Evening Star Newspaper, November 17, 1929, Page 115

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C. NOVEMBER 17, 1929. ‘A New Prophet on the Horizon in Toyokiko Kagawa—a~American Educated, Author of Forty-Five Books, Lives in the Slums, Makes Three-Piece Suits to Sell for $1.50, and Hopes to Convert a Million People to Christianity in the Next Three Yecars. BY HERBERT A. MILLER, Professor of Sociology, Ohio State University. HE most famous novelist and poet in Japan, at the age of 41, has been persuaded by the mayor of Tokio to become head of the city's social bu- reau because he knows more about the slums and has better judgment concerning social distress than any one else in Japan. Neither writing nor social administration, however, is of more than incidental interest to this man; his greatest object is the teaching of a new way of life. Asia, from time immemorial, has produced the prophets—Confucius, Buddha, Christ, Mo- hammed and many lesser figures—now Gandhi of India Is reckoned as belonging in the list. ‘They all have aimed at the same thing—teach- ing men to live for time and eternity. Toyokiko Kagawa of Japan may also be re- corded by the ages. A prophet must have knowledge, wisdom and vision. Kagawa has all three and belongs peculiarly to modern times. Gandhi sees the evil of the machine, Scriologist Miller, who saw the prophet. and political organization, and denounces them, Kar wa accepts them and would regenerate thom. Zvery one is crying out about the evils that the machine age has brought us, and every- wicre there is despair because there seems to be nothing to do but eat, drink and be merry before we die. Capitalism, nationalism and materialism are rampant and efforts to stem their force seem futile. “n Japan Kagawa has arisen and cheerful- ness, intelligence, energy and philosophy have already made him a world figure. Gandhi spins and weaves in primitive fashion and wears almost no clothes. Kagawa estab- lishes a co-operative society which makes a three-piece suit, American style, which sells for a dollar and a quarter. IT was my good fortune to spend some time with Kagawa. I tried in every way to con- found him, but his knowledge is prodigious. German philosophy, statistics, history, economic theory, modern psychology always came back in reply with a laugh. Always, however, there was one final answer—that the world must be saved through love. This is an old theory and on many lips it is sentimental, with Kagawa it is both practical and intelligent. He has learned it from an experience rare and complete, and his faith comes both from the outside and from spiritual insight. He does not deny the world, he faces it. He was born in 1888, of a well-to-do family, and in a Japanese Buddhist school studied the Confucianist classics. He had great moral diffi- cultics in his youth and was greatly influenced by the life of a missionary. While in college his health failed and he lived a year in a fish- ing village, where he shared extreme poverty. He returned to college in Kobe and went at once into the worst slum district, where he stayed for four years trying to help the people. Then he went to Princeton to try to find & solution, but the philosophy which he finally arrived at came from “meditation.” On his return from Princeton he went on the very first day to live in the slum and con- tinued to live there until his children made it necessary to have a more healthful place, respected the people among whom he was working and showed no trace of ‘superiority.” KAGAWA contracted trachoma from his asso- ciates and is nearly blind. His philosophy starts with: “I love them, that is all.” It is only through love as best exemplified by Jesus that the world can be regenerated. Kagawa believes such love is enough and has unbounded faith in its practicability. I have met few men, even professional scholars, whose breadth of knowledge is so wide, or who have greater exactness of facts; though he suffers from bad health, he has written 45 books, and has several under way at the present time. In addition he has a mul- titude of enterprises going at full speed; makes thousands of speeches each year, drawing crowds wherever he appears. His interest is with the masses because they have the greatest need, but the intellectuals and the government are his friends, though he finds himself often arraigned against the gov- ernment. A pamphlet - containing extracts from three novels and his book on the “Psychology of the Poor” were reprinted for the House of Peers. It showed the actual suffering under which great numbers of people lived. As a result the peers secured a government appropriation of 20,000,000 yen—$10,000,000— for a slum reclamation program, covering five years, in the six largest cities of Japan. Kagawa’s first novel, which brought him in- stant fame, was a description of the philosophy of his own life and ran through 180 editions. Although he mgight have joined the life of the literary set, he stayed with his slums, Hxs object in writing is both to spread his ideas and to raise money for his numerous activities. He lives in extreme poverty and gives away a great amount of money. He is interested in the labor movement and has organized labor unions and labor parties, He himself refuses to be elected to Parliament and has accepted the fact that labor is as ignorant and pigheaded as capital, Labor in Japan has been greatly influenced by the materialist socialism of Marx, as intro- duced by the Russian Communists. Kagawa is sympathetic with most of their objectives, but feels that materialism is equally futile whether socialistic