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Mission in Northeast Asia
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 January 2009
This article argues that Anglicans in North East Asia face a challenge to re-imagine their history in the light of the resources of the Anglican theological tradition. That history has been largely influenced by a narrative which has seen the Christian faith come from across the sea in the form of European missionaries in the Age of Discovery. But there is evidence of the presence of Christian faith long before this which came not through missionaries but through ordinary people who practised their faith. Anglicans can deploy a notion of via media which is not the assumption of a midpoint between contesting claims, but a method for sublating differing opinions by providing a new paradigm, integrating them into a new conceptual framework. Anglicans are thus called to aim for a church whose very mode of existence bears its message.
1. Osamu, Tsukada, Ingurando no Shuukyou (The Religion of England) (Tokyo: Kyobunkwan, 2004), pp. 4–5,502Google Scholar.
2. Nishihara, Renta, Richaado Fukkaa – Sono Shingaku to Gendai-teki Imi (Richard Hooker—His Theology and its Present-day Meaning) (Tokyo: Seikokai Shuppan, 1995), p. 143Google Scholar. According to Tsukada, ‘on-the-way-ness’ would mean being in the progressive (‘-ing’) form. Tsukada, , Ingurando no Shuukyou, p. 6Google Scholar.
3. Yang, Jeremiah Guen Seok, ‘The Anglican Contribution in Korea over the Next Decade’, in Wingate, Andrew (ed.), Anglicanism: A Global Communion (London: Mowbray, 1998), p. 409.Google Scholar
4. On this point, while Nishihara makes careful use of the term ‘sublate’, he seems rather to agree with Allchin's term‘integrate’. The‘third way’ which this writer is proposing is offering an alternative within a‘new paradigm’, one which allows for the possibility of active transformation.
5. The expression ‘the Anglican Way’ is one that can already be found here and there in the English-speaking world, but I want to call the reader's attention to the wealth of historic insight related to the term ‘the Dao’ (the Way) within the cultural sphere where Chinese characters are used. As a result, the Anglican Way is not treated as a mere methodology in this paper, but in terms of the image of a locus where numerous ways would draw together into a comprehensive worldview regarding values and their realization in society.
6. For Yang Guen-seok, being a genuine Anglican in Korea means‘to be faithful to God while also being responsible to the people of Korea’. He says that this is in fact the responsibility which Korean Anglicans need to fulfil as a part of the Anglican Communion (Yang, ‘The Anglican Contribution in Korea over the Next Decade’).
7. Here, the Age of Discovery (or the era of the great voyages) is taken to be the age that was emblematic of Europe-focused Christianity, and the spirit linked to that age is described as the Age of Discovery-shaped view of history.
8. Wu Liming says that ‘Nestorianism was suppressed together with Buddhism by Emperor Wuzong, a believer in Daoism, and completely disappeared from China by the tenth century’ and that‘Nestorianism entered China again during the Yuan period when the Mongols ruled.’ ‘However, just as was the case during the Tang period, Nestorianism in China was mainly something for foreigners, and taking the wider view, it seems that it did not exert any important influence among Chinese’ (Christianity in Asia 1 [Singapore: Christian Council of Asia, 1979]), but this all has to do with the Han peoples and ignores the circumstances of Central Asia and peoples other than the Han. Yet, after this, Bar Sauma, who was appointed ‘Circuit Superintendent Bishop’ by Mar Denha, Patriarch of the Nestorians, and hailed from the Great City of the Yuan (that is, today's Beijing) was renowned as a Nestorian cleric in thirteenth-century Beijing. The Ongud royal family to which the Great Khan married his daughter were known as Nestorian believers, and King Georgis was to convert to Catholicism through Monte Corvino (in the 1290s). Namio, Egami, The Mongol Empire and Christianity (San Paulo: 2000)Google Scholar.
9. The relationship between Nestorianism and Japan is often treated as a fable, and Japanese language books written on the relation between the two seldom maintain a high academic level. In reference to the point made by Oh yun-dea that Nestorianism influenced Japanese Buddhism, Sawa Masahiko took the position that ‘this is no more than a daring hypothesis’ and would not give countenance to this idea. Masahiko, Sawa, History of Japanese Christianity (Soufuukan: 2004), p. 31Google Scholar.
10. The commander in chief of the invasion army was the Christian lord Konishi Yukinaga, and many of the officers and men were Christians. At this time, Korean infants who were left on the battlefields separated from their families were given infant baptism by military commanders of Konishi's army. It is possible to consider this the first act of the story of Korean Christian history. de Medina, J.G. Luis, Origins of the Catholic Church of Korea (Seoul: Published for the Royal Asiatic Society by Seoul Computer Press, 1986, Japanese translation, 1988)Google Scholar.
