A Visit to Japan by Arthur Grosvenor Daniells

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 15, 1915

A Visit to Japan

By Arthur Grosvenor Daniells

As Brethren Fulton and Johanson had consented to comply with the earnest request given them to attend the workers’ meeting and biennial conference of the Asiatic Division Mission to be held at Shanghai, May 1-14, they joined Elder Porter, Professor Salisbury, and me on our return to China. At Hongkong, Professor Salisbury left us, to return to his work in India. Personally, I felt this separation very much. It had been five months since Brother Salisbury met me on my arrival in India. He had traveled with me over his large field, acquainting me with its conditions and needs, and counseling with me regarding various plans for the more rapid advancement of the work. These associations in gospel work bind hearts together in strong, close bonds of brotherhood. I shall ever remember with pleasure this visit to India.

From Hongkong, our company journeyed north to Japan, spending one day at Shanghai on the way. As soon as we could get ashore, we were bundled into jinrikishas and hurried out to our mission compound, the headquarters of the Asiatic Division. Here we had the pleasure of meeting a large number of former acquaintances and fellow workers,—Sister Porter, the Drs. Selmon, Brother and Sister Woodward and their daughter Mary. Brother and Sister Gillis, Brother and Sister Wood, Brother and Sister Blunden, Sister Shull, Sister Hall, and Brother and Sister Stafford.

Dr. Selmon gathered the students in the chapel that we might meet them all together, and speak a few words of greeting. Time did not permit of anything like a close inspection of our buildings and facilities at this headquarters; a closer examination will be made on our return to the conference, but the general appearance seems good.

Our first sight of Japan was at Nagasaki, which presented a beautiful view. We were met here by our Japanese minister, Elder Kuniya, and a number of Sabbath keepers living in the city. Word from Elder DeVinney, superintendent of the Japan Mission, made it seem best for Elder Porter to leave our boat and hasten on by train to Tokio. Our ride through the Inland Sea, of Japan, must be placed among the most interesting and beautiful sea voyages we have ever made. Hundreds of beautiful islands, covered with dark-green foliage, rise from the water in every direction.

At Kobe, Dr. Noma and her sanitarium family came onto our boat to give us a warm Japanese welcome to their city and country. Here I left the boat; and after an hour’s visit at the sanitarium, Elder Kuniya and I hurried on by train to Tokio.

Once more we were made glad by the sight and the handshake of fellow workers, who had been together some days attending a workers’ meeting. After a long effort, our brethren in Japan have succeeded in securing a block of land in a suburb of Tokio, where they have erected good buildings for their headquarters. They have a neat, well-planned printing house, a good school building, and a number of residences for those whose duties make it necessary for them to live at the headquarters. They ought to have more land, but on account of prices they purchased only what they actually need for their buildings.

It gave me pleasure to meet our Japanese workers. Elder Okohira is located at headquarters, doing editorial and school work. Elder Kuniya is located at Kobe, and is doing evangelistic work in different parts of the kingdom. These are earnest, loyal men of good influence in Japan, and their wives are fully united with them in their work. In the printing office, the school, and also in the field work, we have promising young men helping to advance the cause in their native land: and this is what I find in every country I visit. God is raising up efficient, reliable, consecrated men and women wherever his cause is established, to join in quickly finishing his work throughout the world.

It is a remarkable and significant fact that as soon as people in these lands accept the third angel’s message, a great

desire fills their hearts to make it known to others. They are ready to cut loose from any work in which they have been engaged, to give their lives to the advancement of this cause. So I find them in the ministry, in the schools, and the printing houses, in the Bible work, in translating and editorial work, in the canvassing work, and in every other kind of endeavor. Each one seems suited to some special work, and is happy to take up that which it is thought he can do best; and the blessing of the Lord attends their efforts. Through them God is causing his work to advance in all directions.

