I finished Silence last night and was wondering why the Japanese hated and persecuted Christians so much...

I finished Silence last night and was wondering why the Japanese hated and persecuted Christians so much. I don't have much knowledge of Old Japan.

Because Christians are cancer

Anything not-Japanese is fair game for them. They only considered themselves human; everyone else was sub-human. Christianity of course would take them away from their Shinto roots, as they believed their dead watched over them, and Christianity stands opposed to that.

Humanity is cancer. Christianity is the cure.

That historical japanese attitude of being arrogant

Christianity had little to offer Japan as they already had Buddhism. If they only had Shinto they'd probably eat it up.

Not that one advanced religion can't replace another advance religion (look at Iran converting to Islam from Zoroastrianism) but it hasn't happened as often.

Nothing grows in Japan.

the government saw it as potentially subversive, both the teachings themselves and the structure of the church. the shimabara rebellion (while also admittedly largely motivated by famine and taxation rather than solely being a religious uprising) seems to have cemented the view of christianity as a dangerous influence

Because Japan feared the growing influence of foreigners in the Islands and so kept it in check by, well, forcing them out and telling Christians to renounce their faith or die. In addition to adopting an Isolationist policy.

The funny thing about Japan's isolationist Anti-Foreign Policy is it is influenced by the earlier Chinese "Haijin" Sea-Travel bans. Ironic being China allowed the Christian missionaries in since the trouble was pirates. And guess what? No great invasion fleet followed the Catholic Missionaries.

It's totally incompatible with Japan.

Japan's always been a deeply xenophobic society.

Christianity's also far less profound than Buddhism, and needed over a millennia of rationalist exercise for pseuds like Augustine and Robert Barron to pretend the incarnation and transubstantiation are more interesting and relevant than they actually are.

>inb4 Christianity's more spiritually profound than Buddhism, and if you read more than wikipedia you'd agree with me
>inb4 Christianity invented science and started western civilization
>inb4 stop persecuting us, we're always being persecuted
>inb4 "your an idiot"

>Japan's always been a deeply xenophobic society.
>*Incorporates Chinese culture.*

That historical christian attitude of being arrogant

>one of the most xenophobic countries doesn't like foreigners bringing in foreign ideas that threaten their way of life
No idea, user. Crazy gooks is what I tell ya!

Contact with English and Dutch traders made the Japanese realize that the Portuguese and Spanish utilized Catholic missionaries to engineer conquests in the New World, Africa, and parts of Asia.

Remember what the Protestant Reformation was partly about? Imagine it from the POV of non-Europeans; Catholics would have to listen to the Pope in Rome than their temporal leaders in their respective lands.

Sure, after a gradual phasing in of it over several millennia.

It's far easier to digest your nextdoor largest trading partner for almost the whole of your history, than Portuguese and Dutch who who began aggressively flooding your shores in a single century.

Better luck next time.

Except England and the Dutch also got the boot.

Well, England. Dutch were allowed a small island they can never leave from.

they were aware that it could be leveraged against them politically by western empires

I don't for Japanese or their culture, but can you really blame them for being xenophobic throughout their history? They're neighbor was one of the superpowers of the Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern eras; one of the great civilizations along Greece, Rome, Persia, India, and the Islamic Caliphates.

Look at Britain and how it related to its neighbors in the North Sea. Imagine if mainland China wasn't a unified empire, but multiple states like Medieval and Early Modern Europe. Having smaller states neighbor Japan instead of a colossal empire would probably have made them more susceptible to foreign influences and less wary of outsiders.

Actually the English quit voluntarily. The Japanese outposts weren't making as much profit as India was. Even the Russians were given a rare opportunity to possibly trade, but it got squandered from miscommunication in the 18th century.

>they were aware that it could be leveraged against them politically by western empires
Didn't seem to work in China.

Or in Vietnam.

Or in Korea.

>Inb4 Philippines
Yeah, a bunch of barbarian niggers with 0 civilization are a good example.

China made 0 attempts to invade Japan. Only the Yuan Mongols ever did and the Japanese were aware of the difference between Mongol and Chink, considering they adopted the Chinese worldview of who consists the "barbarians."

t. Sam Harris

>barbarian niggers with 0 civilization

Sounds like japistan to me

Actually, let me rephrase that: the Catholic Missionaries didn't subvert their influence to ruin their host countries.

In fact they did the reverse in China: they taught the Chinese how to manufacture the latest European artillery an also how Confucianism and Christianity did not clash and were actually complementary allowing you to be both.

They were truly there to hopefully convert the populace.

Yes, that would be the misanthropic and nihilistic attitude at the heart of Christian morality

Because Christians held the same belief that Christians did during their persecution in the Roman era. They're some finge upstart cult that is weirdly popular but also stubbornly refuses to follow any cultural norms that don't gel with the establishment. While annoying, they grow really really fucking fast. Japanese Christians revolted twice, and only once was in the face of hardcore oppression.

This. Also note that Japan was considerably more open to trade and new ideas during the Sengoku Jidai when control over the islands was fair game and those crazy Christians had boomsticks that made killing people a hella lot easier. After Hideyoshi came into power, it was a better idea to keep Christian daiymos in check by expelling missionaries. It went into overdrive during the Tokugawa shogunate since they got word that the Spanish were blobbing a lot of the map and missionaries were the first step a lot of the time.

The Japanese were very interested in Christian missionaries at first. The Church at the time was deeply involved with politics, and the politics for the missionaries home countries, Spain and Portugal.

the Japanese were very aware of European imperial acquisitions in Asia and elsewhere. They also realized Europe superior navel capacities. there was a real fear on there part that Christians would side with European forces over Japan in a conflict

>an also how Confucianism and Christianity did not clash
And that's how they ended up with a delusional NEET college drop out starting a war that killed people on a WW1 scale 200 years later, might have been a bad idea in hindsight

Christians - particularly foreign educated or foreign Christians - were loyal to Western nations or worse, the Vatican. They sought to replace native Japanese rule with foreign rule, either as a puppet state (under the Vatican) or as colonies (Any Western power).

So the Japanese establishment, predictably, said "Yeah, nah, fuck that".

Did nothing wrong. Out with Manchu devils.

And exorcise the devil sect "Confucianism" too.

It wasn't really popular in Japan, neither it is now.

What a fucking brainlet.

It was seen as being as much of a threat as the Ikko movement.

>t. autist still butthurt over being dragged to church

Yeah, but that's looking at things in hindsight. The Chinese Empire didn't acquire all that land and dominate non-Han peoples by being nice. Chinese seapower and power projection would've made it very possible for Japan to be annexed as a province.

The English protestants being so married to the truth convinced the Japanese that the Church and the Portuguese Jesuits were insurrectionists after Japan had just recently been involved with a hell of a civil war.

They were too scared of their katanas of destruction

They were Buddhist, not Shinto

>And that's how they ended up with a delusional NEET college drop out starting a war that killed people on a WW1 scale 200 years later, might have been a bad idea in hindsight

You mean Hong Xiuquan?
Who was in the Qing Dynasty? The Dynasty that threw out the Jesuits?
Who read Protestantshit?
And considered Confucianism the devil's work?

Yeap, Catholics did that alright.