Reception of the Sixteenth-Century Jesuit Mission in Japan and Japanese Martyrs in Early Eighteenth-Century Poland: Oratio XVI; Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admissi seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis]J[esu] by Andrzej Michał Temberski, S.J.

The Sixteenth-Century Jesuit Mission to Japan and the First Persecutions

Francis Xavier (1506–52), a co-founder of the Society of Jesus and one of the most important Catholic missionaries of the early modern period, arrived in Kagoshima, southern Japan, on July 27, 1549, accompanied by three other Jesuits. They were warmly received by the local Japanese authorities. The daimyo of Kagoshima agreed to establish the first Jesuit mission, hoping to foster trade relations with Europe. Xavier worked and taught in Japan for more than two years, building close relations with the Shingon monks and the initial congregations in Hirado.

By 1569, there were about twenty thousand Christians in Japan; by 1579, that number had grown to 130,000, and there were two hundred congregations led by eighty-five Jesuit priests, twenty Japanese brothers, and one hundred catechists.^[1] However, in the late 1580s, Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1537–98), the powerful chancellor of the realm from 1586 until his death in September 1598, who initially supported Christians or at least accepted their presence in Japan, began to view the expanding Catholic minority as a threat. In January 1597, he ordered the arrest of twenty-six Catholics, including three Jesuits, six discalced Franciscans, and seventeen Franciscan tertiaries.^[2] They were subjected to torture and physical mutilation before being crucified on a hill towering over Nagasaki on February 5. Most of the martyrs—as many as twenty of the twenty-six— were native Japanese. Their sacrifice contributed to the growth of Christianity in Japan—they were called “the seed of Christians”^[3]—alongside the missionary efforts carried out by successive generations of Jesuits. By 1601, the number of converts reached three hundred thousand, and by the early 1630s, this had risen to 720,000; the total population of Japan at that time is estimated at twelve million.^[4] Remarkably, this occurred despite increasing persecution under the Tokugawa shōgunate.

In 1614, as Rady Roldán-Figueroa points out, Shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu, through his son Shōgun Tokugawa Hidetada, proscribed Christianity and ordered all foreign clergy out of the country […]. After 1614, some missionaries defied the shōgun’s order and continued to travel to Japan, in many cases from Manila. During the next 10 years, approximately 708 Christians, including 26 Europeans, were martyred.^[5]

As M. Antoni J. Üçerler notes, “the Christian faith had already been proscribed and the missionaries expelled in November 1614 […]. And yet Christian samurai were still playing an important role in the nation’s politics and on the battlefield—mostly in opposition to the shogun.”^[6] Despite the threat to their lives, some European priests were still attracted to Japan as late as the early eighteenth century: “In 1708 Giovanni Battista Sidoti (1667–1714) became the last Roman Catholic priest—but not a Jesuit as is sometimes claimed—to succeed in landing on the shores of Japan during the Edo period.”^[7]

Reception of the Jesuit Mission in Japan and Other East Asian Countries in Seventeenth-Century Western Europe

The increased persecution of Christians in distant Japan, whose Christianization had gone so smoothly in the early years after Xavier arrived in the country, was met with a reaction from Rome. On September 14 and 15, 1627, Pope Urban VIII (r.1623–44) beatified all twenty-six martyrs of Nagasaki:

The next year, printing presses throughout Europe and New Spain issued countless copies of books and broadsheets that memorialized the martyrs of Nagasaki of 1597. Books of Japano-martyrology published in 1628 memorialized the many other Catholics, both European and Japanese, who died for their faith since Shōgun Tokugawa Hidetada (r. 1605–1632) had expelled all Catholic missionaries from Japan in 1614.
In 1628, publishers in at least 22 cities in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, New Spain and Spain took part in a barely noticed publishing event. The beatification of the martyrs of Nagasaki became a sort of “rally around the flag” event throughout Catholic Europe that both revealed and fostered a deepening of interest in the fate of the Christian church in Japan.^[8]

