Inoue Masashige

Inoue Masashige ( Japanese 井上 政 重 ; * 1585 in the province of ( mi (Japan); † March 27, 1661 in Edo ) rose in the course of his career to the chief inspector of the early Edo period and in this function pursued the suppression of Christianity in Japan as well as the adoption of useful European knowledge. For two decades (1640 to 1660) he was the key figure in the relations between the Tokugawa government and the Dutch East India Company .

Life

Inoue Masashige was born as the fourth son of Inoue Kiyohide ( 井上 清秀 , 1533-1604) a vassal of Ōsuga Yasutaka ( 大 須 賀 康 高 ), lord of Yokosuka Castle , in Ōmi province. From 1608 he served in the bodyguard of the second shogun of the Tokugawa dynasty, Tokugawa Hidetada . Due to his services in the summer campaign of 1615 against Toyotomi Hideyori (see Siege of Osaka ), he was transferred to Tokugawa Iemitsu in 1616 . In 1619 he received a fief with an annual travel income of 500 koku . In the course of the further career this was gradually expanded. Since 1627 he carried the honorary title Chikugo -no- kami ( 筑 後 守 ).

Tokugawa Iemitsu rose to Shogun in 1623. After he had won a free hand for intervening measures with the death of his father in 1632, during the following decades he laid the foundations for the rule of his family, which lasted over two centuries. Inoue was appointed chief inspector ( 大 目 付 , ōmetsuke ) in the same year . In this newly established office he was responsible for all security-relevant processes, especially the supervision of the regional lords, the high ceremonial masters and the court as well as relations with foreign countries. For his role in the suppression of the Shimabara uprising (1637/38) and the expansion of the castle in Edo, he received a fiefdom in Takaoka ( Shimousa province ) in 1640 , which brought in 10,000 koku rice annually and was the seat until the end of the Edo period served the family. There was also the post of Commissioner for Religious Questions ( shūmon bugyō ) in the Office for Religious Control ( 宗 門 改 役 , shūmon-aratame yaku ), which he exercised until 1659. In this position he had access to the Shogun, above him only the few imperial councilors stood. In 1644, on behalf of the Shogun, he ensured that the fiefdoms prepare regional maps ( kuniezu , shiroezu ) and registers for rice production capacities , etc. ( gōchō ), with which a new, more precise overall map of the country was produced in Edo.

The "Christian hill " ( Kirishitan-saka ) on a city map of Edo from 1771

Memorial stone marking the Christian prison in Tokyo ( Bunkyōku , Kohinata)

Inoue had two residences in Edo. The secondary residence in the Kohinata district, located on a small hill, served as a prison and official residence. Since many Christians languished here, people spoke of the "Christian estate " ( Kirishitan Yashiki ) and until the 19th century the hill was also called "Christian hill" ( 切 支 丹 坂 , Kirishitan-saka ). Officials, informers and informers went in and out, prisoners were brought before, news was analyzed and evaluated, situation reports were drafted. An efficient working style was essential. One looks in vain for personal aversions to Europeans in the sources. Missionaries who apostatized after being tortured or threatened with it remained alive. He even took over the ex-Jesuit Cristóvão Ferreira , who had converted to Buddhism, into his service. From then on, Ferreira served under the name Sawano Chūan as an advisor on religious issues and as a mediator of specialist knowledge, especially on astronomy. Who, however, did not want to give up faith B. the Japanese Father Petro Kasui Kibe (1587-1639), was executed. The people feared him, his penchant for western things was well known in the city. "Looks like a Japanese, friend of the southern barbarians, unpredictable, the Christian Commissioner ( Kirishitan bugyō ) Inoue, keeper of Chikugo", was an anonymous wall scribble in the Ueno district, which an official noted in 1651 as questionable and so passed on to posterity.

