Written in Stone

26 Martyrs and Sainthood

    The story of the 26 martyrs began near the end of the Azuchi-Momoyama or Shokuho period, a time in which Japan was being reunified by Toyotomi Hideyoshi after a Civil War.  During this time, Christianity had taken root in Japan and approximately 400,000 Japanese had converted, according to Chizuo Shibata (p. 11).  Shibata also said that a number of these conversions were inspired by visions of conquest.  Because the missionaries were debating about whether or not Japan should be conquered and colonized before evangelized, a number of the Japanese lords who heard these debates converted in order to gain weapons that they would then use to overpower the neighboring lords (Shibata, p.12).  In addition to the issues that this caused, Japan had to also struggle with the conflicts being played out between the "competing" factions of Catholicism (Jesuit, Franciscans, Dominicans) (Shibata, p. 12).  Eventually, Toyotomi Hideyoshi became suspicious of the Christians and issued a decree that was meant to expel the missionaries.  However, this decree had little effect as the decree was not properly enforced.  After some years, when he became more worried about the Christian influence, he decreed an order that would ultimately cause the 26 martyrs to be killed. ("Kirishitan;" Shibata, p. 15)   

    In early 1597, 

160 Christians were arrested, but an official, Mitsumari Ishida, a sympathizer of the Christians, had reduced the number of apprehended persons down to 24. Most of them were arrested in Kyoto, and they had part of their ears cut off and were forced to parade through the streets of Kyoto as a warning to the people of that city. Then they were brought to Sakai, a commercial seaport. From there, they were forced to travel on foot all the way down to Nagasaki, almost 500 miles in bitter winter weather. The forced march took more than a month. En route, two others joined them of their own will. So all together there were 26 believers, including 6 foreign missionaries. They were executed immediately when they arrived in Nagasaki, on Nishisaka, a hill overlooking the town. Their dead bodies were left on the crosses for many days. (Shibata, p. 15)

The fourth image in the gallery maps the journey made by the 26 from Kyoto to Nagasaki.  The 26 were taken to Nagasaki, because it was a large port city where the majority of foreigners conducted trades with the Japanese and where the majority of missionaries entered Japan.  

    In early February, the 26 arrived, and were eager to see the crosses waiting for them, as is recounted in Diego Yuki's "Martyr's HIll" and the "26 Martyrs' Story" link on the left sidebar of http://www.26martyrs.com/. 

The martyrs know that each has his own cross, because they have been made to measure. Fr. Ganzalo, the first to arrive, goes straight to one of the crosses: "Is this mine?" It is not. Taken to another cross, he kneels down and embraces it. The others, one after another, start doing the same. "That was quite a sight, the way Br. Philip was embracing his cross..., " comments one of the witnesses. ("26martyrs.com"; Yuki, p. 3)

Because 26martyrs.com and Yuki do not specifically indicate where they got this comment by the witnesses, I tried to find a source that did.  Instead, I found another version of this same scene with a different martyr that had been recounted by Atila Guimarães, Plinio Correa De Oliveira, and Siegfried Schneider:

On the way up the hill, a man tempted the youngest boy Louis Ibaragi, age 12, to renounce his faith. He would not yield but eagerly asked, “Where is my cross?” When they pointed out the smallest one to him, he immediately embraced it and held on to it as a child clings to his toy. (Guimarães & Correa De Oliveira; Schneider)

If the former version is true and each of the martyrs embraced their cross, then the latter could also be true, but in both cases, I did not find the original source for these stories.  It is possible that each of these segments came from each martyr's beatification materials, but, as Cornelius Conover (2008) said in his dissertation, beatification materials are not reliable, "Noting the stock phrases and rigid procedures of saintly processes, studies have concluded that clergymen manipulated testimony" (p.74).  Despite their lack of reliability, these segments are still part of the story that the church tells about itself, which means that in either case, at least some of the martyrs eagerly greeted their crosses and eventual death.  As the story on 26martyrs.com continues, it says that these men were not nailed to their crosses, but held their by chains and were given props to sit on.  One of the martyrs ended up being too short for his cross, and had to be tied around the chest.  Another martyr's prop was too low, so when his strength was failing him, he began to suffocate from the ring around his neck.  The executioners then crossed two lances in his chest, killing him.  This lancing technique was used on the other martyrs as well, and if the initial lancing somehow didn't kill the martyr, a thrust to the neck was added.  When all were dead (or thought to be dead) the crowd pushed through the guards and clamored for every piece of potential relic that they could get their hands on.  Then the bodies were left to hang for at least 37 days, according to Fr. Francis Calderon. ("26martyrs.com")

