulers. To gain acceptance and respectability as a person of high status and learning, Xavier sent for his canonicals and credentials from India, Malacca, and Goa. Having these, he received many converts. “In Kyoto… he had learned a valuable lesson, namely, that religious propagandism, to be successful in Japan, must be countenanced by the ruling classes.” (Brinkley, 532) With these successes behind him, Xavier moved on to Bungo, where the ruler, Otomo, in hopes of wealth and weapons of war, welcomed him warmly. After a four-month stay in Bungo, Xavier sailed for Goa. He died on the way in December of 1552. His twenty-seven month sojourn in Japan had yielded 760 converts (Brinkley, 532).

  Torres and Fernandez remained to work in Japan. They were soon joined by three other Jesuit workers and made Bungo their headquarters, where they built the first Christian church in Japan. They also began to send yearly reports of their work, known as the “Annual Letters,” back to Rome (Brinkley, 533). The next few years were characterized by an adoption-apostasy pattern. If trade came to Japan through the Portuguese ships, the people would accept Christianity; if it did not, they quickly apostatized and began to persecute other Christians. The church at Bungo was experiencing problems related to their hospital work there. As newcomers to the country with little prior knowledge of the culture, the missionaries were unaware that the social outcasts who frequented the hospital were shameful to the other Japanese, and so there was little outward acceptance of the new faith. The people became ashamed to acknowledge Christianity (Brinkley, 535).

  In 1578, Otomo of Bungo converted to Christianity and pronounced edicts that cause practically the whole population to embrace the new faith. In 1580, the whole port city of Kuchinotsu was Christianized, and forty Buddhist temples were destroyed and their idols burned (Brinkley, 536). By 1581, 32 years after Xavier had landed at Kagoshima, there were 150,000 Japanese converts. About 125,000 of these were on the southern island of Kyushu and the rest were situated up near Kyoto. Seventy-five Jesuits now worked in Japan to bring the Japanese to Christ. These numbers are deceiving, however, because so many people adopted the new faith because of the edicts of the rulers. It even became a capital punishment in injure the missionaries or damage their work in any way (Brinkley, 538).


The harvest was certainly great in proportion to the number of sowers. But it was a harvest mainly of artificial growth, forced by despotic insistency of feudal chiefs who possessed the power of life and death over their vassals, and were influenced by a desire to attract foreign trade. (Brinkley, 537)


  Oda Nobunaga came to power as supreme military dictator in 1534 under the title Shogun. In his struggle for power he had fought against many militant Buddhist groups, and now welcomed Christianity as an opponent to this political rival. He went so far as to tell the Jesuits that, if they got Portuguese ships that he could use to invade China, he would build churches for them all over the country and order the people to convert (Leonard, 145). Christianity prospered much under his rule, but “policy as a statesman ranked much higher in his estimation than duty towards religion.” (Brinkley, 539) Nobunaga was only a patron of Christianity insofar as it helped him to achieve his political aims, a trend which he set for the rulers to come. He was assassinated in 1582, leaving a vacuum that was soon filled by hid old ally Tokugawa Hideyoshi. The Tokugawa regime was to rule Japan with an iron fist until the Meiji Restoration brought power back to the Emperor in 1868.

  Hideyoshi was initially friendly towards the new European religion. In 1582 he favorably received Father Organtino, and in 1586 exempted churches from billeting soldiers and the fathers from “local burdens.” (Brinkley, 539) He soon seemed to be having second thoughts, however. In 1587 he issued a questionnaire to vice-provincial Coelho regarding the Portuguese practice of slavery, the Christian eating of meat, and the past militant uprisings of Christian nationals. Coelho replied that the Jesuits were powerless to prevent the slave trade, that they would cease to eat meat if it was offensive to the Japanese, and that the uprisings had been caused by local chiefs and were not sponsored by the Jesuit order. Hideyoshi was less than satisfied with this, and on July 25, 1587, he gave orders that, since they had preached a law contrary to Japanese law and had destroyed their Buddhist temples, the Jesuits were all to leave Japan within twenty days upon pain of death. Brinkley sees two basic reasons for the change of heart on the part of Hideyoshi: 1) he saw “ruined temples, overthrown idols, and coerced converts” – the work of zealous new Christian lords, and 2) he had recently been endowed with significant military favors by the Buddhist baron of Satsuma province (Brinkley, 540). Hideyoshi stated, “I fear much that all the virtue of the European priests is merely a mask of hypocrisy and serves only to conceal pernicious designs against the empire.” (Brinkley, 540) A later Japanese writer, Takasu, echoed Hideyoshi’s sentiments:


