Insatiable Curiosity and a Spirit of Inquiry Wove a New Era

Tamotsu Isoda | Enku Shoko

Missionaries visited Japan to spread Christianity and establish a foothold for invasion.
However, their expectations were greatly disappointed.

Although Japan at the time did not have the same literacy rate as today,

it is said to have had one of the highest literacy rates in the world.
In letters sent back to their home countries, missionaries reportedly wrote with surprise that
“the Japanese are a people who learn well.”

Moreover, the Japanese were
full of curiosity and had a strong spirit of inquiry.

Even regarding the teachings of Christianity,
they would relentlessly bombard them with questions.

Stories even remain of the missionaries being completely at a loss.
—

Western medicine encountered by such Japanese people
during the Edo period.

Among these, the exquisitely drawn anatomical charts of the human body

gave the Japanese a great shock.
To the point of shaking their common sense up to that time.

And so began
the battle with an unknown language.
What was written was Dutch.

But—

in Japan at that time,
there were no Dutch dictionaries.

They didn't know the pronunciation.

They didn't know the grammar.

They didn't even know the meaning of the words.
It was not an era like today

where you could find answers by searching.

Even so, the Japanese did not give up.

They compared the anatomical charts,

guessed the meanings of the words,
and while repeating discussions over and over,

they unraveled the meanings little by little.

A mind-numbing task.
Yet, they did not stop translating.
That is how the
“Kaitai Shinsho” (New Book of Anatomy) was born.

It spread in Japan as Rangaku (Dutch studies),

and became a guidepost for those aspiring to medicine.

—
Japanese people

have always adopted everything.
However,

they don't just end by imitating.

They learn from overseas,
make adjustments in their own Japanese way,

and sublimate it into a unique culture.
That is true

for food,
technology,
and craftsmanship as well.

“Can't we make it better?”
“Can't we make it easier to use?”
That is how
they continue to make improvements.

Sometimes,
they even perform a “magical modification” that surprises people overseas.

However,
there is always

a desire to “make people happy”
in that, I feel.

—
The Japanese who continued to challenge an unknown language
without even a dictionary.
That “never-give-up temperament”

may still be flowing within Japan today.

That is what I think.
—

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