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crackdown on Christians in Urakami Village, Nagasaki, Japan in the 19th century
Urakami Yoban Kuzure (浦上四番崩れ) was the last and biggest of four crackdowns on Christians in Urakami Village, Nagasaki, Japan in the 19th century.
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Urakami Yoban Kuzure (浦上四番崩れ) was the last and biggest of four crackdowns on Christians in Urakami Village, Nagasaki, Japan in the 19th century.
The introduction of Christianity to Japan occurred in 1549 with the arrival of the Navarrese missionary Francis Xavier, who arrived by Portuguese ship. Christianity was initially welcomed, but following concerns that it posed a threat to Japanese political and social order, the religion was officially banned in 1614. This led to a period of severe persecution and isolation of Christians, which lasted for 259 years until the ban was lifted in the 19th century. In 1867, at the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate, villagers of Urakami who had maintained their faith as Hidden Christians (Kakure Kirisitan) and declared their Christian faith were captured and tortured in large numbers by order of the Shogunate. The Edo Shogunate was soon dissolved, but the villagers were exiled by the new Meiji government, which had taken over the Shogunate's policy of banning Christianity.
This incident was sharply criticized by Western countries where the Christian faith flourished. This led to the abolition of the Christian ban in 1873, and the lifting of the ban on the Christian faith in Japan for the first time in 259 years since the total ban in 1614.
From 1639 the Tokugawa Shogunate closed the country to the rest of the world and only in Nagasaki was trade with Portugal allowed(Sakoku-isolationist foreign policy).
Under the Tokugawa Shogunate everyone had to belong to a Buddhist temple to prove they were not Christian. Those who were found to be Christian were tortured to obtain information on other Christians and then subsequently executed. So, the discovery of one Secret Christian usually led to a number of them being executed. After the Shogunate issued a ban on the practice of Christianity, the believers became Hidden Christians, secretly defending their faith and passing it on to the next generation.
Spread across the country, several Christian communities existed, but after the ban, they disappeared over the years and remained clandestinely only in the vicinity of Nagasaki.
Among these hidden Christians in Nagasaki, there was a prophecy of a preacher named Bastian, who was captured and martyred by the shogunate in the early Edo period (1603–1867). It was said, "If you endure for seven generations, a padre (priest) will come again from Rome." The first three of the crackdowns there were minor incidents, however the last, the Urakami Yoban Kuzure in 1869 (the second year of Meiji), was severe.
In the mid 19th century the Edo Shogunate was weakening. In 1854, the United States made the Japan-US Treaty of peace and Amity with it. France and other powerful countries also followed that example. In 1858, at a time the Treaty of Amity and Commerce ( Ansei Treaties) between Japan and France was signed same as with the United States, Great Britain, Russia, and the Netherlands. And diplomatic relations and trade between the two countries began. This treaty led the Shogunate to open several Japanese ports and offer the land to make French settlements. Nagasaki was one of them.
The treaty was unequal and unfavourable to the Japanese side in a number of respects, like extraterritorial jurisdiction, no tariff autonomy, MFN treatment. Moreover, the elimination of these unequal clauses was not only negotiated with one country, but required the consent of all other countries that had accepted MFN treatment. Later on the Meiji Government had have to continue this unequal treaty too. Then the unequal treaties put the new government at a great disadvantage, especially in terms of the economy, and their revision was a major task for the Meiji Government.
In 1838, the Paris Foreign Missions Society was granted authority for the mission to Japan by The Vatican. Fathers Girard and Furet entered the Ryukyu Kingdom (Okinawa). Bernard Petitjean, a French Catholic missionary, was ordered to Japan in 1860. He stayed in Ryukyu for one year and learned Japanese. He landed in Yokohama in November 1862 and went to Nagasaki in 1863. His mission was to provide pastoral care for the French living in the settlement of Ōura.
Later, Petitjean obtained permission under the Treaty of Commerce between Japan and France to build a church for the French living in the settlement on the hilltop overlooking Nagasaki's Nishizaka (the site of the martyrdom of the 26 saints of Japan in 1597). Construction of the church and bishop's palace began in 1864.
The Ōura Tenshudo or Oura Church opened on 19 February 1865. It was a rare Western-style building at the time, so it gained a reputation, and the Japanese living nearby called it the 'French temple' or 'Nanban-temple' and came to see it. Petitjean opened the church to the visiting Japanese and allowed them to visit freely. There was a reason why Petitjean opened the church, which was originally built for the French residents, to curious Japanese visitors and allowed them to see it. There was a slight hope that, as Nagasaki was the land of the Christian martyrs, there might still be believers somewhere, or that some of the Japanese who visited might be believers.
On 12 April (old calendar 17 March) of 1865, some villagers of Urakami visited the church. One woman, whose name was "Yuri", age 52, came to close to Father Petitjean and said, "Our heart (faith) is same as yours" as well as "Where is the statue of Santa Maria?" The father was astonished. It was the first time of the emergence of "Hidden Christians" (Kakure Kirishitan) who came to the French Priest, Father Bernard Petitjean. They rejoiced at the image of the Virgin Mary and prayed. The priest was again surprised to hear that they observe 'Kanashimi-setu' (Lent) based on a liturgical calendar passed down orally.