The people will be only too glad to die for the sake of the alien God… The subversion of the people and overthrowing of the state are taught as being in accord with the God’s will. So in the name of all-embracing love the subjugation of the land is accomplished. Though greed is the real motive, it masquerades as a righteous uprising. (De Bary, 95-96)


  While attempting this persecution against the Christians, Hideyoshi encouraged trade with the Portuguese, his prime motivation for allowing Christianity in the first place (Earhart, 79). This edict against the Christians was not enforced very enthusiastically, however, and in 1593 the Franciscans arrived, and their aggressive proselytizing seemed a concern only to their rivals, the Jesuits (Leonard, 162).

  The Jesuits ignored Hideyoshi’s order and bribed with gifts the soldiers sent by Hideyoshi to tear down their temples. The Portuguese placated Hideyoshi regarding this flaunting of his authority, and he agreed to allow them to continue their work. “Being assured that Portuguese merchants could not frequent Japan unless they found Christian priests there, he consented to sanction the presence of a limited number of Jesuits.” (Brinkley, 541) By 1595, native Christians numbered 300,000, including seventeen feudal chiefs (Brinkley, 542).

  Hideyoshi was not to be placated much longer, however. In 1595, the galleon San Felipe wrecked on the coast of Japan. The pilot, when questioned regarding the military strategies of the European kings, confirmed his worst fears. “Our kings begin by sending… missionaries who induce the people to embrace our religion, and when they have made considerable progress, troops are sent… and then our kings have not much trouble in accomplishing the rest.” (Brinkley, 543) Fearing for his country, Hideyoshi ordered that all Franciscans be arrested, have their noses and ears cut off, and be paraded through Kyoto, Osaka, Sakai, and be crucified at Nagasaki. These twenty-six were Japan’s first Christian martyrs: six Franciscans, three Jesuits, and seventeen Japanese believers (Brinkley, 543). In 1598, local authorities pulled down no less than 137 churches. All Jesuits were ordered to leave the country. While waiting for the ship to come and take them away, however, Hideyoshi died, buying some time for the Europeans (Brinkley, 544). This was the end of the “Golden Age” of Christianity in Japan, if it ever had one. Christians occupied a higher percentage of the population during those early years than at any time since.


After only slightly more than half a century of evangelism, the number of Christians in Japan stood at an estimated 500,000, approximately two percent of the population, a much higher percentage than has ever been achieved in modern times. (McFarland, 32)


  The successor to the shogunate was Tokugawa Ieyasu, who was also initially friendly to the Jesuits, allowing Father Jerome de Jesus to build the first Christian church in Yedo (Brinkley, 545). At the turn of the century he sent emissaries to Europe to “observe closely the social and political conditions in the home of Christianity.” This mission, a unique opportunity for the Japanese to view the home culture of the Europeans, reported the Inquisition, fanaticism, religious wars and sectarian quarrels which were tearing Europe apart at the time, doubtless leaving an evil impression in Ieyasu regarding the worth and motives of the foreign visitors to his country (Brinkley, 546).

