The Japanese Political Thought of Uchimura Kanzō (1861–1930): Synthesizing Bushidō, Christianity, Nationalism, and Liberalism (review)

This welcome study opens a whole new field through its application of the insights of literary criticism to the major secular works of this controversial Meiji historian, social critic, poet, and religious leader. There is nothing like it, and the author should consider publishing a Japanese version.

Most scholars of Japanese modern history know the name of Uchimura, but few know much about him. As in the case of many among his fellow Japanese Christian leaders, the changes of the early Meiji period devastated his samurai family's fortunes. To better their lot, his parents encouraged him to learn English. This led him to a new school in northern Japan modeled on the land-grant colleges in the United States that trained students in technical and military skills. Strongly evangelical American Christian teachers taught almost all subjects in English. Under their influence, Uchimura converted to Christianity and shortly after graduation returned to Tokyo whence he continued to further study in the United States. Willcock believes that while there between 1884 and 1888 and then upon return home during the succeeding decade he mapped out his interests for the rest of his career.

Life after returning home was not easy. Uchimura discovered that he could not teach with missionaries or in government schools. He made history by hesitating to bow deeply enough before an important document signed by the emperor. He then determined to write, producing thirteen books and major essays in less than ten years. An analysis of several of these—Japan and the Japanese, Chijinron (The earth and man), and Kōkoku shidan (A history of the rise of nations) along with the major article "Jisei no kansatsu" (An observation on the times)—forms the core of this study. In 1903 Uchimura retired from professional writing to concentrate on the development of liberal reformers whose careers would peak right after World War II.

Willcock starts her discussion with reference to Uchimura's diaries and letters written shortly after he arrived in the United States in 1884. Lonely and dejected, he confessed to a mentor his desire to "live as a simple Christian Japanese…. Christ and Japan are my watchwords."¹ Willcock follows this perceived dichotomy between Christ and Japan through Uchimura's life, ending with its most famous expression in the aphorism "Two J's" published in 1927 in his English-language magazine, The Japan Christian Intelligencer. It appeared 28 months before his death in 1930. Willcock then analyzes his writings in terms of this dichotomy. The first "J," Jesus, refers to Uchimura's faith in Christianity, while the second refers to the nation of his birth, Japan. Uchimura was delighted to find in the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah another individual concerned with both his personal faith and the fate of his nation: "I was thoroughly moved by Jeremiah. My heart bleeds for the fate of a country in her rise and fall, and for patriots who experience struggles" (p. 120).

Within eight years after Uchimura's return to Japan in 1888, he published the books and the major article that Willcock calls his "Political Thought." She begins with Japan and the Japanese, first issued in 1894 and reissued in 1908. It highlights five individuals in Japanese history, each of whom represents a certain role in society, beginning with Saigō Takamori, whom Willcock calls a "Restorationist" (p. 146). Each of the others, along with Saigō, she names a "hero" (ibid.), and each hero demonstrates the practical consequences of action on behalf of society that accords with traditional Japanese ethical teachings.

Willcock notes that Japan and the Japanese was Uchimura's "most significant single work, in so far as it revealed … the principal elements of his thought." He used the methodology of the immensely popular British historian Thomas Carlyle to make his case, "consciously delineat[ing] the values from [Carlyle's] On Heroes...