As Hitomi Omata Rappo notes, “one of the major reasons for the martyrs’ beatification was that they, like Jesus Christ, were crucified.”[9] Yet while the manner in which the Nagasaki martyrs met their fate was undoubtedly significant, the topic of missionary martyrdom in remote Asian countries had already captured the attention of European Catholics, particularly Jesuit writers. In 1591, Francesco Benci (1542–94), a professor of rhetoric at the Collegium Romanum (1583–90) and editor of the Annuae litterae Societatis Iesu in 1596–91, published the six-book Latin epic Quinque martyres e Societate Iesu in India (Five martyrs from the Society of Jesus in India).^[10] This work vividly describes the missionary activities and martyrdom of five Jesuit priests who met their tragic end in Cuncolim (Goa) on July 15, 1583. On that day, a mob of residents from this Hindu settlement not only killed the five Jesuits but also took the lives of one lay Portuguese individual and fourteen Goan Catholics. For Benci, the martyrdom of his confrères was of immense significance. Among them was Rodolfo Acquaviva (1550–83), the nephew of the Society’s superior general, Claudio Acquaviva (1543– 1615, in office 1581–1615). The work’s subject matter, combined with its high literary quality, references to classical (Virgil’s Aeneid) and Renaissance (Vida’s Christiad) epic tradition, and the skillful use of amplification and ekphraseis, contributed to its immediate popularity.^[11] By 1592, a second, revised edition had been published in Rome by the Typographia Vaticana: “Until the suppression of the order in 1773, many passages from the Quinque martyres were excerpted and anthologized for a variety of purposes in Catholic and Jesuit publications.”^[12]

The martyrdom of nine Jesuits, including Francisco Pacheco (1566–1626), the provincial father of Japan, who were burned at the stake on Martyrs’ Hill near Nagasaki on June 20, 1627, also received a hagiographic work in hexameter verse. The extensive poem, consisting of over six thousand lines, Paciecidos libri duodecim (Twelve books of Pachecid),^[13] was authored by the Jesuit Bartolomeu Pereira (1597–1650), a teacher of Scripture at the Colégio des Artes and a relative of Pacheco. The poem, as Carlota Miranda Urbano observes, was published in 1640 in Coimbra,

in the year in which the Society of Jesus celebrated its first centenary and clearly expresses the epic self-conscious of the young religious Order. In fact, the poem may be read not only as an epic poem of an individual hero, Father Francisco Pacheco, but also of the missionary work of the Society of Jesus in Japan, presenting the Society as a “collective hero” in the epic background.^[14]

This baroque predilection for hyperbolic amplifications also extended to Xavier: no longer “the Apostle of Japan,” he now became “the Apostle of the East Indies, of all the kingdoms of India, and all of the Christian world,” especially after he was canonized by Pope Gregory XV (r.1621–23) in 1622.^[15] This process is further illustrated by the Jesuit Francisco García’s (1641–85) hagiographic work La vida y milagros de San Francisco Xavier (The life and miracles of Saint Francis Xavier), which was published in Madrid in 1672. As noted by Rachel Miller, although Xavier had never traveled to the Americas and was very shortly in Africa on his way to India, García nevertheless emphasizes his ties to four continents, saying:

What part of the world did this prodigious Apostle not consecrate with his presence, not illuminate with his doctrine, not amaze with his miracles? In Europe, he passed through a few kingdoms, in Africa, he was on some islands, in Asia, he walked through many provinces, and in America he navigated the seas, never missing an opportunity to increase the empire of Christ.^[16]

Miller primarily analyzes the iconography of Xavier, which is dominated by early modern paintings and engravings of him preaching in or baptizing various “nations,” with turbans or Ottoman costumes used to symbolize Asia and feather headdresses as the symbol of America.^[17] It is significant that this iconography lacks kimonos or other Japanese costumes that would relate to one of Xavier’s greatest missionary successes. The absence of figures in East Asian costumes among the exotic faithful sur- rounding the saint, however, is not simply the result of simplifications and insufficient ethnographic preparation by artists such as Francesco Curradi (1570–1661), Godfried Maes (1649–1700), and Jan Michiel Coxie (c.1650–1720).^[18] After all, their aspiration was not so much accurate historical illustration as to create a metaphorical image of Xavier’s patronage of the “New People” (to Europeans). As Miller concludes, the inclusion of costumes and other elements from all four continents in these images of Xavier “demonstrates his triumph and creates a vision of the world brought together in religious unity.”^[19] The authors of panegyrics tried to combine two perspectives—historical and metaphorical—using the tools of rhetoric. García emphasized the vast scale and difficulties of Xavier’s travels to underscore that the Jesuit missionary “traveled to more kingdoms, baptized more souls, converted more kings, or walked more leagues”^[20] than the original apostles. Panegyrics, as we will see later in this essay, share with seventeenth-century religious painting a remarkable freedom in depicting East Asia. They also focus on European audiences, who often prioritized creating images comprehensible to those raised in Latin culture over strict fidelity to the details and realities of a particular distant land.

