Guido Verbeck

Guido Herman Fridolin Verbeck, 1868

Verbeck in Japan

Missionaries Guido Verbeck, Samuel Robbins Brown, and Danne B. Simmons

Guido Herman Fridolin Verbeck and his students in Nagasaki (Photo by Ueno Hikoma, ca.1868)

Guido Herman Fridolin Verbeck , also Verbeek (born January 28, 1830 in Zeist , Netherlands , † May 10, 1898 in Tokyo ) was a missionary who was a great influence as a teacher and counselor on Japan in the early Meiji period .

Childhood and youth

Verbeck was born the sixth of eight children of the married couple Karl and Anna Maria Verbeck in the Dutch city of Zeist . His family belonged to the Moravian Brethren (Unitas Fratrum). After completing school he began studying engineering at the Polytechnic Institute in Utrecht .

United States

At the age of 22 he traveled to the United States at the invitation of a brother-in-law , where he worked for about a year in a forge founded by the Herrnhutern in Green Bay ( Wisconsin ). During this time he changed the spelling of his name from "Verbeek" to Verbeck . To see more of America, he moved on to Brooklyn ( New York ) and from there to Helena in Arkansas , where he worked as an engineer. The life of the slaves on the plantations moved him deeply, as did the teachings of the preacher HW Beecher. After he had barely survived a cholera in 1854, he went to a theological seminar in Auburn ( New York ) in 1855 .

Nagasaki

During his training, the Japanese government opened more and more ports for foreigners to land. Nagasaki was also opened in 1859 . In March Verbeck completed his training in Auburn and became a missionary of the Dutch Reformed Church . In April he married Maria Manion and shortly afterwards the couple crossed over to Shanghai . From here he traveled on alone and arrived in Nagasaki in November. Here he first lived in the Sōfuku Temple ( Sōfuku-ji ). After he was able to rent a suitable residence, his wife arrived in December.

Since all missionary activity was still forbidden, the missionaries who had arrived prepared themselves by studying the national language and translating texts. From 1860 on, Verbeck taught four young Japanese in the English language.

The situation in this time of upheaval was confusing and dangerous for western foreigners. In September 1862, the British Charles Richardson was killed in an attack. In Nagasaki, too, one had to be careful. Although the Verbecks had meanwhile moved their domicile to the enclave for foreigners, the following year Verbeck moved with his family to Shanghai for six months and waited for things to improve.

The monitoring of the marine region around Nagasaki, a city directly subordinate to the central government, was carried out alternately by the two domains Fukuoka ( province Chikuzen ) and the domain Saga ( province Hizen ). In 1863, Major Domus of the sovereign of the Saga domain, Murata Wakasa ( 村田 若 狭 ), who was interested in Western science and Christianity , contacted Verbeck and sent two young men to teach English. As a result, a close relationship developed between Verbeck and Saga. The governor of Nagasaki had also recognized that Verbeck could be of use. He advocated that the government in the Edomachi district created a school for Western studies ( 洋 学 所 , Yōgakusho ), and from August 1864 on, Verbeck gave lessons in foreign languages ​​and natural sciences here. In the same year the facility was relocated and renamed "Sprachschule" ( 語 学 所 , Gogakusho ). Soon afterwards they moved again. At what is now called the “House of Moral Excellence” ( 済 美 館 , Saibikan ), a total of 19 teachers taught English, French, German, Russian, Chinese, Dutch, history, geography, mathematics, physics and economics. In his English classes, Verbeck used the American Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution.

This school quickly acquired an excellent reputation, and in 1867 Verbeck received letters from the rulers of Kaga, Satsuma, Tosa and Hizen, who wanted to set up similar institutions in their domains. The Saga domain had set up a language school, Chiekan ( 致遠 館 ), in Nagasaki as early as 1865 , which was managed by Verbeck. Until the so-called Meiji Restoration in 1868, he taught at two institutions at the same time. Some of his students such as Ōkuma Shigenobu , Soejima Taneomi , Ōkubo Toshimichi , Sagara Chian , Koide Sennosuke, Yamaguchi Masuka, Ishimaru Yasuyo and Mawatari Toshiyuki should soon make careers.

Verbeck also assisted with the employment of William Elliot Griffis in Fukui . The life paths of the two missionaries crossed repeatedly during the following years, and after Verbeck's death Griffins wrote an extensive biography of the deceased.

Verbeck also ensured that a dictionary edited by Takahashi Shinkichi (1843-1918) and Maeda Masayoshi, called "Satsuma Dictionary" in Japan, was printed in 1869 by the American Presbyterian Mission Press in Shanghai.

In 1867 his son Gustave was born in Nagasaki , who later became a cartoonist in the USA .

Tokyo

In 1867 Tokugawa Yoshinobu , the last Shogun of the Tokugawa dynasty, resigned. In early 1868, the Tennō was re-installed as the highest state authority, and a little later the reform forces began their work. Many came from the western parts of the country. Some of them, as Verbeck quickly discovered, were former students of his who now valued his skills and advice.

Verbeck undertook an exploratory trip to Osaka , where he realized that foreign interest had already focused on the populous and economically important regions of Kansai and Kantō . When he received an invitation from Ōkubo Toshimichi , who had meanwhile gained great influence as a kind of interior minister, he took this opportunity and took the position of a teacher at the "High South School" ( 大学 南 校 , Daigaku-Nankō ) in 1869 Tokyo on. This was the nucleus of the first modern university in Japan, the Imperial University of Tokyo , which was soon renamed as "Development School" ( 開 成 学校 , Kaisei-gakkō ) . Here, too, he exerted a strong influence on the young, inquisitive students. For a while, Takahashi Korekiyo lived in his house, who had learned English from the missionary James Hepburn in Yokohama and was later to become Prime Minister.

