You are loved

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We live in a world of performance. If you are a sports fan you have access to an amazing array of real-time statistics on a football receiver’s speed, distance the pass traveled, and so much more. In swimming, it used to be that you watched the race and at the end the final times were posted. Now, mid-race there are on-screen statistics of speed in ft/sec and measures of the distance between swimmers. We live in a world of performance. Work has productivity measures, school has grades, … maybe homilies need a real time scoring system like diving or gymnastics.

We live in a world where our worth is often measured by productivity, recognition, credentials, and visibility. From an early age we learn, often without being explicitly taught, that approval follows achievement which signals that you are valued because of what you do, what you produce, how you compare. As a priest, listening to folks, it is evident that similar logic carries over into our relationship with God.

Subtly, almost unconsciously, we can begin to believe that God’s pleasure is lost or gained through activity, sacrifice, or visible success. When things go well, we feel affirmed – “I am blessed” we might think. When things are not going so well, we feel something is off kilter. Faith can become another arena of performance. “I need to pray more.” “Read more scripture.” “Go on retreat.” “Then things will be OK.”  There can be a performative intention behind all those things as a means to seek God’s pleasure.

You might be thinking, “Jesus’ life is pretty performative!” And indeed, as we move from the Christmas Season into Ordinary Time, we will see the public and very active ministry of Jesus unfold as He performs miracles, healings, casting out demons, forgiving sins, controlling nature and so much more. All very performative and with a purpose: to affirm that the Kingdom of God is indeed upon the people.

But not today. 

There are two things that stand out for me in the gospel reading as Jesus is first stepping into public view, when his ministry formally begins, how does He begin? Not with preaching, not with healing, not with miracles but by waiting. Not only that, before any performance, achievement, before any measurable success in ministry and mission, the Father names him Beloved. Let’s explore these two things.

We live in a performative world. We want to do something for God before we have truly stood before God. But Jesus begins differently. He stands in line with sinners. He listens to John preach. He receives John’s baptism. He submits himself to the Father’s will as mediated through another human being: “for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”

Jesus’ public ministry is born not from initiative or performance, but from surrender. Jesus chooses the place of humility. He does not separate himself from the brokenness of humanity. He enters it quietly, patiently, without exemption. He lines up and waits his turn. This is not a gesture of convenience; it is a revelation of who God is.

Isaiah had already given us the pattern: “Here is my servant… not crying out, not shouting.” God’s chosen one does not impose himself. He does not force righteousness upon the world. He enters the world gently, from within, sharing its condition. And only after this act of submission does heaven open. The Spirit descends not upon Jesus not as a wonder-worker, but upon Jesus, the obedient Son. The Father’s voice does not praise achievement, but relationship: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” The Father’s voice does not say, “Now I will love you because you have begun your mission.” It says, “You are my beloved.” Full stop. This is not sentimentality. It is identity; our deepest identity.

We often speak about the Sacrament of Baptism as a commissioning to act, but it is first a declaration of identity and belonging. Before we are sent, we are claimed. Before we are asked to serve, we are named beloved. We are baptized not because we are finished products, but because God chooses to stand with us where we are. His true holiness is not distance from our human weakness, but is a faithful presence within it.

Because when we begin where Jesus began — in humility, submission, and trust — then the same promise is spoken over us: You are my beloved.

Jesus’ identity as beloved does not protect him from hardship. In fact, it leads him into the wilderness, into conflict, and eventually into the Cross. But what sustains him through all of it is not success, but the unshakeable knowledge of who he is before the Father.

That same identity is given to us in baptism.

To live as the beloved does not mean disengaging from responsibility, effort or hardship. It means being mindful that performance does not define our worth. It means allowing ourselves to rest secure in God’s pleasure even when our work is incomplete, our efforts misunderstood, our plans undone, or we are at wit’s end.

In a world that constantly asks, “What have you accomplished?” The Gospel challenges us to answer a different question: “To whom do you belong?”

When we live from that place, fear loosens its grip. Comparison loses its power. And love – real, patient, self-giving love becomes possible. Because only those who know they are already loved are truly free to give themselves away.