Reception of Far Eastern Missions in Andrzej Michał Temberski’s Orator sacro-civilis

What Xavier’s lives and the epic poems about Jesuit martyrs have in common is undoubtedly an emphasis on the great importance of missionary activities for the Society’s integration. The same goal can also be seen in three panegyrics in honor of Xavier by the Polish Jesuit Andrzej Michał Temberski (1662–1726), included in the collection of his speeches, Orator sacro-civilis (Religious and secular speaker), published in Poznań in 1715. In Oratio VIII: Somnus Xaverii, vigiliae pro Indiarum orbe (Speech 8: Xavier’s dream; Vigils for the Indian world),^[21] Temberski urges the saint, resting in Goa, to wake up, but he also notes that “it seemed that Japan, Piscaria [?], Brazil and other kingdoms of the Antipodes were coming out to meet him, the trumpets of Faith resounded, victorious, triumphant.”^[22] The next two speeches are dedicated to the relics of Xavier: his hand transported to Rome (Oratio IX: Manus Xaverii Romam translata, constans prodigium) and his “immortal body” (Oratio X: Immortalitas corpus Xaveriani).^[23] The three orationes in honor of Xavier focus primarily on his cult, in which the miraculous body of the deceased saint symbolizes the triumph of Xavier himself as well as that of the Society of Jesus. The Japanese Jesuit martyrs, to whom speech 16 of the second part of Temberski’s work (Oratio XVI: Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admisti)^[24] is dedicated, appear primarily as “Ignatian martyrs” and “our heroes” (Martyres Ignatiani, Heroes nostri), who through their sacrifice and beatification by Urban VIII elevate all Jesuits. However, this is not the only reason why Temberski reaches for the topic of the Jesuit mission in the Far East. Before taking a closer look at the panegyrics in honor of Xavier and, above all, in honor of the Japanese martyrs James Kisai (1533–97), John Soan de Goto (1578–97), and Paul Miki (c.1562–97), it is worth introducing the Polish author himself and the role orationes 8, 9, 10, and 16 play in the entire collection of his occasional speeches entitled Orator sacro-civilis.

Temberski was born in Podolia—the southeastern part of the Polish Crown, today the west-central and southwestern parts of Ukraine and northeastern Moldova—to a noble family in 1662. After entering the Society of Jesus in Kraków in 1684, he taught grammar in Krosno (1686–88) and poetry in Kalisz (1689–90). Following theological studies in Poznań, he was ordained priest in 1693 and then taught rhetoric and poetry in Bydgoszcz in 1694–95, Brześć Kujawski in 1696–97, Lublin in 1697–1700, Sandomierz in 1700–1, and Lviv in 1701–2. Between 1702 and 1709, he taught rhetoric to seminarians in Jarosław, was prefect of secondary schools in Lublin (1709–10), rector of colleges in Rawa Mazowiecka (1710–13), Lublin (1714–18), and Toruń (1719–23), and finally rector in Jarosław in 1723–26.^[25] Temberski thus traveled frequently but, it seems, almost exclusively within the boundaries of the Polish province of the Jesuit order. There were some important missionaries among the Polish Jesuits who were active on other continents, such as Andrzej Rudomina (1595–1631), involved in the creation of the Chinese liturgical and theological terminology; Michał Boym (c.1612– 59), missionary to China, naturalist, linguist, and explorer; Jan Mikołaj Smogulecki (1610–56),^[26] a distinguished mathematician and astronomer; and Wojciech Męciński (1598–1643), superior of the Jesuit mission in Cambodia and the first Pole in Japan, where he was killed on the orders of Shōgun Tokugawa. Their travels, works, or martyrdom may have inspired Temberski; however, Orator sacro-civilis should be analyzed primarily in the context of college teaching in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. As Jakub Niedźwiedź points out:

