NEWS
In memory and gratitude of Professor Yasuo Furuya
Update: July 6, 2018
Professor Emeritus Yasuo Furuya ran through his life, leaving numerous keen observations and acute statements, underpinned by an overwhelming abundance of experience. He was born in Shanghai in September 1926 as a son of a Japanese missionary and spent his childhood in an international city to learn about the contradictions associated with ethnicity and society at an early age. Upon returning to Japan, he attended Jiyu Gakuen Boys Department famous for its educational philosophy emphasizing initiative and autonomy, where he acquired the basic attitudes of life: speaking and acting based on one's own judgment and responsibility. However, he was conscripted for military service, and experienced that everything was exactly the opposite as things were in Jiyu Gakuen, learning that this was the norm in Japanese society. One day when he was staying in a military barrack, he heard the radio broadcast of the Emperor announcing that Japan had surrendered. He assumed that Japan's tragedy stemmed from the fact that Christianity did not take hold in Japanese society and decided to become a pastor on that very day.
After studying at a seminary in Tokyo (predecessor of Tokyo Union Theological Seminary ), he went to study in the United States shortly before the Treaty of San Francisco was signed. He wanted to be sent to Asia as a missionary. He not only earned a doctoral degree in Princeton Theological Seminary , but also found himself a graceful wife, Sachi , who used to be a librarian at that time. His experience of studying abroad in Germany (while he was a student at Princeton) opened his eyes to the science of religion and he also went to Switzerland to participate in a seminar for foreign students held by Dr. Karl Barth . Dr. Barth recognized something special in this young man from Japan who asked many insightful questions. Prof. Furuya lived the rest of his life so as to practice freedom he learned from Dr. Barth.
Only several years after ICU was founded, Prof. Furuya was invited to teach at ICU when he was about to start on a missionary tour to Indonesia. Although his term at ICU was initially planned to be only for several years , Prof. Furuya deeply committed himself to his work at ICU until he retired from his position of Graduate School Professor at the age of 70. He taught Christianity studies and Religion at ICU. He was a teacher with a special gift of attracting students and he also served for many years as the senior pastor of ICU Church. During his tenure, Prof. Furuya often traveled abroad for international conferences and educational purposes, perhaps more often than anyone else. He used to actively engage in conversations with the local people. In Southeast Asia, he heard a lot of harsh criticism about Japanese and their acts during and after the war, but in the Philippines, he heard a story about an exceptional Japanese, Colonel Nobuhiko Jimbo who saved the life of Manuel Roxas, who later became the President of the Philippines. This episode seemed to have deeply touched Prof. Furuya and he often talked about Colonel Jimbo.
When Prof. Furuya was invited to give a lecture or preach, he used to encourage churchmen saying that if 10% of the population became a Christian believer, that country would change. Prof. Furuya has been counted among the top 10 evangelists of modern Japan. He encouraged many ICU students to become a pastor and serve at chapels across Japan, which was another great contribution he made for the future of Japan.
His academic interest centered on the challenges facing missionaries in Asia and Japan. Later in his life, "Japanese theology" which inevitably sees Japan as a subject of theological criticism, became his main theme and published a number of remarkable books on this theme. Why does not Christianity become rooted in Japan? -- Prof. Furuya saw the answer to this question in the fact that, ever since the Meiji Era, missionary work in Japan had targeted the highly educated population, which was an attitude still present in the Japanese churches today. He called for a fundamental change in the attitudes of theological education and Christian organizations in Japan. He paid much respect to Toyohiko Kagawa, who was a pioneer in this aspect, and served many years as the chairperson of Kagawa Society , an academic society named after Kagawa. Needless to say, he long played a leadership role in The Japan Society of Christian Studies as well.
Prof. Furuya's freedom was somewhat unreserved, but his straightforward, open-minded and carefree personality had the power to convince people. He was an exceptional storyteller and never bored his audience even when it was the same story that we'd heard many times before. In his autobiography he wrote when he was approaching the end of his life, he confessed how he had thought that ICU might have been made specially for him because it provided the perfect setting for doing what he wanted to do. From a viewpoint of an innocent observer, however, I would say that the contributions Prof. Furuya made for ICU were far greater than what ICU offered him. Now that he has left us for heaven, I would like to send him our gratitude anew, in a new appreciation of what precious a gift he was for ICU and Japan.
Koichi Namiki
ICU Professor Emeritus (Religion)