Eclipse of the Son: The Fate of the 1880s Revival in Meiji Japan

Abstract

Japanese Christianity in the 1880s was experiencing significant growth, so much so that missionaries were proclaiming that Japan would become the center of East Asian Christianity by the turn of the century. However, this trend reversed itself in the 1890s, when Christianity was no longer looked upon with favor by the Japanese people, and the rapid growth of the previous decade thus reversed itself into decline. After exploring Christianity’s rapid growth in the 1880s (which is rarely mentioned in “revival” literature, despite its resemblance to other, more famous revivals of the period), this article will explore several reasons for its reversal.