Event: Asian Studies Brown Bag Series

PTJC is happy to host Asian Studies Brown Bag Series.

This time, Yutao Lu is going to share his research with us on Wednesday, February 16, 2022.

Jolyon Baraka Thomas and Religious Freedom: The Development of Japanese Buddhism and Christianity in Pre-1947 Japan

Recent scholars have carefully revisited the discourse of Japanese religious freedom before 1945. Notably, Jolyon Baraka Thomas and his book, Faking Liberties: Religious Freedom in American-Occupied Japan. For Thomas, the creation and existence of secular Shintō, or State Shintō, only reflected how the so-called secular state interfered and harmed religious freedom in pre-1945 Japan rather than one particular religious organization ruled over all others. This talk will largely agree with Thomas’ position that the Japanese had religious freedom before the Allies’ Occupation. However, it will try to discuss that religious freedom in Japan was not as straightforward as Thomas has claimed by looking into the development of Japanese Buddhism before the Constitution (1889) and the development of Japanese Christianity after the creation of the Constitution.

All are welcome!

Please register for this event here.