You are loved. Remember that and let tomorrow bring what may. You are loved.

Image credit: The Baptism of Christ, Juan Fernández de Navarrete, “El Mudo” | Museo del Prado, Madrid | Wikimedia Commons | PD-US

What does all this mean?

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This coming Sunday we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord. As already mentioned, Matthew’s primary focus is not on the baptism itself, but on the events that immediately follow: the heavens opening up, the descent of the Spirit and the voice of God. But let’s return for a moment to consider the meaning of John’s baptism. John’s baptism was not a sacramental baptism, but rather was a preparatory, symbolic, prophetic action. It was a sign of repentance (Matthew 3:6; Mark 1:4), a ritual preparation for the coming Messiah, a public acknowledgment of one’s desire to turn away from sin, and a way of awakening Israel to expect God’s imminent saving act.

This was not Jesus’ baptism – He did not need purification. He did not become holy by the waters. Rather, He made the waters holy by entering them. (cf. St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Ambrose, St. Thomas Aquinas) By descending into waters used for repentance, Christ prepares them to become the instrument of rebirth. In this He was baptized to reveal Himself as Messiah and sanctify the waters for Christian baptism.

Importantly, Jesus identifies Himself with humanity. John’s call for repentance was a call for the people to remember that they were people in Covenant with God. His wilderness ministry called them to the Jordan River at the spot where the people first crossed into the land promised in the Abrahamic covenant. They are called to return to the beginning, reenter the land, and once again be a covenant people. By his baptism, Jesus shows that he stands with the covenant people.

But at the water’s edge it is revealed that he is the Son of God and thus at the same time is the maker of the Covenant, the means by which God has chosen to redeem us. At the water’s edge Jesus inaugurated His public ministry, fulfilled all righteousness and so began the saving plan of the Father.

Image credit: The Baptism of Christ, Juan Fernández de Navarrete, “El Mudo” | Museo del Prado, Madrid | Wikimedia Commons | PD-US

An interim thought

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At the beginning of the Edo Period, Daimyo Hideyoshi had grand visions of a Pan-Asia empire that included China. Under the leadership of the Tokugawa Shogunate, the country set clear restrictions that mostly isolated Japan from face-to-face contact with the world. The nation remained open to commercial trade but not to social corruption from outside influences. Through the Dutch in Nagasaki, the advances in science and technology were available to them. But their world was largely an “internal” world. What was the impact of all this on their self-view vis-a-vis other peoples and nations?

With the advent of the Asia-Pacific war in the 20th century, there was a clear doctrine of racial, cultural and national superiority whose rightful destiny was as leader of the Asia Pacific regions (and perhaps more). But was that present in the 19th century when Japan became more open to the world?

What emerged was a layered self-view of cultural centrality and moral distinctiveness. The Tokugawa Shogunate did not view itself in terms of being the center of an empire, but it did see itself as a center of a superior civilization. Its criteria included moral cultivation, ritual propriety, and social harmony, governed by proper hierarchy and order.

This can be seen by its changing view of China. Where once China was the center of learning, governance, religious thought and social order, that view was increasingly a distant memory. Classical Chinese learning was still revered but in the present the Japanese held that the Chinese had lost their moral position in the world (Confucian) by internal revolts and external wars. Japan now viewed themselves as the true heir of classical civilization. They made this judgment as an ethical and historical assessment, not a judgement on the Chinese people.

Westerners were often described as technically skilled, morally crude, and socially disordered. Christianity was seen as a western import and was condemned not as “foreign” per se, but as socially destabilizing and politically subversive. Westerners were not viewed as racially inferior, but as culturally dangerous to the higher Japanese civilization and morally undisciplined. At the same time, the Japanese became far more certain and confident in their own institutions and traditions, becoming somewhat immune from foreign moral claims. Where once the Japanese looked to China and others for recognition and approbation, they no longer sought it or needed it. 

Sakoku was certainly cultural insulation, but one that did not mandate superiority. It is later thinkers in another time that would radicalize the fruits of the Tokugawa Shogunate to become the Japan facing the world in the 20th century.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives.