It is highly probable that the Jesuit schools were attended mostly by the sons of the gentry. […] In Masovia, where the percentage of the impoverished gentry was the highest in the entire Polish–Lithuanian state, the colleges of Pułtusk, Płock and Rawa were overcrowded with the sons of the gentry. It can be supposed that free studies in a Jesuit college could give a young nobleman a chance for some sort of career.^[27]

Jesuit education primarily led to a career in the army, land administration, or at the royal or magnate courts. Alternatively, after their schooling, many alumni managed their estates or, like Temberski—and the famous poet Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski (1595–1640) and the author of the famous rhetoric textbooks Jan Kwiatkiewicz (1629– 1703)—joined the Jesuits.

Orator sacro-civilis is divided into three thematic parts. The first part contains sixteen praises of Jesus Christ, Mary, and of ancient, medieval, and early modern (particularly Polish) saints (Dei-Hominis, Matris ejus et Divorum laudes),[28] although the whole section begins with a speech on the occasion of the Peace of Ryswick between the king of France Louis XIV (r.1643–1715) and the Holy Roman Empire (Oratio I: Pax inter Galliarum et imperium facta, 1697 ad Natales Dei Cunas proclamata), celebrated as a secular-religious ceremony in Lublin at Christmas 1697.^[29] The second part, which is of most interest to us here, is sixteen panegyrics in honor of saints or blessed Jesuits;[30] the third consists of six “prefationes” devoted to praising Polish kings and to a description of Polish diplomacy and state institutions.^[31] For Temberski, all parts of this opus multiplex follow up on his school practice as a professor of rhetoric. He mentions this explicitly at the beginning of his introduction to the reader (Benevolo lectori).[32] All parts provide the reader with useful examples that he intends to use in his own sermons or occasional speeches delivered in church if he becomes a clergyman (part 1) or in political speeches as an official or diplomat (part 3). Thus, since Temberski’s students were probably dominated by the Polish gentry, it is not surprising that in parts 1 and 2 the author draws mainly on Poland’s ancient and recent history.