     Soon after the 26 were martyred, Toyotomi Hideyoshi died, and Tokugawa Ieyasu became the next leader, which marked the beginning of the Tokugawa era and the Edo period.  During this time, Christian persecution continued, and an estimated 40,000 Christians were killed as a result (Shibata, p. 16).  Of these, at least 650 were killed on Nishisaka Hill ("26martyrs.com").  In the mid 1600's, Tokugawa Iemitsu, Ieyasu's grandson and successor, issued the famous edicts that would effectively seclude Japan.  Some have blamed this seclusion on the conflicting relations with the Christian nations, but Kazui and Videen suggest that this one-to-one correalation cannot be made.  Tashiro Kazui and Susan Downing Videen, in their article, "Foreign Relations during the Edo Period: Sakoku Reexamined," said that it was commonly thought that, during this time, the continued trade with the Chinese and Dutch in Nagasaki was the only window to the rest of the world that Japan maintained. However, Kazui and Videen go on to say that Japan also maintained relations with the Korea and Ryukyu Islands, which therefore means that, "It is clear, then, that we must not limit our examination of foreign relations during this period to the role of Christianity and to Nagasaki and its relationship with Europe" (Kazui & Videen, p. 284-285).

    When the borders of Japan were reopened, church officials arrived to research the 26 martyrs' eligibility for sainthood.  In 1862, they were all canonized ("List of 26 Martyrs").  This is important, because this possibility of sainthood is likely what motivated many, including the 26, to become martyrs.  Saints are considered to be role models, they "represent the highest human realization of the religious profession in question" (George, 85).  In the Catholic tradition, it is also traditionally thought that saints have higher status in heaven (George, 85; "Saint").  According to Ferrero (2002) and Woodward (1996), around the time that the martyrs were killed, sainthood was roughly defined.  According to the latter source, sainthood was then connected to whether or not a popular cult had formed around the saint candidate(s) (p. 50).  Later, the criteria could be boiled down to doctrinal orthodoxy, miracles, heroic virtue, and martyrdom (Ferrero, 2002, p. 341).  Martyrdom is initially defined as one who willingly dies "for the faith at the hands of a tyrant who is opposed to the faith" (Woodward, 1996, p.129).  However, Woodard says that ideally the church wanted the martyr to be one whose witnessing provokes the tyrant.  According to the story, the 26 martyrs fell into the latter category.

     "Frequently Asked Question Regarding 4 STEPS TO SAINTHOOD" provides a simplified description of the current process of determining sainthood. While I have yet to find proof, I suspect that the process was much the same in 1862 as it is today.  According to Woodward (1996), achieving sainthood meant a few things.  It meant that the church would identify the saint from time to time and encourage the populace to emulate the saint's life (p. 13, 51), that the saint's life would be used by the church to tell stories about itself (p. 13), and that a feast day for celebrating the saint would be added to the church calendar (p. 51).  For the 26 martyrs it meant that (at the very least) Japan would one day build a museum and a shrine in their honor.  Both structures were built after the atomic bomb and were opened in 1956 (26martyrs.com). By the look of the website, it seems that the museum, while featuring the 26 martyrs, memorializes all of the Christians who died on Nishisaka Hill during the Edo period.  The relief on the side of the museum is the last image in this discourse's gallery.

Final Fantasy X Connection

       There is definitely a connection between the Catholic's saints and Final Fantasy X's high summoners, but the specific connection between the 26 martyrs and Final Fantasy X is not as easily found.  Using the zoom feature on the two maps below, you can see that there isn't a location based connection.  This is even more the case when you look at the map linked below these two maps which includes a marker at the birthplace of Final Fantasy X's scenario writer.  The scenario writer, Kazushige Nojima, was born in Sapporo, which is on Hokkaido Island--the northernmost of the main islands ("Kazushige Nojima").  SquareEnix's office is located in Shibuya, Tokyo, which is on Honshu Island--the largest of main islands ("BUSINESS LOCATIONS").  And the hill where the 26 martyrs were killed and where the museum was built is in Nagasaki, which is on the North Western side of Kyushu Island--the southernmost of the main islands.  While these locations do not suggest any connection between Final Fantasy X and the 26 martyrs, Tokyo's connection to Kyoto might suggest something.  If you remember, Kyoto was the place where 24 of the 26 martyrs were arrested.  Back during that time period, Kyoto was the capital of Japan instead of Tokyo.  When the capital of Japan moved to Tokyo, I doubt that anything related to the 26 martyrs moved with it, but there is still a chance.