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205 Martyrs of Japan

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Not to be confused with 16 Martyrs of Japan or 26 Martyrs of Japan.

205 Martyrs of Japan
Painting of the Nagasaki Martyrs
Martyrs
BornUnknown
DiedJapan
Venerated inRoman Catholic Church
Anglican Church
Lutheran Church
Beatified7 July 1867, Vatican City by Pope Pius IX
Feast10 September

The 205 Martyrs of Japan (日本の殉教者, Nihon no junkyōsha) were Christian missionaries and followers who were persecuted and executed for their faith in Japan, mostly during the Tokugawa shogunate period in the 17th century.

A number of the figures were ethnic Koreans who were kidnapped, enslaved, and brought to Japan after the Japanese invasions of Korea.[1]

Background

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The Christian martyrs of the 1622 Great Genna Martyrdom. 16th/17th-century Japanese painting.

Christian missionaries arrived with Francis Xavier and the Jesuits in the 1540s and briefly flourished, with over 100,000 converts, including many daimyōs in Kyushu. The shogunate and imperial government at first supported the Catholic mission and the missionaries, thinking that they would reduce the power of the Buddhist monks, and help trade with Spain and Portugal. However, the Shogunate was also wary of colonialism, seeing that the Spanish had taken power in the Philippines, after converting the population. It soon met resistance from the highest office holders of Japan.[2] Emperor Ogimachi issued edicts to ban Catholicism in 1565 and 1568, but to little effect. Beginning in 1587 with imperial regent Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s ban on Jesuit missionaries, Christianity was repressed as a threat to national unity.[3] Many Christians were executed by burning at the stake in Nagasaki.[4] After the Tokugawa shogunate banned Christianity in 1620, it ceased to exist publicly. Many Catholics went underground, becoming hidden Christians (隠れキリシタン, kakure kirishitan), while others were killed. Only after the Meiji Restoration, was Christianity re-established in Japan.

The first group of martyrs, known as the Twenty-Six Martyrs of Japan (1597), was canonized by the Church in 1862 by Pope Pius IX.[5]

Martyrdom

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The persecution of Missionaries and Christian followers continued after the martyrdom of the twenty-six individuals in 1597. Jesuit fathers and others who had successfully fled to the Philippines wrote reports which led to a pamphlet that was printed in Madrid in 1624 "A Short Account of the Great and Rigorous Martyrdom, which last year (1622) was suffered in Japan by One Hundred and Eighteen Martyrs'.[6]

Through the promulgation of decree on martyrdom, Pope Pius IX declared these martyrs venerable on 26 February 1866 and subsequently beatified them on 26 July 1867.[7][8][9] Their feast day is September 10, the day of the Great Genna Martyrdom.[10]

This group is also known as Alfonso Navarrette Benito, Perdo of Ávila, Carlo Spinola, Ioachim Díaz Hirayama, Lucia de Freitas, and 200 companions.[11]

Ordained martyrs

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Augustinian and Augustinian Recollect

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Foreign missionaries

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Japanese missionary

  • Blessed Thomas of Saint Augustine Jihyoe aka "Kintsuba" (OSA) - 6 November 1637

Dominican

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Foreign missionaries

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Japanese

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Franciscan – Alcantarines

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Foreign missionaries

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Japanese

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Franciscan – Observant

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Foreign missionaries

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Japanese

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Jesuit

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Foreign missionaries

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Japanese

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Martyred laity

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Augustinian laity

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Japanese religious brother

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Japanese oblates

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Japanese tertiaries

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Dominican laity

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Foreign Missionaries – Confraternity of the Holy Rosary

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Japanese – Confraternity of the Holy Rosary

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Japanese tertiaries

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Franciscan laity

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Japanese tertiaries

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Catechist laity

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Japanese

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Christian laity

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Japanese

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ De Sousa 2019, p. 122.
  2. ^ Brodrick, James (1952). Saint Francis Xavier (1506–1552). London: Burns, Oates & Washbourne Ltd. p. 558.
  3. ^ Jansen, Marius (2000). The Making of Modern Japan. Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674003347.
  4. ^ MARTYRS OF JAPAN († 1597-1637) (poz. 10). Archived from the original on 23 November 2021. Retrieved 22 March 2011.
  5. ^ Martyrs of Japan (1597–1637) at Hagiography Circle
  6. ^ Seitz, Don C. (October 1927). "The Nagasaki Martyrs". The Catholic Historical Review. 13 (3). Catholic University of America Press: 503–509. JSTOR 25012455.
  7. ^ Broeckaert 1869, p. 215.
  8. ^ Doak 2022.
  9. ^ Martyrs of Japan (1597–1637) at Hagiography Circle
  10. ^ Committee for Promoting Canonisation 2022.
  11. ^ Martyrs of Japan at the All Saints & Martyrs website
  12. ^ De Sousa 2019, pp. 122–124, 160–161.
  13. ^ a b c d e De Sousa 2019, pp. 122–124.
  14. ^ De Sousa 2019, pp. 160–161.
  15. ^ De Sousa 2019, pp. 154–155.
  16. ^ a b De Sousa 2019, pp. 158–159.
  17. ^ a b c De Sousa 2019, pp. 122–124, 162–163.

Sources

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