The Voice

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This coming Sunday we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord.  “And a voice came from the heavens, saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.’” (Mt 13:17). The voice from heaven speaks the words that are repeated at the scene of the Transfiguration (Mt 17:5) and reveal God’s proclamation of Jesus’ full identity. After Jesus’ acceptance of John’s baptism as the will of God for him, God declares his pleasure because of the obedience and more fundamentally, declares the unique relationship between God the Father and his Son.

The words of the declaration are usually understood to be derived from one or both of Isa 42:1 and Ps 2:7.  “Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased.” (Isaiah 42:1) and goes on to say that God has put his Spirit upon him, which links closely with what we have seen in v. 16.  “You are my son; today I have begotten you.” (Ps 2:7) in which God addresses his anointed king

The echo of both passages lend themselves to Matthew’s focus of fulfillment passages. While his primary fulfillment focus will be Jesus as the One to come, greater than Moses, Matthew is attentive to other fulfillments: son, servant, king.

As R.T. France points out: “God is not quoting the OT, nor setting a puzzle for scripturally erudite hearers to unravel. He is declaring in richly allusive words that this man who has just been baptized by John is his own Son in whom he delights. From this point on Matthew’s readers have no excuse for failing to understand the significance of Jesus’ ministry, however long it may take the actors in the story to reach the same christological conclusion (14:33; 16:16; 26:63–64). It will be this crucial revelation of who Jesus is which will immediately form the basis of the initial testing which Jesus is called to undergo in 4:1–11: “If you are the Son of God …” (4:3, 6). And there, as in the account of the baptism, Jesus’ sonship will be revealed in his obedience to his Father’s will.” (Matthew, 124)

Image credit: The Baptism of Christ, Juan Fernández de Navarrete, “El Mudo” | Museo del Prado, Madrid | Wikimedia Commons | PD-US

Japanese Isolation

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In the previous post, in the broadest of terms, we traced the relationship of China (and by extension Korea) and Japan from pre-history up to the 17th century and the beginning of the Edo period of Japanese history. Also known as the Tokugawa period, this was a period in Japan’s history which experienced prolonged peace and stability, urbanization, economic growth, and expansion of the arts and culture. During this period (1601-1868) the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional daimyo, or feudal lords.

The shogunate believed that the source of the previous era’s instability was the militarism and expansionism of Daimyo Hideyoshi, exacerbated by the dual effect of European traders and Christianity – most notably Portugal and Catholicism. Japan’s governance was dominated by regional daimyō who were rulers/war lords of regions (domains) of Japan. The daimyō discovered that direct trade with the Portuguese increased their wealth and power, even more so if the daimyō directed the people of the domain to accept Christianity. As a result, the traditional Shinto religion was weakened and, in some cases, virtually disappeared, especially among the poor and peasants. 

As a result, the Tokugawa Shogunate began to implement policies designed to limit the access of the regional daimyō to foreign trade. The collection of policies issued between 1633 and 1639 are known today as Sakoku which essentially translates as the “locking of the country.” The name was a description coined in a later period. In their own day they were known as the “maritime restrictions.” There were several issues that gave rise to these policies:

  • The need for control and stability: the Shogunate wanted to prevent powerful regional lords (daimyo) from gaining wealth and power through foreign trade, which could challenge the central government’s control.
  • Elimination of European colonial influence: to remove the colonial ambitions of Spain and Portugal, who were perceived as threats while at the same time restrict Dutch trade to Nagasaki
  • Fear of Christianity: the Tokugawa Shogunate viewed Christianity as a subversive force that threatened the social order and the Shogun’s authority, leading to the persecution of Christians and expulsion of missionaries. The advantage of the Dutch trading relationship is that the Dutch Trading companies had no interest in evangelization.

Of interest were restrictions on Japanese citizens. The 1633 edict prohibited any Japanese citizen who had lived abroad for 5 years or more from ever returning to Japan. In 1638, the prohibition was expanded to exclude any Japanese citizen who had ever resided abroad for any amount of time.

During the implementation of the policies, the Shimabara Revolt gave an added incentive to further expand the restriction so as to preserve Tokugawa supremacy, enforce a rigid social structure, and ensure internal peace.

