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Peace Profile: Christian Pacifism and WarObjection in Early Twentieth-CenturyJapanYuichi Moroi aa Temple UniversityPublished online: 20 Aug 2012.

To cite this article: Yuichi Moroi (2012) Peace Profile: Christian Pacifism and War Objection inEarly Twentieth-Century Japan, Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, 24:3, 374-382, DOI:10.1080/10402659.2012.704329

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Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, 24:374–382Copyright C© Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN 1040-2659 print; 1469-9982 onlineDOI: 10.1080/10402659.2012.704329

Peace Profile: Christian Pacifismand War Objection in EarlyTwentieth-Century JapanYUICHI MOROI

At the turn of the twentieth century, Japan was winning war after war, estab-lishing itself as an emerging colonial power in Asia. The Sino–Japanese Warof 1894–95 allowed Japan to acquire Taiwan and establish a foothold in theKorean peninsula. A decade later, the outcome of the Russo–Japanese Warsolidified the Japanese domination of Korea, and produced its colonizationby 1910. As a non-Western country that had defeated an European power forthe first time in modern history, much of the nation was jubilant about theirmilitary accomplishment; only a handful held an opinion against war, muchless expressed it in public. Christian pacifists were among the few, along withsocialists.

One of the most prominent figures in Christian pacifism in Japan at thattime—and perhaps throughout the twentieth century—was Uchimura

Kanzo. He was born in 1861 as a son of a samurai (warrior class) family.Converted to Christianity at the age of seventeen while he studied at the Sap-poro Agricultural College, Uchimura then studied abroad at Amherst Collegeand received a degree there. Back in the country, when he was teaching En-glish, geography, and history at the First Higher School in Tokyo in 1891, herefused to bow at the emperor’s newly issued Rescript on Education, whichshocked the nation and was widely condemned. With this incident, the na-tionalists began to intensify the attack against Christians as unpatriotic inImperial Japan. Being forced to resign and change jobs, Uchimura devotedhimself to authoring a number of religious writings and leading private Biblestudy groups. Although he supported the Sino–Japanese War, publishing Jus-tification of the Corean War both in English and Japanese in 1894, it wasevident Uchimura had become a strong opponent of war by 1904, when theRusso–Japanese War began. He remained a Christian pacifist until his deathin 1930.

The Western—indeed, American—influence on Uchimura—is obvious,and he acknowledged it. However, he was equally critical of the American

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war at the time (the Spanish–American War) and the mainstream churchesthat supported it as much as the Japanese war. Based on the articles he pub-lished around the Russo–Japanese War, we can examine Uchimura’s pacifism,especially the basis for his objection to war, his ideas of peace and pacifism,and his view on the conscientious objection to military service. While histone is religious and moralistic at times, it shows a unique perspective on warobjection in Japan in the early twentieth century. A rare critique of war fromthe winning side may provide some lessons about the nature of war that’s stillrelevant today.

Uchimura’s Christian pacifism has its root in his life experience andobservation. With his family’s samurai (warrior) class background, Uchimurainitially took war for granted; it was an undeniable part of social history. Evenafter his conversion to Christianity, for more than twenty years he believed inwar as an option and argued against his Quaker friends in the United States.However, several things made his position on war change and turned himinto a strong opponent. First, he became a war objector as a result of hiscontinuous study of the Bible, especially the New Testament. Embracing itswhole spirit—rather than taking words out of context and interpreting themindependently—he concluded that he could no longer support war. Second,his experiment and experience of nonresistance made him an opponent ofwar. Having faced massive personal attacks (probably after his refusal to bowat the emperor’s Rescript in 1891), he tried nonresistance, on the advice ofhis friend. As a result, he “gained peace of mind greatly.” Uchimura realizedhow ugly and stupid conflict would have been if he had avenged the attacks:“Paul’s lesson in chapter twelve of Romans,” he said, “has never been drivenhome clearer to me.”