The second part of the Orator sacro-civilis presents important figures and moments in the history of the Society of Jesus. Temberski dedicates the first three speeches to the founder of the Jesuits, St. Ignatius of Loyola (c.1491–1556), and his cult: Oratio I: Ara Ignatiani honoris, compendium artis, fabricata a strenuo Thyrso Gonzalez Generali Soc[ietatis] Jesu; Romae (Speech 1: The altar of Ignatian honor, a compendium of art formed by the strenuous Tirso González, general of the Society of Jesus,^[33] in Rome); Oratio II: Natalis Societatis; Natalis Ignatii divinus (The Society’s birthday: Ignatius’s divine birthday); and Oratio III: Caelum terrestre; Tumulus Ignatii inter cineres immortales, stylo elogiari (Speech 3: Heaven on earth; Ignatius’s tomb between immortal ashes, in the sententional style).^[34] Speeches four to seven praise Francisco de Borja (1510–72) as the superior general (in office 1565–72) who brought the Society to Poland.[35] Thus, although Temberski refers to the Jesuit community as Respublica Ignatiana,^[36] he gives the Polish province the name Borgiana, and he does so in front of a large number of Jesuits at the provincial congregation in Jarosław (Oratio IV: Habita in congregatione provinciali Jaroslaviae, intra Octavam D[ivi] Borgiae; Provincia Polona Societatis Jesu, Borgiana).^[37] The next speech—Oratio V: Apotheosis trium gratiarum, quas D[ivus] Borgias Poloniae exhibuit (Speech 5: Apotheosis of the three graces that Saint Borja[38] has shown to Poland)—is an apotheosis of the three graces Borja bestowed on Poland, namely that he made the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth prosperous (dotata), learned (docta), and sacred (sancta).[39] In the metaphorical Oratio VI: Fames conviva Borgiae (Speech 6: Borja’s fellow hunger), the Jesuit general becomes a provider of spiritual grain (annona). In the seventh speech, on the other hand, Borja is glorified as the founder of the College of Jarosław (Oratio VII: Fundator Collegii Gratiarum D[ivus] Borgias Jaroslaviae), although the college was established over a year after the general’s death. Thus, the first half of the “Jesuit” chapter of Orator sacro-civilis shows a gradual change of perspective from the Spanish and Italian beginnings of the Society to the importance of the Jesuits and their general Borja to Poland and finally to the foundation of the college in Jarosław, with which Temberski himself was associated between 1702 and 1708 and 1723 and 1726. In the subsequent panegyrics in honor of Xavier mentioned earlier, the Polish Jesuit refers to the global dimension of the Society’s missionary activities. The next three speeches are panegyrics in honor of Stanisław (Stanislaus) Kostka, the earliest and most widely venerated Polish Jesuit at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Kostka died in Rome in 1568 at the age of seventeen and was beatified in 1605. Speech 11 glorifies him as the “delight of Polish kings” (Oratio XI: Delicium Polonorum Regum Stanislaus Kostka),^[40] while speech 12 recalls the conversion experience of his elder brother, Paweł Kostka, before the face of the deceased (Oratio XII: Conversio Pauli Kostka ad vultum Beati Stanislai).[41] Paweł Kostka has since become a patron of the church and promoter of the cult of Stanisław. The third speech dedicated to Stanisław Kostka, like the ninth speech in honor of Xavier, is a description (ekphrasis) of his relics—the head transferred from Rome to Krakow: Oratio XIII: Caput Kostkanum Cracoviam Roma allatum, est a consilio patriae in extremis (Speech 13: Kostka’s head transferred from Rome to Kraków,^[42] serves fatherland with advice on ultimate issues).^[43] The next two panegyrics commemorate another youthful Jesuit, Aloysius Gonzaga, of Italian aristocratic descent. Aloysius died during the plague in Rome in 1591 and was beatified, like Kostka, in 1605. Both speeches—Oratio XIV: Martyr innocentia, seu mortificatio Beati Aloysii and Oratio XV: Flos vitae Aloysius inter cineres mortis sue de morte B[eati] Gonzagae[44]—emphasize Aloysius’s innocence (innocentia) and youth (flos vitae), which may have been of special formative importance to the seminarians taught by Temberski himself.

Temberski’s Latin Panegyric in Honor of the Japanese Martyrs of Nagasaki of 1597

The last panegyric of this collection is Oratio XVI: Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admisti, seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis] J[esu] ab Urbano VIII, 1597 (Three heroes admitted to the coat of arms of the cross, or the nobility of the Japanese Jesuit martyrs [confirmed] by Urban VIII). This speech in honor of James Kisai, John Soan de Goto, and Paul Miki is the only one dedicated to non-European Jesuits. Temberski, apparently on purpose, did not choose Wojciech Męciński, the famous Polish Jesuit who suffered martyrdom in Japan, although his story was already well known in the second half of the seventeenth century. The author of the compilation Vita et mors gloriose suscepta R[everendi] P[atris] Alberti Męcinski Poloni e Societate Iesu [The life and glorious death of the Reverend Albert Męciński, a Pole from the Society of Jesus], published in Kraków in 1661, mentions four earlier vitae of the Polish martyr: by Philippe Alegam- be, Francesco Rosini, Francisco Roas, and Jan Bieżanowski.^[45] Thus, Temberski does not reach for the example of Europeans who successfully acclimated to the cultures of East Asia (Matteo Ricci, Boym) or suffered martyrdom in Japan (Pacheco, Męciński) but “inculturates” Japanese martyrs into European, mostly Greco-Roman tradition. In the very first sentences of Oratio XVI, Temberski states that “the nobility of Loyola’s republic” (“nobilitas Reipublicae Lojoleae”) can celebrate its apotheosis (“apotheosim celebrat”) all the more because the God-Man (“Deus homo”) granted the privilege of martyrdom (“gloriae privilegium”) to the native inhabitants of Japan (“aborigines”). The noun aborigines, used by classical authors to refer to the primeval Romans or Lat- in ancestors of the Romans,^[46] occurs again at the end of the speech when the Polish Jesuit states that the cross itself “ennobles Paul, John, and James, and distinguishes the future nation because these three are original inhabitants of the people chosen by God’s will.”[47]