11. Pedro Morejon who was head of the Amakusa residence of the Jesuits and in charge of instruction for women believers in Kyoto also had deep connections with the believers of‘Korea’living in Japan. In a letter addressed to Rome, he reported on a letter from Julia Ohta, an influential Korea-born believer, and added the following comments:‘one considerable wonder for which I cannot fully express my admiration is how God has made use of the means of the arrogant ambition of the lord of Japan, the Taikoh, to make war against Korea, choosing from that land those many people He had appointed for salvation from eternity, making some into excellent Christian believers and some into celebrated martyrs… People from that land are blessed with great ability and wits, and have mild and attractive dispositions… Vast is the number which were brought to Japan as prisoners from the war, but practically all or a large portion became Christians.’de Medina, Luis, Iezusu Kai-shi to Kirishitan Fukyou (The Jesuits and Christian Mission Work) (Iwata: Shoten, 2003), p. 187Google Scholar. ‘Practically all or a large portion’is probably an exaggeration, but it is a fact that the lists of Christian martyrs in various parts of Japan include people of‘Korea’.
12. Masahiko, Sawa, Mikan Chousen Kirisuto-kyo Shi (Unfinished Christian History of Korea) (Nihon Kirisuto Kyodan Shuppankyoku, 1991)Google Scholar.
13. Mahn-yol, Yi, Hanguk Kidokyo Suyong Sa (Studies of the History of Reception of Christianity in Korea) (TureShidae, 1998), pp. 95–141Google Scholar. Yi considers Yi Su-jeon to be ‘the Macedonian of Korea’ (p. 105, cf. Acts 16.9), but Yi Su-jeon's role was not merely that of an intermediary. Though TSUDA Sen, who also happened to be Yi Su-jeon's mentor, judged that it was still too early for the evangelism of Korea to begin, it was at this point that the timing was just about in line for involvement from the Japanese Christian world in the evangelization of Korea. However, Yi Su-jeon entrusted the evangelization of Korea not to the Japanese church he already knew, but to American missionaries; this was a judgment made not only in light of Christian mission, but with a view to the whole process of Korean modernization.
14. In the preceding pattern of Kirishitan studies, it was said (for instance by Ebisawa Arimichi) that the work of lay communities (confraria) was characteristic of the hidden Kirishitan, but through an analysis of the confraternita which developed in Italy in the thirteenth century, and then assigning this to be the product of‘a more popularized (i.e. minjung-based) Christianity’, Kawamura has indicated that Japan accepted this popularized Christianity and transformed this into a more Japanese konfurariya. It appears that underlying the organization of kirishitan lay groups, one can find the know-how developed in Italian city states to create private democratic organizations for piety. Shinzou, Kawamura, Kirishitan Shinto Soshiki no Tanjou to Hen'you (Making Christian Lay Communities in the‘Christian Century’in Japan) (Tokyo: Kyobunkwan, 2003)Google Scholar.
15. Ohashi, who is trying to re-evaluate the hidden Kirishitan from the viewpoint of minjung history, sets his sights on the social attributes of Kirishitangroups and points out that‘Christian minjung’played an important role in minjung history, in its movement toward the dismantling of the shogunate state. It is important that Ohashi understands the Kirishitanto be‘one of the elements of Japanese culture that bloomed into the modern Japanese isles’. Yukiyasu, Ohashi, Kirishitan Minshuushi no Kenkyuu (The Study of Kirishitan Minjung History) (Tokyo: Tokyodo Shuppan, 2001).Google Scholar
16. Nanjira Kirishitan ni Arazu—Chikugo Imamura Kirishitan Oboegaki (Ye are not Christians—Memorandum on the Kirishitan of Imamura of Chikugo) (Tokyo: Keisou Shuppan Saabisu Sentaa, 1987). While Mihara grounds his work in primary source materials, as a writer he makes use of his imagination as he writes this work. In his novel, the reason these Japanese farmers are judged not to be Christians by the French father is that the words used in bestowing baptism were imperfect—at some point in their transmission of the faith, the Latin ‘ego te’ corresponding to‘I… to thee’went missing.
17. In fact, the kakure (hidden) Kirishitan faith that continues even today is a unofficial Buddhist-style or Shinto-style faith of ancestral worship, no longer related to Christianity, but definitely of profound interest as a case of mass indigenization and transformation of religion (regarding this point, see Kentarou, Miyazaki, Kakure Kirishitan no Shinkou Sekai [The Faith World of the Kakure Kirishitan] [Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai, 1996]Google Scholar). There are cases of this sort of transformation other than the kakure Kirishitan; on this score, see Mullins, Mark, Christianity Made in Japan: A Study in Indigenous Movements (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998)Google Scholar.
18. Much of the world history that gets circulated in Japan is embellished by this view of Western European Christian history. One can point to an understanding that previous to Europe's Age of Discovery, the great sea routes had already been developed through the Islamic Age of Discovery of the eighth century and China's Age of Discovery in the tenth century (Masakatsu, Miyazaki, Jipangu Densetsu [The Zipangu Legend] [Tokyo: Chuo Kouron Shinsha, 2000]Google Scholar). We need to be aware that the various stories that are told from the viewpoint of Western European Christianity act as an ideological device which has a major impact on us.