or capitalistic and that a new spirit must come into the world. Kagawa is a Christian evangelist, but not the kind we have known in America. He has the zeal and drawing power of Moody or Billy Sunday, but the profundity of a university presi- dent. He talks the language of a Christian, but he has a background of Buddha and Con- fucius, which is a spiritual and moral system that has given character to Eastern Asia for thousands of years. Kagawa approaches problems in the Jap- anese way—with a smile. Men smile when they tell you how many children they lost in the earthquake. When Kagawa talks about sin he makes the people laugh at it. As he interprets Christianity its essence is love, and through that as a practical force Japan’s Rooseveltian he believes that problems can be solved. It has to be exemplified through living and not through theology, and it will take time to learn. He tells the Labor parties: that they must have a generation of political education. ' EXCEP'I‘ that capitalists selfishly forget the interests of their workmen, Kagawa is not opposed to capitalism. He is not for mak- ing work easier in having less to do, but that there shall be an object above merely earn- ing the daily bread. This sounds almost like an apologist for things as they are, but Kagawa is much deep- er than that. He thinks that there must first be a change in the attitude toward iife. Kagawa believes that the spread of Com- munism in Japan is due to pitifully small wages, to child labor, to unempiloyment and to exploitation by capitalists, Many have been put in jail, but the gov- ernment cannot stop it that way. *“The only way is kindness and love. I sympathize with the working people. They are oppressed, but revolution by force is not right. Force can never accomplish anything' good. Not force, but love. I am working to make Japan really Christian.” An evangelistic ecampaign in America is both a prosaic and sentimental thing on ac- count of the level on which it is carried, but Kagawa in Japan as head of a govern- ernment to convert a million people to Christianity in three years is a living flame to light the world by social regeneration. The reason I, as well as others, consider him e e Old Japan e prophet, Kagawa. a prophet is because something will be added to Christianity by his work, which will make it a different kind of religion. In Europe and America, in many respects, Christianity has run out. It goes on by its momentum, but many people do not take it very seriously. It has power because Chrise tianity is almost a symbol of Western civiliza+ tion and it may get its rejuvenation as well as its birth in-Asia. The dynamic power of Kagawa is a new and potent factor. There are two reasons for this. One is the thorough grounding of the Japanese in “Bushido,” which is a combination of Buddhism and Confucian ethics, and the other is the peculiar social and political situation of Japan at the present time. | JAPAN is acutely conscious of the fact that it has problems to solve. A thoroughly modern country in its aims, it still has its feet in the past. Strongly nationalistic, it has the necessity of international adjustment as few other countries have. It is in exactly the right mood for spiritual experiments. - It will keep its own soul, but it is looking to the rest of thé world for enrichment of thaty— soul. When the Emperor Meiji, who was responsi- ble for the modernization of Japan, began his work 63 years ago, he granted complete re= ligious freedom and welcomed all religions. ‘The imperial family still adheres to Shintoism, but the Emperor gave $50,000 toward the new Y. M. C. A. Building in Tokio, and for many years has given a subsidy for the social work of the Salvation Army. This gives a surprising standing to Chris< tianity. There is vastly more news about Christian activities in the Japanese papers than could possibly get into an American paper, and yet there are barely more than 200,000 Christians iIn the country out eof 60,000,000 people. Kagawa is, of course, an internationalist through and through. He loves all nations; though he says there is a ‘“Heaven-America and a hell-America.” Lincoln and Emerson he knows well and thinks they represent one * aspect of America. The advocates of big navies and national materialism, he thinks; can all be won over, i THIS practical idealist and political agi~ tator supports three social settlements, helps a leper colony, maintains a research bureau, heads a great co-operative organiza- tion, begins speaking in the morning at 6 and always speaks in the evening, besides his prodigious writing. As a practical man Kagawa is amazing. Hq' lives the strenuous life in a way that would™ have commanded the respect of Roosevelt. He is an advocate of the simple life, and yet at home with elegance. As we were eating lunch at the hotel, in reply to one of my ques- tions, he asked what was the real use of all these things, indicating the quantities of silver by each plate, the finger bowls and other ace cessories. I could only admit their unimpor- tance for the task of getting food. The modern world is well aware that it is facing staggering problems. It has many would-be prophets of pessimism who have many followers. The significant thing about Kagawa is that he believes that by religion human nature ean be molded into finer forms. (Copyright, 1929.) A prophet in his own home. Kagawa, his wife, and their two children. When but he intends to return when the; 12 years acted to his wits bes she children are 12 years old the family will return to live in the slums. old. He was attracted to his wife because she