How were The Hidden Christians Treated during the Edo Period?

What Does it look like

Hidden and camouflaged

Example: Camouflaged Ways of worship through hidden storages of drawings of the Mother Mary, and rearranging stones on top of the coffin of the dead into a cross for prayer and rearranging it again once finished.

Lasted untill the law was removed in 1873 Meji 6 Era.

Big Ideas

Faith In Secrecy: Euthanized and Demonized in faith, under fierce adversity through the governmental laws which saw christianity as a threat, as it was a time of SE Asian colonization, and Japan was a very closed minded state, not letting Western Influences in issueing a ban on Christianity in 1614, and issuing a law to register to a temple to prove they weren't christian in 1630's.

Cultural Adaptation: camouflaged their ways of worship through buddhist and shinto beliefs, often using symbolism from both those cultures to represent christian ones, and usually hiding mundane and everyday things to hide their faith including the use of the christian calendar, or the use of drawing stored in hidden storages.

Community and Identity: The resilience and the undying perserverance of the community of the Christians despite the demonization of their religion, was vital for its survival during the troubling time of Edo Japan.

Perspectives Omitted/ Questioned/ Challenged

Non-Christian Japanes Communities: Allyship or not? how were the Christians seen socially? what was it influenced by? Propaganda?

Abandoned Faith: Survival Based Integration from Hidden Christians due to the aggressive and oppresive nature of the christian identity.

Which questions can this source help me answer? Which can it not?

Perspectives Ommitted

Perspectives Unincluded

Big Ideas Surrounding Hidden Christianity

Big Ideas Left Out

What it Looks Like

Who Wrote it and Why

How it Is depicted and Why

Who Wrote it(Video)

Kakure Kirishitan Descendants

How is it Depicted and Why?

It is Depicted through the lens of the Kakure Kirishitan(Hidden Christians) Descendants who talk about how they have bled history, and how this blood has strengthened the DNA that is now the community of the Christian faith in Japan.

Ideas left Out

Women were seldom talked about during the history of Hidden Christians, but they have sustained a crucial role in teaching and sustaining the faith and traditions through teachings and healing, often being the Leaders of the organized commuinties and role models.

Psychological impact: There was lots of humiliation rituals and inhumane ways they killed them, including Crucifixion upon capturing on the hill of Nishikaze, they didn't discriminate upon women nor kids, which had a big impact on the victims and survivors of the religion


Transmission of Faith: The ways in which the faith was spread and practiced, and passed down through a generation where it was absent of written records.

Perspectives Reflected

Hidden Christians: Accounts of history and orgins

Japanese Authorities: Governmental Creed acknowledging the suppression of Christianity through the Tokugawa Shogunate Laws and Policies

Modern Descendants: Descendants of The Hidden Christians talking about the history and highlighting the key information for more awareness of what the hidden christians had to sustain from.