Paper short abstract:

I will examine the tension between the Confucian intellectual background and the Orientalist view on the Islamic concept of God as the commandant, focusing on Mahometto-den by Hayashi Tadasu (1876. A translation of Life of Mahomet by Humphrey Prideaux, 1697).

Paper long abstract:

Hayashi Tadasu was the son of a Dutch-style medical doctor but learned English and was ordered by the Tokugawa shogunate to study in England in recognition of his excellent language skills. After returning to Japan, he fought in the Tokugawa army against the new government forces in the Hakodate War. After the Meiji Revolution, he was hired by the new government to join the Iwakura Mission and later became a high-ranking official in charge of industry, the introduction of technology, and the postal system. At the same time, he translated economic and legal documents. Then, after the establishment of the Meiji Constitution and the Diet, he served mainly as a diplomat. While Hayashi's career as a progressive bureaucrat and diplomat is interesting in its own right, this paper focuses on Hayashi as an intellectual. Although Hayashi wrote few books of his own, he played a major role in introducing Western liberal thought in the early Meiji period, including John Stuart Mill's Principles of Political Economy, Bentham's "Theory of Criminal Law," and Francis Lieber's On Civil Liberty and Self Government. One point that has not received much attention, however, is his interest in Islam in the very early Meiji period and his translation of Life of Mahomet by Humphly Prideaux who was Dean of the Norwich (the head of the Chapter of Norwich Cathedral) and an orientalist scholar. While the original book attacked “the imposture of Mahomet” from a Christian standpoint, Hayashi referred to other books on Islam and pointed out in his afterword that the original book was covered by a one-sided prejudice. Behind this criticism was the influence of Carlyle and others who viewed Mahomet as a hero.

　It is noteworthy that in the process of Hayashi's criticism of the original texts, the idea that the Islamic God is “pure will” emerged. At that time it was very difficult to translate the concept of “pure will”, which transcends good and evil, into Japanese. In this paper, I would like to explore the uniqueness of Hayashi's viewpoint.

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