Third, his observations about world history by the turn of the century,especially the aftermath of the Sino–Japanese and the Spanish–Americanwars, solidified Uchimura’s conviction against war. The essay will addressand closely review this point in a moment. Fourth, Uchimura attributes hispacificism to an American newspaper: the Springfield Republican in Mas-sachusetts. Having been a subscriber for twenty years, he came to admirethe paper as “the refresher of thought,” which he rarely found elsewhere inthe world. He recognized the paper’s pacifism, although not absolute, in itscritical stance to all wars; he found it, for example, in its opposition to theAmerican occupation of the Philippines, in spite of public opinion. Uchimuraappreciated articles by “prominent pacifists in the world” in the newspaper,which “destroyed completely the logic of the pro-war position” that he hadheld.

Among the things that made Uchimura an opponent of war was his ob-servation of contemporary history, especially the consequences of the

Sino–Japanese and the Spanish–American wars. As indicated, although he

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did support the Sino–Japanese War in 1894, Uchimura came to regret hisposition. The war’s aftermath opened his eyes and he seriously questioned themorality of the country that won the war:

The outcome of the Sino-Japanese War taught me a lesson keenly that war brings usonly harm without benefit. The goal of Korean independence was in danger becauseof it; and the morality of Japan, the winner, has been very corrupted. . . . This is theresult of the war—indeed winning a war—that I observe in my native Japan.

Uchimura drew a similar conclusion about the winner of the Spanish–American War as well:

If you think about the aftermath of the Spanish-American War in the United States,you would find more radical change [than in Japan]. Because of the war, the nationalpolicy of the United States has changed dramatically. The United States, once a freecountry, is now becoming an oppressor; they used to have only twenty thousandactive troops, but now, they are planning to be the largest militarized country in theworld. Indeed, few words could describe the fall and corruption of the Americansociety that was brought by the change in the thoughts of the people in the UnitedStates. I feel pain and sadness beyond words in witnessing the corruption of today’sAmerica, the country that I have regarded as my second homeland. It is obviouslythe Spanish-American War that has directly brought this corruption.

The content of this “moral corruption” of society is not entirely clear fromthese statements; however, his view on war’s influence on morality could beseen in these characteristics: the harboring of hostile feelings toward the en-emy, the double standard in reporting by the media, and the loss of compassionfor fellow humans. Altogether, Uchimura argued, war makes humans beasts.

The first moral corruption—harboring hostile feelings against the enemy,is perhaps a psychological necessity in war, but it clearly violates the principleof “love thy enemy.” Uchimura recognized that the object of hatred could beeasily expand to all human beings, including oneself:

People believe that it is a common human nature to talk only about the opponent’sevil deeds and hide their own; it’s about enmity and patriotism, they say. But theydo not realize how great a calamity they have been accumulating with these . . . Itis quite clear, in theory and practice, that if you hate the enemy, the object of hatredwould naturally expand to all human beings; as a result, you would come to hate yourfellow countrymen and eventually dislike yourself. Thus, what we must try our bestis not to like or dislike this or that nationality, but rather not to harbor hostile feelingitself. . . . The hostile feeling against the enemy would turn to the hostile feelingagainst one’s fellow countrymen after war; and the enmity would turn eventually tohostile feeling against life itself. If you do not stop such a feeling with an effort, youwould start entertaining a thought of harming yourself in the end.

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The second moral corruption resulted from the media’s double standard in re-porting, which incited and perpetuated hostility against the enemy. Influencedby such media, the nation becomes insincere and loses interest in the truth:

The Russo-Japanese War got rid of the remaining small amount of sincerity from thenation; for no newspaper was interested in reporting the truth at the time of war—byconcealing our faults and exaggerating the enemy’s, newspapers were fanning thehostile feeling against the enemy among the nation and trying to win the war at anycost—even at the cost of truth. Without the media report that provided truth andmaterials for us to make fair judgments, war made us the people of insincerity andunreason.

