Japan Primary Source Essay

Japan Primary Source Essay

Japan Christian Cleansing

Throughout history countries have enacted various forms of autarkic policies to increase control and order within their borders while shutting out foreign influence. Beginning in the 17th century, the Tokugawa went about executing three key strategies to consolidate power. The first measure they took involved instilling divine power in the name of the emperor so that his legitimacy cannot be questioned. Second, they sought to gather complete control over the daimyo in order to prevent civil war. Lastly, the Tokugawa enacted a policy of isolationism or sakoku from both the West and Mainland China to minimize the threat foreign influence or an inspired rebellion. During this period of isolationism, Japan maintained limited diplomatic and commercial relations with the Chinese, Koreans, the Ryukyus and the Dutch. The spread of Catholicism stood in the way of the Tokugawa’s aspirations of political consolidation. Although the political dynamics in Japan, initially favored European missionary efforts, the subsequent exclusionary policies allowed the Tokugawa to not only consolidate power, but also create a lasting peace in Japan throughout the 250 years long rule under the Tokugawa Shogunate.
Having converted five hundred thousand Japanese to Catholicism, Jesuit missionaries conducted one of the most successful efforts in converting a population during the 15th to early 16th centuries. There were many factors that helped facilitate such a spread of religion. First off, Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) the general, who unified about half of Japan, and a major daimyo ruler during the Sengoku period, encouraged missionaries to spread Christianity to weaken the political influence of the wealthy and powerful Buddhist monasteries. In a letter to his 1549 letter to Jesuits in Goa, the missionary St. Francis Xavier, points out how the Japanese people were an obedient people and that “when one reasons with them pointing out what they do is evil,...

Similar Essays