Difference between revisions of "Otomo Nata Jezebel"
(Created page with "*''Died: 1587'' The first wife of Christian ''daimyô'' Ôtomo Sôrin was a daughter of Nata Akimoto, high priest of a major [[Hachim...") |
(No difference)
|
Revision as of 17:53, 9 March 2018
- Died: 1587
The first wife of Christian daimyô Ôtomo Sôrin was a daughter of Nata Akimoto, high priest of a major Hachiman shrine. Actively resisting Jesuit influence and the spread of Christianity in her husband's lands, she has been described as "the ‘defender and martyr’ of the traditional religions that had given Bungo its coherence and peace until the Jesuits arrived."[1] Jesuit records regularly name her as among the reasons for the slow and difficult spread of Christianity in Bungo in the 1570s-1580s, and dub her "Jezebel," after the idol-worshipping queen of King Ahab from the Book of Kings, a figure associated with seduction, desire for usurpation of the office of the king, and protection of the prophets of Baal who fought against God's prophet Elijah.
Despite her husband's kind treatment of the Jesuits, "Jezebel" remained affiliated with her parents' Hachiman Shrine, and associated regularly with shrine maidens (miko), mountain ascetics (yamabushi), and wandering Buddhist nuns (Kumano bikuni). The Jesuits readily identified her as "a sorcerer, magician, and a witch," "a pagan, idol-worshipping enemy of the church." Her brothers included Tawara Chikakata,[2] and she gathered around herself numerous powerful supporters at court, who helped oppose Sôrin's destruction of Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines, abandonment of Shinto and Buddhism, and embrace of Christianity.
The Nata family controlled a large portion of the Kunisaki peninsula in northern Bungo, and "Jezebel" held significant tracts of land herself.
References
- Haruko Nawata Ward, Women Religious Leaders in Japan's Christian Century, Ashgate (2009), 109-.
- ↑ Ward, 111.
- ↑ Chikakata was also from the Nata family, and was adopted into the Tawara family. Tawara Chikahiro, another prominent opponent of Christianity, was also a relative of "Jezebel's."