Finally, the third moral corruption can result even when the war is won.Nations not only lose respect for the truth, but also respect for human life.Uchimura deplores the lack of compassion he observed even among his fellowcountrymen:

People consider human life precious in normal circumstances, but at the time of war,they come to think of it not as precious as the life of cattle and horses. The enemy’scasualty of two hundred thousand made us so joyful that we did not shed a tear for areport of our casualty of fifty thousand. Fifty thousand casualties on our side! Fiftythousand families have lost their husband, father, brother or child. Fifty thousandfamilies have been screaming for the loss of their loved ones. And yet, no one was indeep sorrow for it; the celebration [of winning the war] was everywhere, and everychurch held the victory prayer with gratitude. Where is the respect for human life?Where is the love of brotherhood? The heap of corpses and the stream of the blooddid not stay in the people’s mind so long. ‘We’ve won the war,’ ‘We’ve defeated theenemy’—these erased and washed away the pain and sorrow of the victims of war.War makes us not only unreasonable but also inhumane; people begin to hate theenemy and become unconcerned about the fellow human life by war. Nothing couldoverride the compassion of the people and destroy society at its foundation as muchas war. War, indeed, makes humans beasts.

According to Uchimura, “War’s evil influence on morality is obvious. Evenif war would end with a great victory, what was gained politically and eco-nomically would not suffice for what was lost in terms of morality.” Naturally,Uchimura’s concern about morality occupied the central place in his interpre-tation of peace and pacifism, and in his view of conscientious objection.

Uchimura argued that peace cannot be obtained through war. Politiciansthroughout the world may claim war to make peace, but that is a delusion,

the most widespread superstition about the war:

Real peace does not come out of the pressure of armed forces; needless to say, itmust come from favor and friendliness. Militarists claim victory, and politicians thenational prestige. But the real peace does not come from such lower motivations. Thepeace that is worthy of preserving for the future comes from the spirit that respects

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the enemy and recognizes some degree of benefit and rights to them. If peace comesby killing people, wealth must come by stealing. War never makes peace. . . . Warkills people; it destroys livelihood. It causes all the tragedies and evil things. Itdoes not, however, cause peace. Peace is to be recovered by a project besides war.Thus, we pacifists are the ones who try to reach peace through its righteous path:abandoning hostility by all means, we advocate a way to make the enemy trust usand make us respect them.

In order to take the “righteous path” for peace, one has to acquire a high moralstandard. Reaching peace in this way seems more moralistic than practical;however, in his idea of pacifism, Uchimura clarified the role of war objectionand other peacemaking activities.

For Uchimura, objection to war is a part of pacifism—a “negative” part ofit. The other “positive” part is to contribute to society by producing, nurturing,and maintaining peace and happiness. He said: “pacifism is not only aboutnot fighting; war objection is just a negative aspect of it. The other, positive,aspect of pacifism is to produce and enrich—the happiness of the family, themaintenance of forest, the protection of wild birds, the utilization of rivers,the cultivation of land, and other things that make the ordinary people’s liveshappy.”

Each part of pacifism has only limited usefulness during war. Up untilwar breaks out, protesting, objecting to war should be the way of pacifists;however, once war begins, Uchimura argues, pacifists should focus on thepositive part:

We had protested war as much as our limited power allowed until war broke out.However, once it started, in spite of our wishes, our way to prevent war came toan end. . . . Once our hope to prevent war and maintain peace did not materialize,we came to think about how we could recover peace as soon as possible. . . . Theobligation, responsibility, and purpose of pacifists are to maintain or recover peace;in the case we could not maintain it, then, as a second measure, we must hasten thetime for the recovery and create opportunities for it.

But he admits that once war begins, pacifists have few things to do to “recoverand create opportunities” for peace:

. . . it is not a time now [during war] for pacifists to act. Pacifists in wartime are likesoldiers in peacetime: they have few useful things to do. However, since peacetimeis the normal state of human society and wartime is the abnormal state, there willbe a time soon when we pacifists can contribute to society. Our service will bedemanded at the time of the reconstruction of peace; our advice and work will surelybe accepted for the continuation of peace and the cultivation of friendship. At thetime of war today, we pacifists should wait quietly for the time when our service willbe required, much like soldiers in the peacetime.

