THE JESUITS IN JAPAN AND THEIR LEGACY OF TEMPURA Jesuit priests Francis Xavier, Cosme de Torres and brother Juan Fernandez arrived in Kagoshima, Kyushu, Japan on the Feast of the Assumption, 1549. With the consent of the Daimyo, they preached on the streets of Kagoshima, using a catechism written by St Francis and translated into Japanese by their companion, Anjiro. St Francis Xavier departed Japan in 1551 to bring the Jesuit mission to China, following which the Japanese mission fell under the leadership of Father de Torres. The success of the Jesuits in converting large numbers of Japanese people, however, aroused much animosity on the part of the Buddhist monks. Father de Torres debated with learned members of the Buddhist community, which were recorded by Brother Fernandez, basing his arguments on reason, believing that it would be highly effective against the Japanese who were, as he said, "led by reason just as well as and even more willingly than Spaniards." He espec...
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