Shimabara Revolt

There was one major disturbance to the relative peace of the Edo period: the Shimabara Revolt. The daimyō of the Shimabara Domain levied incredibly high taxes on the people in order to build Shimabara Castle and other regal endeavors. The daimyō was very anti-Christian, a faith popular among the poor, because he believed it was destructive of the social order. There were strict laws in the Domain prohibiting Christianity which was actively persecuted. In December 1637, an alliance of local rōnin and mostly Catholic peasants rebelled against the Tokugawa shogunate due to discontent over the daimyō policies. The Tokugawa shogunate sent a force of over 125,000 troops supported by the Dutch to suppress the rebels who were defeated.

After the rebellion’s end, the shogunate forces executed an estimated 37,000 rebels and sympathizers as punishment. The daimyō, whose policies had fomented the revolt, was executed. The shogunate suspected that European Catholics had been involved in spreading the rebellion. As a result, the Portuguese traders were driven out of the country, an existing ban on Christian religion was strongly enforced, and an already ongoing policy of national seclusion was made stricter by 1639. Christianity in Japan survived only by going underground.

Sakoku … sort of…

Japan highly regulated its borders to most foreigners from 1639 until the mid-1850s. This isolation, enforced by banning most foreigners from entering and Japanese from leaving, lasted over 200 years until American “gunboat diplomacy” forced Japan to change policies, leading to the Meiji Restoration and modernization. In the retelling of the event, the myth grew that Admiral Perry’s sailing into Tokyo Bay forcibly opened Japan. Japan was “closed” to economic trade with the U.S., but Japan was never “closed.”

Japan was not “closed” under the sakoku policy. There was extensive trade with China through the port of Nagasaki, in the far west of Japan, that included a residential area for the Chinese. As well there were trade and diplomatic missions received from Korea. On a smaller scale there was also trade with the people of Hokkaido (in modern times the northernmost home island of Japan, then a separate Aniu people.) There was also trade with the Ryūkyū Kingdom whose major island is Okinawa.  The only European contact permitted was the Dutch enclave on Dejima Island in Nagasaki harbor. Western scientific, technical and medical innovations flowed into Japan through Rangaku (“Dutch learning”). In this way Japan was still open to the developments in Europe of science and other topics.

Natural Isolation

Japan was “isolated” in ways that were natural to its context. It is an island nation whose closest neighbors, China and Korea, lived on the other side of the “Sea of Japan,” a body of water known by the Koreans as the “East Sea” and by the Chinese as the “Whale Sea.” It is a body of water which is often turbulent and stormy and thus naturally limits movement and trade between Japan and its mainland neighbors.

In addition to the maritime isolation, the topology of Japan contains mountain ranges that separate the eastern and western parts of Japan. This limited movement and contact between domains naturally led to a variety of dialects. By the 17th-century Japan had a variety of dialects (hōgen), with significant differences between eastern and western regions, and the Edo (Tokyo) dialect gaining influence over the traditional Kansai (Kyoto) standard during the Edo Era. The relative stability of the Tokugawa era, coupled with restrictions on movement between domains, allowed regional dialects to flourish and diverge further.

Japan was also “isolated” by language from its closest neighbors. Japanese and Korean languages are typologically similar (how the language works) and share loanwords from Chinese, but they aren’t genetically related to Chinese or necessarily each other. A whimsical description is that they are more like cousins who grew up in different houses but borrowed furniture from the same rich relative (China).

We will continue this look into Japan’s “isolation” period in our next post when the Americans arrive in the Western Pacific.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives.

The Baptism of Jesus

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This coming Sunday we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord. The scene is filled with eschatological overtones. The heavens are opened, a voice comes from heaven, the Spirit is given. The Judaism of Jesus’ day  tended to regard all of these elements as the revelatory gifts of God that happened in now-past OT times and that no longer occurred. But they also believed those signs would reappear in the “last days.”  What becomes clear is it is not the baptism that is central to Matthew’s  narrative, but the events that follow. Those events reveal the beginning of the long awaited eschatological events of salvation.