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For pacifists, war is like a thunderstorm passing by. They should wait pa-tiently for the time—the “normal” time of peace—when they can fulfill their“obligation and responsibility” with the acceptance of the broader public.Indeed, Uchimura takes war as something like a natural disaster, such as“famine and tsunami,” in which the nation has to endure. This is a fatal-istic view on war—something out of human control, thus not being veryinsightful about how the machinery of war operates. When he talks aboutthe “positive” part of pacifism, to “produce and enrich” the country, it is notclear how such a contribution would be connected to the war-making state.Uchimura failed to see the relationship between the pacifists’ action, or in-action, and the process of war. Such a fatalistic view of war, something outof one’s control and influence, can be seen also in his view of conscientiousobjection.

There was no clear, direct tradition of conscientious objection to militaryservice in Japan. War was conducted by a certain class of the people

in the feudal era. (There might have been isolated cases of conscientiousobjection, like in any other country, but they were hardly a tradition.) Af-ter the formation of the modern Japanese state in 1868, it was only fiveyears later that nationwide conscription was first implemented. Despite theabsence of an indigenous tradition, a handful did declare their conscientiousobjection to military service during the wars waged from the beginning ofthe twentieth century through World War II; they were the Christian paci-fists.

The question of conscientious objection, however, was difficult forUchimura as it must have been for the handful of others who became theisolated cases. In the country where a rising military might and feat symbol-ized successful development as a modern state, enthusiastically supported bythe majority of the nation—the mainstream Christian churches included—ittook enormous courage to express opinions against war, not to mention to de-clare and practice conscientious objection to it. It was difficult for Uchimura,for he was torn between loyalty to the country and Christian pacifism, andtried to strike a balance between them. His unique solution must reflect thisdifficulty.

In essence, he advocated the military service for conscientious objec-tors. He said: “When the state orders us into military service . . . with alegal mandate, then, choking up in tears, we should obey the order withthe thought of the unrighteous brothers facing the difficulty.” Otherwise,Uchimura was afraid that society would see the pacifists as “cowards” andwould not listen to their messages; in addition, he thought that pacifists’ re-fusal of military service would end up with the induction of others. “Thus,”he maintained, “we should take up this painful service rather willingly for

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the sake of them [would-be inductees] as well.” Once war began, Uchimurabelieved that this would be “the most moderate and appropriate way to abolishwar.”

In terms of participation in the military, it was similar to that practicedby Seventh Day Adventist conscientious objectors—both complied with thedemand of the state at war. However, what makes Uchimura’s view unique ishis idea of the death of conscientious objectors on the battlefield. He describedthis as the death of atonement and the death in remonstration—only which,he thought, could abolish war. Adopting a religious tone, Uchimura describedit this way:

If all the sins could be erased only with good deeds, war could be finally abol-ished only with a numerous, pitiful death of war objectors on the battleground.Warmongers’ death on the field would be of no use for the abolishment of war;however, when a man who hates war and does not have a slightest inclination for itand whose opinion of benevolence was not heard in the world turned into a tragicbattlefield becomes a victim of the sin called hostility and closes his pacifist lifebecoming a target of the enemy fire on the field, then, at last, a part of the sin ofhumanity would be atoned and the final peace of the world would come closer tothis world. This is thus a kind of the punishment of the cross on the Calvary. Ifthere were ‘the beauty of war,’ I suspect, it would not be the death of warmon-gers who do not know the value of life; rather, it would be the death of a pacifistwho knows all well about the preciousness of life and the pleasure of peace. Apacifist who advocates love of people would not die for this or that country; how-ever, he would die willingly, with his gratitude to God, in order to atone for apart of the sin of humanity with his blood, becoming a victim of war. The paci-fist who goes to war with this spirit would want to die, not desire to live. Withhis death he wants to remonstrate with his nation and to arouse repentance amongthe human beings who are excited about killing brothers and sink themselves intosin.