Verbeck also served as an advisor to the Meiji government under Sanjō Sanetomi . When Sagara Chian , one of his students from Saga, was tasked with reforming the medical system, Verbeck emphatically supported his position, so that in 1871 the government opted for German medicine as the basis for medical training and practice in Japan. Verbeck also exerted influence on the establishment of the administration in the prefectures created instead of the old fiefs . The idea he developed , probably based on the Great Embassy of Peter the Great , for an exploration trip to the USA and Europe went down in history under the name Iwakura Mission (December 1871 to September 1873).

In 1871 the Ministry of Education was founded, which Verbeck used as an adviser for the introduction of the modern school system in 1872.

In February 1873 the ban on Christianity that had been in force in Japan for two centuries was lifted so that he could now pursue his missionary activities more openly. The stress of these years in Japan, however, was not without consequences for his health. In 1873 he took a six-month leave of absence to recover and traveled from Yokohama to London . In June he made a short trip to Switzerland to meet Iwakura Tomomi , who was preparing to return to Japan with his entourage. On this occasion he paid a visit to his hometown after a long time.

When he returned, he gave up the job at the university. In the same year he received a five-year contract as attaché to the Japanese Senate and spent the following years as a missionary, advisor and - in close collaboration with Japanese scholars - as a translator of legal texts (Code Napoléon, Johann Caspar Bluntschlis General Law, the constitutions of numerous states in Europe and America etc.). In 1877 he taught at the "study academy" ( 学習 院 , Gakushūin ), which was valued by court circles . In 1886 he became professor of theology at the Meiji Academy ( 明治 学院 , Meiji Gakuin ).

When he wanted to move to the United States with his daughter in 1890, he was refused because he could not prove his Dutch citizenship and his previous stay in the USA was not sufficient for naturalization. The Japanese government then issued him a permanent residence and travel permit for Japan.

Verbeck died of a heart attack in 1898 at the age of 68. In recognition of the great merits of the deceased, the Tennō sent a funeral offering of 500 yen. A delegate from the court and other dignitaries attended the burial in Aoyama Cemetery in Tokyo.

When Ōkuma Shigenobu founded Waseda University in 1882 , he specifically referred to Verbeck, who introduced him to the life and work of Thomas Jefferson .

Honors

In 1877 Verbeck received the Order of the Rising Sun , which had been introduced two years earlier .

Verbeck's writings

• GF Verbeck: Hogaku shishin . Tōkyō: Kinkōdō, Meiji 10 [1877].
• GF Verbeck: What is the best method of acquiring the Japanese language: a paper read before the Tokyo Missionary Conference, November, 1882 . [Sl: sn, 1882].
• GF Verbeck: History of Protestant missions in Japan: read at the Ōsaka Conference . Yokohama: R. Meiklejohn, 1883.
• Ambrose D. Gring; GF Verbeck: The Heidelberg Catechism, or the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, in English, and Japanese Colloquial confirmed with proofs from the holy Scriptures . Yokohama: R. Meiklejohn & Co., 1884.
• GF Verbeck: A synopsis of all the conjugations of the Japanese verbs, with explanatory text and practical application . Yokohama: Kelly & Walsh, 1887. (95 p.)
• YN Murakami; GF Verbeck: A New easy conversations in English and Japanese, adapted for Japanese schools . Osaka: M. Sasuke, 1887.
• GF Verbeck: Hito no kami o ogamubeki riyū . Tōkyō: Kirisutokyō Shorui Kaisha, Meiji 29 [1896].

Remarks

1. ↑ Beecher's sister Harriet Beecher Stowe became known as the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin .
2. ↑ In 1866 Wakasa Murata was baptized in Verbeck's house.
3. ↑ Not to be confused with the school of the same name founded in Osaka in 1907.
4. ↑ An English-Japanese pronouncing dictionary, with an appendix containing a table of irregular verbs, tables of money, weight, and measure, and a list of English signs and abbreviations. Shanghai: American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1869 (700 pages). ( 高橋 新 吉 ・ 前 田 正 穀 共 編 『改正 増 増 補 和 訳 英 辞書』 )
5. ↑ Verbeck presented the proposal to Ōkuma Shigenobu in 1869 as a "Brief Sketch" .
6. ↑ In a letter dated July 10, 1873, Verbeck explains that because of this he is in a state of nervous weakness. Griffis, p. 268.
7. ↑ It is an offering called saishiryō ( 祭 粢 料 ), which has been given to the family of deserving citizens as a funeral gift since the Meiji period. The monthly salary of a primary school teacher was 8 to 9 yen at the time; a highly skilled technician received about 20 yen.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Owned by the Nagasaki Library.

literature

• Griffis, William Elliot: Guido Verbeck of Japan: A citizen of no country; a life story of foundation work inaugurated by Guido Fridolin Verbeck . Chicago: Fleming H. Revell, 1900. ( digitized version )
• A. Hamish Ion: American Missionaries, Christian Oyatoi, and Japan, 1859-73 . Vancouver: UBC Press, 2009.
• Earns, Lane. R. "A Miner in the Deep and Dark Places: Guido Verbeck in Nagasaki, 1859–1869." Crossroads . December 13, 2003.

Web links

• Photo with Verbeck and his students in Nagasaki (Japanese website)