  That Ieyasu’s personal religion was Buddhism didn’t help the situation for the missionaries (Earhart, 79), and he proceeded to dismiss Christians who had been employed at the royal court, banish them from Yedo, and forbid any feudal chief to harbor them. In 1613, native Christians were convicted of conspiring to overthrow the government by the aid of foreign troops and were put to death (Brinkley, 547). At their execution ground, a crowd of 30,000 believers gathered to sing hymns, prompting the authorities to bury later martyrs in the ocean by sinking their coffins with rocks to prevent such inspiring gatherings (Leonard, 164).

  Ieyasu’s first prohibition against Christianity had been in September of 1612, and his second in April of 1613. Since the missionaries preferred death by martyrdom to compliance with these decrees, Ieyasu issued his final edict on January 27, 1614, fifty-four years and five months after Xavier landed at Kagoshima. This, his final word on the matter, proscribed Christianity until the edict was finally reversed in 1873 (De Bary, xiii). He ordered all foreign priests to be collected at Nagasaki for removal from Japan, all churches to be pulled down, and all converts to apostatize. This outbreak of persecution may have been fueled by the fact that the Christians had supported the Tokugawa rival Hideyori in recent military campaigns. In fact, Tokugawa fought one battle against a foe “whose banners were emblazoned with a cross and with images of Christ and St. James.” (Brinkley, 548) Tokugawa Ieyasu died on June 1, 1616, resulting in a temporary reprieve from persecution (Brinkley, 549). During his reign, the Jesuits had introduced moveable type to Japan and had even printed some books in Japanese (Varley, 102).

  No later than September of that same year, Ieyasu’s son Hidetada continued and intensified the persecution. He ordered exile for all Christian priests, and that the Japanese people were to be burned alive and have all of their property confiscated if they, their business partners, or their servants connected themselves in any way with the Christians. The punishments included not only the perpetrators themselves, but extended to include the woman and children and the five neighbors to either side of their dwelling (Brinkley, 550).

  Fathers De l’Assumption and Machado were beheaded, but the people’s sense of heroism was stirred and many converted and many who had apostatized returned to the faith. “Though missionary work in this situation was fraught with difficulties, Christianity spread with surprising speed.” (Ichiro, 23) Navarette, vice-provincial of the Dominicans and Ayala, vice-provincial of the Augustinians were also beheaded… two Dominicans were imprisoned for five years a Franciscan monk was beheaded.. the Dominicans Zuniga and Flores were roasted to death in Nagasaki in 1622… and the list goes on. When the rulers saw that martyrdom by death produced more believers, they sought to coerce apostasy through torture (Brinkley 551-552). Matsukura, the feudal chief of Shimabara, threw converts into the boiling hot springs at Unzen and suspended them upside down in pits of filth until death ensued. Penalties increased from crucifixion to burning to broiling on gridirons. When the numbers of believers did not decrease, worse tortures ensued. It is surprising that very few actually recanted. In 1626, 3,000 converts were executed (Brinkley, 553). A financial reward was offered for abandoning the faith, and one could do this by denouncing a propagandist or by stamping on a picture of Christ (which came to be known as fumi-e, for the words for “to step on”, and “picture”) (Brinkley, 554). To enforce its proscription policy, the government made it mandatory for everyone to register as a Buddhist at the local temple (Ichiro, 24).

  The famous Shimabara Rebellion occurred in late 1637 and January of 1638. Rebels from Shimabara and Amakusa gathered at Shimabara to oppose the government. On January 27, 1638, twenty thousand fighting me with thirteen thousand woman and children took over Hara Castle, which was surrounded on three sides by cliffs that dropped one hundred feet to the pounding surf below, and on the fourth side by a swamp. Due to lack of supplies and constant shelling from a Dutch ship, all of the rebels were killed by April 2, except 105 prisoners (Brinkley, 554). No foreigners or any priests were found at hara after its fall (Drummond, 108). This was the “last stand” of Christianity in Japan, after which it survived “only in remote places and by stealth.” (Brinkley, 555).