When the population of Nagasaki complained of economic hardship after the Portuguese were expelled, he was sent to the city in autumn 1640, where he and the two governors were responsible for the relocation of the trading post of the Dutch East India Company from Hirado to Nagasaki on the artificial island of Dejima ( Deshima) initiated. Whenever something had to be implemented or adjusted against the Dutch, Inoue appeared. Inoue prepared the annual audiences for the head of the Dutch trading post at the court of the Shogun. He arranged the distribution of the gifts, passed on the wishes of the Imperial Councilors and took care of all pending problems. He dealt with the Europeans in a way that betrays self-confidence and scope. Interesting people were invited and entertained. Occasionally he spoke to the imported red wine and sake and was noticed by loud laughter. Once he even had a piglet slaughtered for his guests and prepared in a European way. On the other hand, he was careful not to get too caught up in the web of mutual favors and obligations.

Inoue not only collected information from his own country. The Dutch had to submit annual reports ( fūsetsu gaki ) which were more or less subtly checked during face-to-face encounters. There were also annual orders. Diaries of the managers of the Dutch trading branch mention a garden in his property, which European souvenirs gave a special touch: water wheels and mini sluices in the brook, foreign plants to tulips that triggered a speculative bubble ( tulip mania ) in the Netherlands during the 1930s . Inoue ordered terrestrial and celestial globes, telescopes, books, pocket watches, concave mirrors, glasses, paintings, maps, signal trumpets, fire pumps, grain mills, firearms, and more. Custom-made products such as a nine-shot rifle hidden in a “convertible stick” give rise to all sorts of speculations about its endangerment.

This made him one of the few Japanese who knew that the earth was a sphere, that four moons orbited Jupiter and who in the far west was coalescing with whom and against whom. Inoue had recognized the technological potential of the Europeans and tried to use it as best he could. More than half a century before the so-called "Holland Studies" ( Rangaku ) came up, he adopted western techniques and sciences, including the healing arts. Also for personal reasons. He suffered from hemorrhoids , bladder stones and a catarrh , which his personal physicians could not cope with, and so over the years the inquiries from the doctors at the Dejima branch about suitable therapies increased. His fondness for Western remedies inspired a courageous man from the people to doodle: "Nowadays there are mummies , bezoars , unicorns - the vain miracle cures of Excellency Inoue".

In 1658 he retired from his office. Before that he put together various papers for his successor to uncover secret Christians, to proceed with interrogations, to some individual cases including an outline of the Christian teaching. These "Christian records" ( 契利斯 督 記 , Kirishito-ki ) were edited by Hōjō Ujinaga (1609–1670, 北 条 氏 長 ) and revised in 1797 by the Confucian Ōta Zensai (1759–1829, 太 田 全 斎 ). A German translation appeared in 1940.

Inoue died in 1661 at the age of 77 and was buried in the Jōshin Temple ( 浄心 寺 , Jōshin-ji ) in Edo. Inoue's eldest son Masatsugu, who, according to the family genealogy, lived "withdrawn because of his lack of talent", had already died in 1650. In his place, his son Masakiyo ( 井上 政 清 , 1628–1675) took over the fiefdom in Takaoka ( Shimousa Province ).

Inoue Masashige was an educated, well-functioning top civil servant who, entirely on the political line of the Shogun Iemitsu, did everything to strengthen the Tokugawa system of rule. It shows far-sightedness when, in a phase when the Tokugawa regime was still busy getting the flow of trade and information under control, he sought to expand his exchange with Europeans in certain areas. These activities, which made a great impression on the company's representatives, did not subside until shortly before his death. He enforced his specifications with charm, if necessary with force. There are solid, cruel reasons for it to get off badly in the Catholic Japanese literature of the time. But the terms to be found in the diaries and letters of the Dutch East India Company such as “our patron” or “our advocate” were also appropriate.

Representation in literature and film

Inoue appears in the novel " Silence " ( Chinmoku ) by Endō Shūsaku , who however designed the character quite freely. Inoue is a former Christian here, for which there is no evidence in historical sources.

In 1971 Masahiro Shinoda filmed the material as " Chinmoku ". The role of Inoue was played by actor Eiji Okada .