From then on, leaders of the congregation living not only in Urakami, but also in Sotome, Goto, Amakusa and Chikugo-Imamura visited Father Petitjean one after another and asked for his guidance. Father Petitjean instructed them in secret and they returned to their villages to spread his teachings.
However, two years later, in 1867 (the third year of Keio), the existence of the congregation came to light when the congregation in Urakami village refused to hold a Buddhist funeral service. The matter was reported to the Nagasaki Magistrate by the village headman. When summoned to the magistrate's office as representatives of the congregation, Senemon Takagi and others clearly expressed their Christian faith, but the perplexed Nagasaki magistrate returned them to the village. Later on receiving a report from the Nagasaki Magistrate, the Shogunate ordered secret detectives to investigate the congregation in Urakami, and at midnight on 14 July (old calendar: 13 June), the secret gathering place was raided by the shogunate officials, and 68 members of the congregation, including Senemon Takagi, were captured at once. The congregation did not resist and those captured were subjected to severe torture. Later on the number increased to 83. After imprisonment and torture, all but Senemon took a vow to apostatise.
The next day, upon hearing of the incident, the Prussian Minister and French Consul, as well as the Portuguese and American Ministers, immediately protested to the Nagasaki Magistrate, accusing him of an offence against humanity. 21 September(old calendar: 24 August), Leon Roche, the French Minister who had lodged a formal protest, and Shogun Yoshinobu Tokugawa met at Osaka Castle, and they discussed the incident. And the Tokugawa Shogunate relented.
After the dissolution of the Edo Shogunate on 7 March 1868 (old calendar: 14 February), the Meiji Government was established with the emperor at its centre. Nobuyoshi Sawa, a councillor, was ordered to serve as governor-general and was responsible to the court of Nagasaki. In addition, Kaoru Inoue, who became foreign affairs officer, and Masayoshi Matsukata, who became councillor, both arrived in Nagasaki.
When the ban on Christianity was again confirmed in Article 3 of the 'Five Advocates' and the notice presented on 7 April (old calendar: 15 March) by the new government, Sawa and Inoue called the Urakami congregation in question and persuaded them, but found that they had no intention of converting.
On 17 May (old calendar: 25 April), after receiving a proposal from Sawa and Inoue for severe punishment of 'execution of the central figure and exile of the general congregation', the government held an Imperial Council in Osaka to discuss the matter. But Kiyokado Komatsu (Komatsu Kiyokado), in charge of foreign affairs, insisted that the current protests from foreign legations be taken into consideration, which led to the decision to 'exile the congregation'.
This decision was met with even more vehement protests at negotiations with foreign ministers the following day. The issue of the Urakami congregation was discussed for six-hour between British Minister Harry Parkes and other government representatives, including Shigenobu Ōkuma. He was a diplomat who had knowledge about Christianity, but he thought it was not good to permit it so rapidly.
The conservative faction within the government, which had once been active in the Emperor Exclusionist movement, did not hide their opposition to Christianity and strongly opposed the repeal of the ban, saying that since Shinto was the national religion-it was natural to exclude foreign religions, and that it was unlikely that the West would immediately accept treaty revisions if Christianity was lifted. The then Japanese ambassador to the US, Arinori Mori, wrote a book entitled "Essay on Religious Freedom in Japan" (日本における宗教の自由) in 1872, in which he stressed the difficulty of continuing the policy of religious prohibition.
Sawa's plan to exile the entire village was approved by an Imperial council on 25 April and implemented in two stages: first the ringleaders to Hagi, Tsuwano and Fukuyama, and then the rest of the village.
On 7 June (old calendar: leap year 17 April), the administrative order indicated the exile of the captured believers, and on 9 July (old calendar: 20 May), Takayoshi Kido visited Nagasaki to discuss the treatment and decided to transfer 114 of the main members of the congregation. From then until 1870 (the third year of Meiji), one after another, the Nagasaki congregation was captured and sent into exile.
Families were split up, and in total 3,414 Christian men, women, and children were sent into exile to twenty different regions in Japan: 500 to Kanazawa, 160 to Tsuwano, 375 to Satsuma, 117 to Tsuru Shima, Okayama, etc.
While their fate, after being exiled, appears to have depended much on the local magistrates, wardens, and other authorities, forced labor and forced conversions were the norm. They were subjected to numerous tortures and private punishment in exile, including water torture, snow torture, ice torture, fire torture, starvation torture, boxing, crucifixion, and torture of children in front of their parents. These methods were just as severe, or even more severe, gruesome and cruel than in the old Shogunate era. About 680 or 20% of them died during their internment in various penal colonies.
The ministers of the various countries informed their home countries of the situation and repeatedly protested to the Japanese government. The following year, the Iwakura mission, led by Tomomi Iwakura and comprising more than 100 delegations and students, travelled visiting the western countries between 1871 and 1873. Their main objective was to learn about Western civilisation and modern systems, while the other was to pursue preliminary negotiations for the revision of unequal treaties.
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