  There are many opinions regarding the reason for this uprising. Brinkley says that the Christians were either taxed beyond their means or the uprising was staged by five radical Christian samurai (Brinkley, 554). Indeed, the samurai class had revered the new faith for its ideals. “The samurai, searching for a new loyalty, found the fulfillment of a need in the faith that asked him to dedicate himself to a supreme loyalty.” (Kerr, 21) Earhart agrees with Brinkley that excessive taxation may have been the reason. “The revolt was not primarily a religious uprising, but a desperate protest against the oppressive rule of feudal lords in a remote and backward region.” (Earhart, 80) Kerr concludes, however, that it was due to being goaded beyond endurance by the persecution of Hidetada that the Christians revolted. (Kerr, 32).

  Any way it is viewed, this event effectively closed the doors of Japan to all foreign intercourse for the next two-and-a-half centuries.


By means of the seclusion policy the Tokugawa regime was able to proscribe Christianity, which it had come to fear almost hysterically as a threat to Japanese social values, and to control foreign trade. (Varley, 121)


  In 1640, when a Portuguese ship came to negotiate the exclusion order of 1639, the ship and almost all of the crew were destroyed. By 1650, Christianity had gone completely underground (Earhart, 80). The underground church managed to carry on without any clergy for more than two centuries (Drummond, 108). During this extended period, the hidden Christian group hid behind a mask of Buddhist and Shinto symbols and the incorporation of ancestor worship in their religious practice (Ichiro, 79).

  The coming of European Christianity to Japan created a situation of cultural conflict for a number of reasons. Perhaps the greatest reason was that Xavier and the other Jesuits had no knowledge of the Japanese language or other cultural factors relating to the context in which they were about to operate. The introduction of firearms into the military arsenal of the Japanese radically altered their methods of warfare and contributed to the slow demise of the strict warrior code of chivalry (bushido) that accompanied traditional sword combat. Though this was not directly the fault of the missionaries, it did accompany their arrival to Japanese soil.

  There was misunderstanding on the part of the Japanese from the very beginning. Initial converts thought that they were getting a new form of Buddhism. When radical feudal barons converted, they were viewed by the mainstream chiefs as being subversive to national unity and thus potentially dangerous enemies. Expecting an imminent invasion by European military forces, the Japanese government acted hastily and out of fear, causing terrible persecutions for European missionaries and Christian nationals alike.

  In conclusion, it can be seen that poor preparation for a cross-cultural encounter can prove to produce long-term results that are very different from the initially intended goals. If Xavier had been adequately prepared for the Japanese situation, Christianity might have gained a more solid foothold in Japanese society, changing the way in which the feudal system developed and leading to a country much different than the Japan that we have today.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Brinkley, R.A. A History of the Japanese People. New York: The Encyclopedia Britannica Co., 1915.

De Bary, W.M. Theodore, ed. Introduction to Oriental Civilizations. Vol. II. New York: Columbia University Press, 1958

Dilts, Marion M. The Pageant of Japanese History. New York: David McKay Company, Inc., 1966.

Drummond, Richard H. A History of Christianity in Japan. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1971.

Earhart, H. Byron. Japanese Religion: Unity and Diversity. Encino, CA: Dickenson Publishing Company, Inc., 1974.

Hurlimann, Martin and Francis King. Japan. New York: The Viking Press, 1970.

Ichiro, Hori, Ikado Fujio, Wakimoto Tsuneya, Yanagawa Keiichi, eds. Japanese Religion. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1972.

Jansen, Marius B., ed. Changing Japanese Attitudes Towards Modernization. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1965.

Kerr, William C. Japan Begins Again. New York: Friendship Press, 1949.

Leonard, Jonathan. Early Japan. New York: Time-Life Books, 1969.

McFranland, H. Neill. The Rush Hour of the Gods. New York: The MacMillan Company, 1967.

Varley, H. Paul. Japanese Culture. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1973.

Varley, H. Paul. Samurai. New York: Delacorte Press, 1970.