Endo's novel was filmed again in 2016 by Martin Scorsese under the title " Silence " and premiered on December 1, 2016 in the Vatican . The actor Issey Ogata plays Inoue in this film.

swell

• Kirishito-ki and Sayo-yoroku , Japanese documents on the history of missions in the 17th century. Translated into German by Gustav Voss, SJ and Hubert Cieslik, SJ, with a foreword by Naojiro Murakami. Tokyo: Sophia University, 1940

literature

• Blussé, Leonard (2003). The grand inquisitor Inoue Chikugano Kami Masashige, spin doctor of the Tokugawa Bakafu , Bulletin of Portuguese / Japanese Studies, vol. 7. Universidade Nova de Lisboa, pp. 23–43 ( digitized version )
• Hasegawa, Kazuo (1979): Ōmetsuke Inoue Chikugo-no-kami Masashige no seiyō igaku e no kanshin [The Inspector Inoue Masashi's Interest in Western Medicine]. In: Iwao Sei'ichi (ed.): Kinsei no yōgaku to kaigai kōshō. Tōkyō: Gannandō Shoten, pp. 196-238
• Hiraoka, Ryūji (2013): Nanban uchūron no seiritsu [On the origin of the “southern barbarian cosmology”]. In: Wakaki, Taiichi: Nagasaki - tōzai bunkakōshōshi no butai. Vol.1, Tōkyō: Benseisha, 42-73
• Michel, Wolfgang (1996): "Hans Jurian Hancke - a Breslauer in Japan". Dokufutsu Bungaku Kenkyū, No. 46, pp. 59-88.
• Michel, Wolfgang (1999): From Leipzig to Japan - The surgeon and trader Caspar Schamberger (1623–1706) . Munich: Iudicium Verlag , p. 107ff.
• Michel, Wolfgang (2007): "Medicine and Allied Sciences in the Cultural Exchange between Japan and Europe in the Seventeenth Century". In: Hans Dieter Ölschleger (ed): Theories and Methods in Japanese Studies: Current State & Future Developments - Papers in Honor of Josef Kreiner. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht unipress, pp. 285–302 ( digitized version )
• Michel, Wolfgang (2010): Medicine, Remedies and Herbalism in the Euro-Japanese Cultural Exchange of the 17th Century . In: Hōrin - Comparative Studies on Japanese Culture, No. 16, pp. 19–34 ( digitized version )
• Nagazumi, Yōko (1975): Orandajin no hogosha toshite no Inoue Chikugo-no-kami Masashige [Inoue Masashige as protector of the Dutch]. In: Nihon Rekishi, No. 327, pp. 1-17

Remarks

1. ↑ In the Japanese calendar the 13th year of the motto Tenshō ( 天正 )
2. ↑ In the Japanese calendar the 27th day in the 2nd month of the 4th year of the motto Manji ( 万 治 )
3. ↑ The first authors to draw attention to Inoue's important role were Nagazumi (1975) and Hasegawa (1979). Further deepening in the field of medicine (Michel, 1995, 1999, 2007, 2010) and astronomy (Michel, 1999; Hiraoka 2013) as well as the relationship with the Dutch East India Company (Blussé, 2003) followed. Basic biographical data in Kansei chōshū shokafu ( 寛 政 重修 諸 家譜 ), 4, p. 305
4. ↑ Something like "Keeper of Chikugo Province". In the Edo period without any concrete function.
5. ↑ In the service diaries of the East India Company he appears as "Commissaris" or dwarskijker , crooked gazer. The term inquisitor, occasionally used by historians, reflects only part of his area of ​​responsibility.
6. ↑ Occasionally translated as Commissioner of the Inquisition or Inquisitionsamt ( Office of the Inquisition ).
7. ↑ Since this project began in the Shōhō period, this map is called Shōhō-Japan map ( Shōhō-Nihonzu )
8. ↑ Preferably Portuguese editions which the East India Company could not deliver
9. ↑ Mummy parts were used medically in Europe and paid dearly. The Chinese pharmacy also knew so-called honey people ( mìrén 蜜 人 ). The mummy pieces brought to Japan by the Dutch East India Company were therefore very popular from the start.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Nagazumi (1975); Hasegawa (1979)
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Michel (1999)
3. ↑ Hiraoka (2013)
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Michel (1996, 1999)
5. ↑ Nagazumi (1996, 1999)
6. ↑ Hasegawa (1979); Michel (1996, 1999, 2007, 2010)
7. ↑ Martin Scorsese meet Pope Francis before Silence Premiere . In: Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved December 1, 2016.

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Inoue is the family name, Masashige the first name.