Different scholars will give varying accents and background to the three signs – mostly surrounding the idea of fulfilling all righteousness. In Jesus’ baptism, he and John fulfilled the OT by revealing the Messiah to Israel. This baptism, an inauguration of Jesus’ ministry to Israel, led immediately to OT fulfillment in that the Spirit, as a dove, came upon the Messiah and the Father endorsed his Son in the voice from heaven. In baptism, Jesus as the servant proclaimed and exemplified the righteousness envisioned by the prophets. Additionally he identified in baptism with the repentant righteous remnant within the nation of Israel (Mt 3:5–6). His baptism reveals his humility and anticipates his ministry to lowly but repentant people..

The Spirit. The Baptism, with all its import and significance, is followed by a quite revelatory event: “ …and behold, the heavens were opened (for him), and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove (and) coming upon him.” (Mt 3:16).

The opening of heaven is familiar elsewhere in the NT as an expression for a visionary experience occurring in John, Acts, and Revelation. In the OT, perhaps the significant parallel is Ezekiel 1:1. Standing beside a river, Ezekiel sees heaven opened and receives a vision and hears God’s voice commissioning him for his prophetic role, later giving him the Spirit (Ezek 2:2). In Isaiah 63, the prophet pleads with God to tear open the heaven, come down, and save his people. There is ample precedence for the opening of heaven to be the prelude to the divine communication and the giving of the Spirit.

The descent of the Spirit of God echoes the well-known messianic prophecies in Isaiah which say that God will place his Spirit upon his chosen servant. As R.T. France points out, this does not mean that before now Jesus has been without the Spirit, since Matthew has attributed his birth to the Spirit (1:18, 20). But now as the Spirit descends on Jesus, He is visibly equipped and commissioned to undertake his messianic mission. (Matthew, 121)

One wonders if Mathew also has in mind the hovering of the Spirit above the water of creation in Genesis. Does Matthew understand Jesus’ baptism as a “new creation,” a genesis? The word “genesis” is the word and idea with which Matthew begins the genealogy (1:1, 18).  

When the Spirit comes upon people in Acts it is evident in their subsequent behavior, speaking in tongues and preaching boldly rather than in any visible “descent.” But such is not the case at Pentecost. (Acts 2:2–3) when we read of both audible and visible phenomena, wind and fire. The Baptism of Jesus is the only occasion when we hear of the Spirit appearing in visual, corporeal form, “like a dove.” Is there an OT precedence for this? There is certainly no direct connection, but some scholars think that perhaps Matthew has in mind a “fusion” of water, new creation, and the flood narrative when all begins again with Noah sending out the dove. Interesting, but speculative.

Image credit: The Baptism of Christ, Juan Fernández de Navarrete, “El Mudo” | Museo del Prado, Madrid | Wikimedia Commons | PD-US

Overcoming Fear with Faith: A New Year’s Reflection

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It’s a new year and each time January brings a mixture of hope and anxiety. We have hopes for 2026, but we carry unresolved worries, unanswered questions, and fears that did not politely stay behind in 2025. The readings for today come at the right time.

In the Gospel, the disciples are doing exactly what Jesus told them to do. He sent them ahead in the boat. And yet obedience has not spared them fear. They are exhausted, battered by the relentless wind and just can’t make any headway – sound familiar? Then they are confronted with something they cannot interpret: Jesus walking toward them on the sea. This is way out of their comfort zone; they think it is a ghost and are terrified. We know those moments when we are out of our comfort zone and the unexpected initiates a fear response. Fear distorts perception. Like the apostles, when we are afraid, even the saving presence of God might be perceived as threatening. What is meant to help us can feel like something that will overwhelm us.

At the start of 2026, maybe our fears are not as dramatic as the apostles – maybe they are. Great or small, the fear, the uneasiness we might sense is real:

  • fear of instability in the economy, the end-of-January potential shutdown of the government, inflation, and more;
  • fear of illness, aging, or decline – those small aches and pains that no longer resolve themselves;
  • fear of loneliness, being misunderstood, or left behind –  our friends moving, passing away, or in their decline, no longer recognize us.
  • Fear that a loved one has reached the end of their earthly life.
  • …name the fear that lurks in your life. We all have them.

