Amakusa Shiro (1/2)Christians Fallen in the Shimabara Rebellion

After the Sengoku period ended and Japan was unified, Christianity was permitted, albeit with restrictions on missionary work. However, in the Edo period restrictions became stricter, and Christians were eventually persecuted.

However, by the time missionary work and faith were banned, there were many Christians other than the samurai, and a large-scale rebellion broke out in Shimabara, Kyushu, in rebellion against the oppression. We will introduce Amakusa Shiro, who is said to have led the Shimabara Rebellion.

About the name Amakusa Shiro

Amakusa Shiro is said to have been born around 1621. He was a devout Christian and was a central figure in the rebel forces during the Shimabara Rebellion.

His real name was Masuda Tokisada. He was originally baptized as "Geronimo" in Christianity, but later changed his name to "Francisco." In this article, we will refer to him as Amakusa Shiro, by whom he is generally known.

From childhood to the eve of the Shimabara Rebellion

Amakusa Shiro was born and raised in Ebe Village, Uto County, Higo Province, Kyushu (present-day Asahi Town, Uto City, Kumamoto Prefecture), and it is said that he went to live with his relatives in Oyano Village accompanied by his father just before the Shimabara Rebellion broke out.

The fact that he was born in Higo can also be confirmed from Duarte Collete's notes.

He visited Nagasaki several times for academic training, and is said to have moved to Amakusa accompanied by his father just before the Shimabara Rebellion. It is believed that he converted to Christianity in Nagasaki, but the details are unknown.

One less credible theory, recorded in the Nagasaki Place Name Study, is that Shiro lived in Hamamachi, Nagasaki, and the ruins of his house remained to this day, but this is probably just a legend.

It is said that he was born with charisma. Also, because he grew up in an economically privileged environment, he was familiar with academics from an early age and had a good education.

It is believed that he was embraced as a savior by former retainers of the Konishi clan and Christians, and was gradually deified.
There are also anecdotes about him performing various miracles, like Jesus Christ, such as instantly restoring a blind girl's sight after touching her, walking on the surface of the sea with ease, and releasing a dove from his hand.

However, many of these legends and anecdotes are also recorded in the four Gospels of the New Testament as miracles performed by Jesus Christ, and it is thought that these stories were probably fabricated and spread around in order to increase Shiro's charisma and fame.

Summary of the Shimabara Rebellion

The Shimabara Rebellion was a large-scale rebellion against the Edo Shogunate, mainly led by peasants and Christians, that broke out in the Shimabara and Amakusa regions from October 25, 1637 (December 11, 1637) to February 28, 1638 (April 12, 1638). It is also called the "Shimabara-Amakusa Rebellion" or the "Shimabara-Amakusa Rebellion," but is generally referred to as the "Shimabara Rebellion" in textbooks and other sources. This article will use the term Shimabara Rebellion throughout.

It is believed that the people of the Hizen Shimabara Peninsula, where the Shimabara Domain ruled by Matsukura Katsuie was located, and the Higo Amakusa Islands, an exclave of the Karatsu Domain ruled by Terasawa Taketaka, were impoverished by the harsh treatment of peasants, excessive tax burdens, and harsh punishments such as being burned alive if they could not pay, as well as the harsh persecution of Christians (Catholics) by the domains and the damage from famine, and launched a rebellion against both feudal domains.
The rebellion involved not only farmers but also townspeople involved in fishing, industry, and commerce, as well as ronin, making it a fairly diverse group of people.

Shimabara was the territory of the Christian daimyo Arima Harunobu, and Christianity was popular among the domain's residents, but in 1614, the Arima clan was transferred and Matsukura Shigemasa was appointed from Yamato Gojo in his place.

Shigemasa was commissioned to carry out the official construction work for the reconstruction of Edo Castle, he independently planned an expedition to Luzon Island and sent an advance party, and he also built a new Shimabara Castle, and in order to cover the costs he exacted excessive taxes from the people of his domain.

They also began severely oppressing Christians, and records from the Dutch trading post chief Nicholas Koeckebacker and Portuguese captains reveal that they subjected peasants who could not pay taxes and Christians who refused to convert to Christianity to cruel torture and execution.

Matsukura Katsuie, who succeeded Shigemasa, also inherited Shigemasa's political stance and implemented similarly harsh taxation. The Shimabara Rebellion was a large-scale rebellion and civil war in the early Edo period, and can be said to be the largest civil war since the Siege of Osaka by the Toyotomi clan, excluding the turbulent period at the end of the Edo period.

The meaning of the land called Amakusa

Amakusa was originally the territory of the Christian feudal lord Konishi Yukinaga.

After the Battle of Sekigahara, Terasawa Hirotaka joined the clan, and until the time of the next clan leader, Kentaka, the clan continued to be oppressed and Christians were suppressed in the same way as in Shimabara.

Contemporary records such as the "Hosokawa Family Chronicles" and the "Amakusa Shima Kagami" state that the cause of the rebellion was excessive tax collection, but Matsukura Katsuie, the lord of Shimabara domain, refused to admit his own mismanagement and claimed that the rebels were united by Christianity, and therefore claimed that the rebellion was a Christian riot.

The Edo Shogunate also used the Shimabara Rebellion as an excuse to oppress Christians, which has led to the widespread view of the Shimabara Rebellion as a "Christian rebellion (religious war)."

However, since this rebellion also involved ronin who served the Arima and Konishi families, as well as supporters of the Amakusa and Shiki clans, the original indigenous lords, the commonly held image of it being a "Christian religious war" is only one side of the story.
Perhaps for this reason, to this day, Christians who fought on the side of the rebels have not been recognized as martyrs.

Matsukura Shigemasa's plan to invade Luzon

In 1630, Matsukura Shigemasa proposed to the shogunate that he invade Luzon Island.
The third shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu, refrained from making a firm commitment to sending Japanese troops to Manila, but allowed Shigemasa to investigate the possibility and prepare military forces.

On December 14, 1630, Shigemasa, with the cooperation of Nagasaki Magistrate Takenaka Shigeyoshi, sent two of his retainers, Yoshioka Kuroemon and Kimura Gonnosuke, to Manila to investigate the Spanish defenses.

They disguised themselves as merchants and traveled to Luzon under the pretext of discussing trade development. Each was accompanied by ten foot soldiers, but on the return journey in a storm, all ten of Kimura's men were killed. The advance party to Manila returned to Japan in July 1631, but the Spanish side was on high alert until July 1632.

Shigemasa is said to have collected 3,000 bows and matchlock guns for military purposes. The plan was thwarted by the sudden death of the commander of the invasion, Shigemasa Matsukura, and a Japanese invasion of the Philippines was also considered by his son, Katsuie Matsukura, in 1637.

The Dutch were initially convinced that Tokugawa Iemitsu had conceived the plan to invade the Philippines in 1637, but in fact it was not the Shogun but Sakakibara Motonao and Baba Toshishige who came up with the idea.

Although the expeditionary force had to be supplied by feudal lords such as Matsukura Katsuie on behalf of the Shogun, the number of troops was expected to be 10,000, double the number that Matsukura Shigemasa had planned. Matsukura Katsuie was the leading candidate to be the commander in chief for the conquest of the Philippines, but the Shimabara Rebellion that occurred in the same year dealt a fatal blow to the expedition plan.

Shimabara Rebellion

Unable to bear the harsh tax collection, the people of Shimabara organized themselves under the leadership of vassals of the former Arima clan, who held leading positions in the region, and secretly began planning a rebellion.