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Spread of Christianity in Japan.

Many of European ships that arrived in the shores of Japan had Roman Catholic Missionaries. They wanted to convert the citizens of Japan to Christianity.

  • In 1549-1587, 150000 people were converted by the Jesuit missionaries under Francis Xavier in the Nagasaki area.

  • Hideyoshi asked all missionaries to leave in 1587 then later executed 26 of them.

  • When shogun Ieyasu died, the bakufu (the military government) started to get more and more concerned about the amount of people converting to Christianity in Japan.

  • The shougun were afraid that Christians (especially Christian daimyo) would follow their spritual leader instead of seeing the shogun as the ultimate authority.

  • Because of the fear of loss of power, Japan was closed off/isolated from the world (mostly the Europeans).

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