Like the disciples, we are rowing hard and making little headway, and we wonder what’s next.

It is into these moments that Jesus speaks – then and now: “Take courage. It is I. Do not be afraid.”

Those words, “It is I,” are not casual reassurance. In the Greek they echo the divine name — “I AM.” Jesus is not simply saying, “It’s okay.” He is saying, “God is here.” The One who comes toward them across the chaos is not a ghost, not an illusion, not a threat, but the living presence of God entering their fear. Notice that He does not shout instructions from a distance. He gets into the boat. And only then does the wind die down.

That is crucial for us. God does not usually remove our fears by eliminating all danger or uncertainty. He removes fear by sharing our vulnerability. Love steps into the boat. This is exactly what the Letter of John names so clearly: “There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear.”

Fear is sinful or a sign of weak faith. Love does mean never feeling afraid. Jesus tells us something more realistic and more hopeful: fear loses its power when we allow ourselves to be loved and when we choose to love in return. Think about it: fear makes us close us in on ourselves. We become defensive, cautious, and suspicious. Love does the opposite. Love opens us up and makes room for others. Love steps into the boat even when gale winds continue and the wave unrelenting. Love is what can make fear loosen its grip.

We don’t have to love perfectly or fearlessly. It is enough that we love faithfully. It is in the active decision to love that we become free and more easily live a life of patience, generosity, forgiveness, and hope. Our vision clears and we recognize Christ in our midst and in others.

Maybe a prayer for our mornings might be, “Lord, get in the boat with me. Still the storms or at least give me the courage to not need to control, but to love freely. Your presence is stronger than my fear.”

Christ stilling the storm on the Sea of Galilee | Ludolf Bakhuizen | 1695 | Indianapolis Museum of Art | PD

China and Japan: A History

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At the end of the previous post, a question was posited: “How did the currents of history bring the U.S. and Japan to this point in history when sanctions and an embargo were the final domino that moved the flames of war to become the firestorm that was the Asia-Pacific War from December 1941 until September 1945?” There is a lot of history upstream of the 1930s and 1940s to consider, but when one reads widely about the period, one recurring topic is China. Japan seemed to be possessed by an inexorable attraction for China. Look at a modern map of China and compare it to a map of East Asia in 1940.  Japan occupies all of Manchuria (while trying to pass it off as the independent nation of Manchukuo), has encroached southward into what the Japanese called “mainland China” or simply “China.” Japan also controls virtually every major port along the South China Sea, East China Sea and the Yellow Sea. Meanwhile in the interior of China, Japan controlled vast areas to the Northeast and set up collaborationist regimes, with the Nationalist (KMT) government under Chiang Kai-shek and a loose affiliation of local war lords retreating to the interior and the Communists fighting from their bases to the Northwest. It created an incredibly complex military and political landscape.

If the Japanese were interested in securing the flanks of their advance to the oil and resource rich areas to the south, it would seem diplomatic means and mutually benefiting treaties and agreement would be more efficient and economical. But when one looks at the arc of history between the two nations it tells the tale of an apprentice who grows up and seeks to dominate the one who was once master. And so, in this post, I will attempt to paint with the broadest of strokes and cover 2,000 years of history between the two nations. There will be gaps, a lack of historical details, and a rash of broad assertions trying to summarize periods of the history. But the purpose is to place the 20th century conflict in a large current of regional and world history.

In the beginning

The Japanese archipelago was largely inhabited by the Jōmon people who were hunter-gatherers. During the 1st millennium BC, the Yayoi people migrated to Japan and quickly became dominant. There are different theories as to their origin: Korea or different parts of China, but what is clear is that they brought rice farming with them, beginning a slow transition from a hunter-gathering period to an agrarian society.  If one took a snapshot of Japan in the 3rd century (AD), it would largely be an agrarian society. The people (known variously as Wajin or Yamoto) were marked by settled farming (largely rice), metal tools and metallurgy learned from mainland Asia, the development of fortified villages, early social stratification where accumulation of wealth through land ownership and grain storage fostered social hierarchy, and all the elements for later more developed social and political structures.  Over time, as with most cultures, the politics moved from clans to chiefdoms, but without centralized government. But by 300 AD Japan experienced the rise of powerful regional leaders. The history of this period is thin, but the legends are plentiful.