19. This type of review is beyond the scope of this paper. However, there is one fact that deserves attention here, the fact that the proximate cause for Toyotomi Hideyoshi's suppression of the Christians could be found in the Jesuit possession of Nagasaki. The Japanese ruler took this involvement as a sign of Jesuitical territorial ambition, and it was only to be expected that the Christians who had taken these actions elicited a harsh reaction. For Nobunaga and Hideyoshi, the most dangerous element that was active domestically was the Ikkou Sect, an armed Buddhist group which had formed autonomous zones through insurrections, and one can easily imagine that they sensed the same sort of danger in the possession of Nagasaki by the Society of Jesus. However, it seems that the Jesuits of the day took lightly the issue of their possession of Nagasaki (Kawamura, Kirishitan Shinto Soshiki no Tanjou to Hen'you, p. 103). Hideyoshi's Edict of Persecution against the Christians declares that the missionaries aspire to reign over Japan. Even if this was a misconception, one cannot deny that the reason for this idea could be found on the side of the missionaries.
20. It is Sugiyama Masaaki who emphasizes the importance of the Eurasian landmass, and in particular the importance of the Mongol Empire in world history. Please refer to such works as Mongoru Teikoku to Daigen Urusu (The Mongol Empire and the Dai-on Ulus) (Kyoto: Kyoto Daigaku Gakujutsu Shuppan-kai, 2004).
21. ‘Mission in the Broken World’, ACC 8,1990.
22. See Nam-dong, Suh, Minjung Sinhak-ui Tamgu(In Search of Minjung Theology) (Seoul: Hangilsa, 1983Google Scholar).
23. See Kayama, , ‘Paradaimu Tenkan to shite no Minshuu Shingaku (Minjung Theology as Paradigm Shift)’, Kong-gong song ui Yunri wa Pyong-hwa (Ethics and Peace of the Public) (Hanguk Shinhak Yong-gu So, 2005)Google Scholar.
24. One personage that can be said to symbolize this is Macarthur, who after the conclusion of World War II had an immense impact on Northeast Asia as Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers and US Far East Commander-in-Chief.
25. There are seven characteristics to the authority of the poor pointed out by Pieris. The first is‘this-worldly spirituality’, which is characterized by the necessities of the lives of the poor. The second is‘faith in the God of our living’, the third ‘the cry for righteousness to the God of our living’, and this is based not in a metaphysical concept of God but in the idea of‘the God who is concerned with this world’. The fourth is a cosmic‘God of our living’in whom the poor believe. The fifth is femininity. The sixth is ecological spirituality. The seventh is story as traditional religious narrative for the poor of Asia. See Kayama,‘Paradaimu Tenkan to shite no Minshuu Shingaku’.
26. This writer spoke on this point in the 11th International Symposium of the GaiKiKyou (the National Christian Liaison Council on the Alien Registration Law) in 2005, in the main lecture he gave on‘60 Years from War's End/Liberation, 40 Years from Establishment of Japanese-Korean Diplomatic Relations—Reconciliation and Coexistence in 21st Century East Asia’, which bore in mind the Northeast Asia Common House concept.
27. Please refer to n. 6 of this paper. Tsukada explains that State Church means the church recognized officially and politically by the state as the church for its citizens, while the National Church is a self-reliant church of a nationality or ethnic group not related to the state, so that it is the church for those living in that certain area. Tsukada, Ingurando no Shuukyou, p. 607, ch. 13, n. 11. In order for the Anglican church to stand as a church that has dealt successfully with the modern nation-state, it is not the state-defined unit of national citizens that is important, but the local nature of the church as the church on the spot. In this regard, we need to bear in mind the inhabitants of the region known as Japan.
28. Pieris, Aloysius, ‘Interreligious Dialogue and Theology of Religions: An Asian Paradigm’, Horizons 20.1 (1993), pp. 106–14Google Scholar, see Kayama, ‘Paradaimu Tenkan to shite no Minshuu Shingaku’.
29. These are characteristics of the initial Kirishitan; I realize that the kakure faith after the period of hiding became another form of ancestral worship, and in most all cases had no liberating element at all. However, and while this is a very rough-andready definition of issues, there is no doubt that it would be meaningful to rediscover the meaning of the Kirishitanlife as minjung religion within Japanese minjung history and within Christian history.
30. It only stands to reason that holding fast to clear political positions such as opposition to state support for Yasukuni Shrine, opposition to the imposition of Kimigayo (the‘national anthem’) and the Rising Sun flag, defence of the peace constitution and promotion of a basic law for foreign residents should be a real help in making clear the mission of this religious body known as the Nippon SeiKoKai.
31. Cox states that ‘the theology of the future should be a type of game’ and criticized the state of affairs where theology was bucking for promotion among the sciences (Cox, H.G., The Seduction of the Spirit: The Use and Misuse of People's Religion (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973Google Scholar). Cox's use of the term‘game’is a criticism against scientism, but if this writer may put this in a different way, it can also be called a criticism against‘production nationalism’which is one of the doctrines of capitalism. Recent environmental thought holds this as its main theme. First generation minjung theology tried to point this out in their theme of‘de-theologisation’.
32. The Basic Christian Communities of South America, the Basic Human Communities of which Pieris speaks and the Sharing House movement of the Anglican Church of Korea, among other movements, give support to this vision.