Our message has not made the progress in Japan that it has in most other countries of the Far East. From the general reports of missionary endeavor in Japan during the last fifty years, we should naturally expect our work to make greater headway there than in these other countries, but in this we have been disappointed. Whether this failure is mainly due to lack of workers and facilities and to defective methods, or to conditions and influences in Japan, it may be impossible to say. But one thing seems certain now, and that is that a change of religious sentiment has taken place in Japan that will make our work much more difficult in the future than it has been in the past. This change is very pronounced, and is clearly recognized by all gospel workers in Japan. It is expressed by those who are studying the trend of affairs there in such statements as, “reaction against Christianity and Christian civilization,” and “a natural swing back of the pendulum from an excessive estimate of everything Western to an equally excessive estimate of everything Japanese,” including the “discount of foreign missionaries and of their message.”

A book just published, written by one of the most hopeful, optimistic workers in the Far East, warns the missionary boards of America of the dangers that threaten the cause of Christianity in Japan. This writer says: “Two forces are at present contending for the possession of Japan—the one pagan, the other Christian; the one material, the other spiritual; the one for Christ, the other against him.” In speaking of the attitude of the leading young men of Japan toward Christianity, this writer says: “According to a careful estimate concerning the religious beliefs of the students of the Imperial University of Tokio, made by one familiar with their religious life, four hundred and fifty are said to be adherents of Shinto and Buddhism, and sixty of Christianity, while about one thousand five hundred are said to be professed atheists, and about three thousand agnostics.” In his endeavor to trace the causes of this reaction in Japan, he says: “The church also must bear its full share of the responsibility, in that it did not adequately press its advantage in the days when Japan was so marvelously open and responsive to Christian missions.”

In seeking to discover some way by which the Christian church may regain what has been lost by this backward swing, he says: “The striking need of Japan for Christian effort in the untouched interior, which missions have heretofore left to the Japanese church, forms one of the most significant elements in the religious situation in Japan. The rural population forms eighty per cent of the whole. . . . Both men and money must be sent, with larger consecration than ever before. . . . Of 772 towns, with a population of over 5,000 each, there are foreign workers in about one hundred, and Japanese workers in about one hundred more, while over five hundred towns and thousands of surrounding villages are untouched.”

I think it is the feeling of all our brethren in Japan who are best acquainted with the situation, that we, as well as other denominations, have lost much by failing to take full advantage of the opportunities that have been ours during the last twenty years. Our staff of workers has been too small and our facilities too inadequate for a strong advance. From now on, we shall work against a much stronger current of opposition than we have had to meet in the past.

In talking with Elder DeVinney regarding the future of our work in Japan, he pointed to the rural territory hardly touched as yet by any of the other missionary societies, especially to that in the north, as the place where he believed we ought now to press our work with great earnestness. Thus far our efforts have been confined chiefly to the large cities, where the indifference and opposition are the greatest of anywhere in Japan. But in order to make a very strong effort in the untouched territory of the north, it will be necessary to strengthen the staff of workers in the field.

We now have a printing house with facilities for doing a good work. We have young people at work selling our literature, and others who can be trained to sell it. We also have a good school in which our young people are receiving the education they need for efficiency in the work. We are now better equipped for an advance move in Japan than we have been at any previous time. Our young men who have gone to Japan during the last few years are learning the language. Elder Benson speaks it well. He has charge of the school in Tokio. Elder Hoffman is able to preach freely in Japanese. He is carrying on evangelistic work in Kobe. Brethren Webber and Anderson, who have recently gone to Japan, are making encouraging progress in the language school in Tokio. Our position will be greatly strengthened in this field when our missionaries are in good command of the language.

As we reviewed our present situation at the closing meeting of our council, all the workers unitedly and feelingly covenanted together before the Lord to endeavor, by his grace, to make the fullest possible use of every opportunity and facility within their reach for the advancement of God’s cause in Japan. The consecration of body, life, time, and all to the speedy finishing of the work was whole-hearted and sincere, and was accepted, I am sure, by the Lord.

A. G. DANIELLS.