The first recorded encounters, taken from Chinese dynastic histories, describe Japan (Wa) as a group of polities engaged in tribute and trade. It was clear that China was in the dominant position as the Japanese leaders sent tribute missions to Chinese courts to gain prestige, acquire recognized titles, and especially to gain access to advanced technology and knowledge. The Chinese character 倭 denoted the nation and the people of Japan. It translated to “dwarf” – which as you can imagine did not find favor with Japan who replaced it with 和 “harmony, peace, balance”.

Nonetheless, unwanted moniker aside, Japan gained writing (Chinese characters), bronze and iron technologies, and the introduction of Confucian ethical ideas. In the mix and middle of all this It is noteworthy that Baekje (one of the ancient three kingdoms that form Korea) often acted as a main intermediary. Its geographical location allowed it to trade with China and Japan and made it the natural route from Japan to the heart of China. Baekje’s contribution to Japanese culture is notable in pottery and Buddhism.

In what is known as the Yamato and Asuka Periods (6th–7th centuries) there was an active effort on the part of the Japanese to learn Chinese models of statecraft. Japan adopted and adapted centralized bureaucracy, legal codes and a calendar system. Students were sent to study administration, law, architecture, and religion but one can see the first movements of the apprentice beginning to rise. Records reveal correspondence asserting Japan’s dignity and implying an equality with the Chinese Emperor.

Part of that insistence is likely related to the idea of the Japanese Emperor. Legend holds that the first was Emperor Jimmu believed to have been born around 711 BC on the island of Kyūshū. He is said to be a descendant of the sun goddess Amaterasu. Most modern scholars regard Jimmu and the nine first emperors as mythical. Emperor Sujin, the 10th emperor, may have been a real historical figure, but even then the reach and reign of control was likely very regional and not across the entire archipelago.

In any case, in the early 8th century, known as the Nara period, was the age when the Emperor began to exert control. Administrative, civil and criminal codes were introduced (Ritsuryō), the land was organized into Provinces and Districts, and a caste system was introduced. The city Nara was the first urban population center. It had 200,000 residents – approximately 7% of the nation. The Nara period was the high point of Chinese influence. At this point Japan was fully embedded in the East Asian order with all traces of subordination to China largely gone.

By 894 AD, Japan stopped official missions to China. The Chinese Tang dynasty was greatly diminished, the Japanese were confident in their own institutions, and Chinese knowledge was considered acquired and was beginning to be considered “classical” rather than current/modern. For the next 800 years or so, until the late 16th or early 17th centuries, the relationship was largely trade with occasional moments of diplomacy when one side or the other wanted something. When China was in the ascendancy, it required Japan to become a tribute state in order to trade. When Japan was in the ascendancy, it left the tribute status. But in the big picture of East Asia, for thousands of years, China had been the intellectual, economic, military, and political center of East Asia. 

During the Edo Period, things changed – and not for the better. On the Korean peninsula an internal reconfiguration of power led the Korean Emperor to become a tribute state to China – but as the most favored state – now a virtual part of China. Meanwhile, by the last decade of the 16th century, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the most preeminent daimyo, had unified all of Japan, bringing about a period of peace. Hideyoshi was not emperor or part of the imperial lineage (and that is a complicated story, best left to others) but he was a “man with a plan.” He planned to invade China, in effect attempting to claim for Japan the role traditionally played by China as the center of the East Asian international order. As relayed to Jesuit missionaries, Hideyoshi spoke not only of his desire to invade China, but also subjugating the smaller neighbouring states of the Ryukyu Islands (Okinawa), Formosa (Taiwan), and the Philippines.

This was the first evidence (I found) of a Japanese vision of supreme leadership of East Asia. If the metaphor of apprentice-master once had meaning, that was no longer true. From this point in history, China and Japan are dedicated rivals.