Then, again, upholding a high moral standard becomes crucial—even to one’sown death:

Go and sacrifice yourself, pacifists of both countries. In your deeds, face the dan-ger that others won’t. In your deeds, die as a victim of war that you hate. Neverhate the enemy even in fighting; for there should be no enemy to you now. Justfulfill your duty that was ordered to you and wish your death would be a death ofatonement. Even though man brings you death, God is waiting for you in heaven.Shake hands with the enemy there; just never stop praying for peace until youdie.

At the time Uchimura wrote these ideas in 1904, Japan was a risingregional power. “A wealthy nation with strong armed forces” became

a national slogan, and the state was eager to suppress dissenters—especiallythose critical of the imperial state system and war. The antiwar socialists were

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crushed in a case of high treason (the Great Treason Incident) prosecutedsix years later. The mainstream Christian churches showed their support forthe nation’s war efforts—in part to preserve their organizations—throughWWII. In an increasingly totalitarian society, holding the idea of Christianpacifism, not to mention expressing and practicing it, was indeed exceptional.Acknowledging these social constraints of the time, some of the limits ofUchimura’s war objection can nevertheless be pointed out.

As we saw in his idea of pacifism, the relationship between the indi-vidual and war is distanced and disconnected—as if war hits the nation likea natural disaster, beyond one’s control. Indeed, in a large-scale war involv-ing nation-states, the total wars of the twentieth century in particular, theindividual is almost powerless. But there is not much reflection upon thesystem of war by Uchimura—that is, war is man-made, not naturally createdor God-given. Another, yet related, limitation of Uchimura’s war objectionconcerns conscientious objectors. However lofty an ideal they may hold, theparticipation of conscientious objectors in war does help run the machinery ofwar. The death in remonstration, the death of atonement by conscientious ob-jectors, is hardly war resistance. The division between the inner (spiritual)objection and the outer (behavioral) cooperation in Uchimura’s conscientiousobjectors may represent the painful compromise of his Christian pacifismto the state’s imperative in a society that has no tradition of conscientiousobjection.

In sum, on one hand, Uchimura’s argument against war provides us withan idea that has contemporary significance: that war makes us insensitive—more so on the winning side—about the number of casualties, the pain ofgrieving families, and the value of life in general. And yet, on the other hand,his moralistic ideas of achieving peace and the de facto cooperation with thesystem of war poses limitations. The difficulty of Christian pacifism in Japanat the beginning—and through the first half—of the twentieth century can beseen in its sociohistorical context. In a society where the absolute obedience tothe feudal authority had been the norm for centuries, and where the tradition ofconscientious objection, much less the liberty of conscience, hardly existed, itmust have been very difficult to confront the key issue of Christian pacifism:that one must obey God above men. Unlike the American counterpart (suchas the Quakers), Uchimura was unable to completely weigh God’s authorityover this world’s—as far as war is concerned. The growing nationalism, theprevailing patriotism, and the emerging sense of national identity that wasalso tied to the economic development of the nation on the world stage atthe turn of the twentieth century were too large to overcome and made thechoice a complicated one. His proclaimed loyalty to the “two Js,” Jesus andJapan, led to a unique, yet painful “solution” to the question of conscientiousobjection—the death of the objectors on the battlefield was the only way out.

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RECOMMENDED READINGS

Howes, John. 2005. Japan’s Modern Prophet: Uchimura Kanzo, 1861–1930. Vancouver, BC:University of British Columbia Press.

Miura, Hiroshi. 1997. The Life and Thought of Kanzo Uchimura, 1861–1930. Grand Rapids,MI: Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Uchimura, Kanzo. 1971–1973. The Complete Works of Kanzo Uchimura. Tokyo: Kyobunkwan.

Yuichi Moroi teaches sociology at Temple University and is the author of Ethics of Conviction and CivicResponsibility: Conscientious War Resisters in America During the World Wars (University Press ofAmerica, 2008). His translation of A Few Small Candles: War Resisters of World War II Tell Their Stories(Kent State University Press, 1999) was published in Japan in 2010. E-mail: yuichi@temple.edu

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