Hideyoshi’s first international action was to invade Korea. He tried to solicit the assistance of Portugal, to no avail. Nonetheless he started what became known as the Imjin War, a series of two Japanese invasions of Korea. The first was in 1592 with a brief truce in 1596, and a second invasion in 1597. The conflict ended in 1598 with the withdrawal of Japanese forces from the Korean Peninsula after a military stalemate in Korea’s southern provinces. This period is interesting in that it sets a pattern: unified government, warrior culture dominated society (samurai), a reasonable naval force was available, and a vision of regional leadership as ordained by the gods – and in the background was the Imperial line, descendents of the sun goddess Amaterasu.

While still in the Edo Period, now post-1600, Japan stabilized internally during the Tokugawa shogunate. This ended the period of expansionism, but also restricted diplomacy. China remained a cultural source but no longer considered politically superior. The Tokugawa shogun initiated policies designed to limit the access of the word to Japan. The collection of policies issued between 1633 and 1639 are known today as Sakoku which essentially translates as the “locking of the country.” 

And so remained the nation until Admiral Perry sailed into Tokyo Bay.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives. Top image generated by WordPress AI on Jan-526

All Righteousness

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This coming Sunday we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord. 14 John tried to prevent him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and yet you are coming to me?” 15 Jesus said to him in reply, “Allow it now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”

Righteousness (dikaiosýnē) is a complex concept rooted in the Hebrew ṣedeq-ṣĕdāqâ and mišpāṭ.  In short, as used by Matthew, dikaiosýnē refers to right conduct before God. This is the consistent usage in Matthew. Jesus is baptized so as to do what is right with God (3:15). The hungering and thirsting of 5:6 is for a right state before God. Yet this righteousness is God’s gift (6:33). It is to be sought with his kingdom. It brings persecution (5:10). It includes the practice of piety (6:1). The way in which the Baptist came is that of right conduct (21:32).

Boring (Matthew, New Interpreters Bible, 160) comments on the phrase:

Both righteousness and fulfillment are key Matthean theological themes. Righteousness here means, as often elsewhere, doing the revealed will of God. Here, fulfill seems to mean simply “do, perform,” and the meaning is that it is necessary for both John and Jesus to do God’s will, which includes the baptism of Jesus. The plural “us” links John and Jesus together as partners in carrying out God’s saving plan (11:2-19). 

The First Temptation of Christ. Brian Stoffregen has an interesting insight about righteousness as “do, perform” what God requires of us.  

John, by trying to prevent the baptism, tempts Jesus not to do all that God requires of him. He tempts Jesus to assume his proper position now: to be the more powerful one; to baptize with the judgmental Holy Spirit and fire; to meet John’s need. I don’t think that these are too dissimilar to the devil’s temptations that occur immediately after the baptism (4:1-11) — temptations for Jesus to use his power now, for his own glory; and avoid his emptying and eventually the pain and suffering of the cross.

What does God require of Jesus? Is it just the baptism? I think that baptism is only part of the picture of Jesus identifying with sinful humanity: the Sinless One is baptized for the forgiveness of sin; the Holy One eats/fellowships with unholy sinners; the Immortal One dies on a cross as a criminal. It is part of the emptying of himself — the God who becomes truly human.

In fact, the “emptying,” occurs even earlier in Matthew. We have been told that the child has been conceived from the Holy Spirit. We have been told that “Jesus” will save his people from their sins. We have been told that he will be called “Immanuel” — God is with us. What happens to this very special child after his birth? He has to flee for his life. The one, who will save his people, has to be saved from Herod. The one who is “God-with-us” has to flee from the Promised Land. He (and his parents) are acting as people who have been emptied of power.

This thought is highly reflective of Philippians 2:6-11 in which Jesus empties himself “becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.”  This passage from Philippians strongly echoes Is 53:12 which speaks of the “Suffering Servant” of God – one who does what is right before God and thus fulfills all righteousness.

Image credit: The Baptism of Christ, Juan Fernández de Navarrete, “El Mudo” | Museo del Prado, Madrid | Wikimedia Commons | PD-US