In praise of the Japanese, Temberski eagerly reaches for military metaphors. On three occasions, Kisai, Goto, and Miki are identified as triarii,^[48] “a class of Roman soldiers who formed the third rank from the front,”[49] seasoned veterans, “who fight for heavens” (“militantes pro caelo”), “brilliantly crowned the names of glory” by Pope Urban VIII, to whom they owe their beatification.^[50] Portuguese Jesuit Bartolomeu Guerreiro (1564–1642) wrote of the missionary martyrs as early as 1642, describing them as “valiant soldiers” (“soldados valerosos”) who won a “glorious crown” (“Gloriosa Coroa”) for promoting the Catholic faith.[51] However, the identification with Romans in Oratio XVI goes beyond mere military metaphor. Although it was the pope who inducted the blessed Jesuits of Japan “into the purple-clad Senate of Saints” (“purpurato Caelitum Senatui inaugurasti”), they had already, through their martyrdom, become “three patricians who, like stars in the Japanese sky, illuminated the nights of paganism with the torch of their noble mind.”^[52] From the point of view of the martyrs of 1597 and their contribution to the Christianization of Japan, as well as to Catholicism as a whole, the key event was the act of martyrdom itself at Nagasaki. Temberski writes about the mountain on which the martyrs were crucified: “Thus, even though they were not beatified with the title of martyrs by the Judge of Rome, the mountain itself would solemnly introduce the names of the heroes, which, having abandoned its former name, grew into Calvary because it raised such sublime souls to the stars.”^[53] The personification of the hill near Nagasaki, which changed its name to Calvary, somewhat resembles the apostrophe to Japan in Pereira’s Paciecidos (12, 327–29).^[54] But references to the 1627 beatification remain an important element in Oratio XVI, which focuses on the inculturation or re-accommodation of the figures of Kisai, Soan, and Miki. They are presented in a context familiar to Polish listeners and readers of the work, who were educated in colleges with readings of Cicero, Caesar, Sallust, and Virgil.[55] Temberski’s metaphorical depiction of the beatification of Japanese martyrs begins with the description of the deification (Lat. consecratio) of Roman emperors. However, the Polish Jesuit immediately distances himself from the old pagan custom when he writes: “But I do not know how far the old superstition has gone in pride, since, to honor their Caesars as saints, it elevated [them] from the funeral pyre into the stars through eagles.”^[56] He may be referring here to the historian Herodian (c.170–c.240 CE), who gave a detailed description of the funeral ceremony and deification of Septimius Severus (d. February 4, 211 CE) (Herodian, 4.2), but he may also have drawn his erudition from one of the many compendia of ancient Roman civilization available in early eighteenth-century Central Europe.^[57] The reference to consecratio in the Roman Empire is part of a longer apostrophe to Urban VIII (300–1). It serves to amplify the pope’s introduction of Japanese “seasoned veterans” (“triarii nostri”) “to the pinnacle of the ages” ( fastigium seculorum) as something both “truer and more solemn” (“tanto verius, quanto solennius”) than the deification of ancient pagan emperors, which merely “pretended to be holiness” (“sanctitas mentiretur”). The apostrophe to Urban VIII appeared more than fifty years earlier at the beginning of Paciecidos (1, 29–42).^[58]

In the Portuguese Jesuit epic poem, this reference is understandable, as it occurred during the lifetime of the famous pope from the Barberini family. For the Polish author, Urban VIII is essential for praising the beatified martyrs and reminding the Polish audience that the renowned Polish Jesuit poet Sarbiewski was raised on the papal “Helicon” (“tuo erudiat Helicone”) and became his Apollo (“Apollo tuus”). Sarbiewski, the author of Lyricorum libri III (first printed in Cologne in 1625), as well as several occasional poems and theoretical works on rhetoric and poetics, resided in Rome only between 1622 and 1625^[59]—before the beatification of the Japanese martyrs. The evocation of Sarbiewski serves as an opportunity for Temberski to connect the recipient of his speech with Urban VIII as a patron of the Polish poet and indirectly with Kisai, Goto, and Miki, who were elevated to the altars by that pope. Although the Polish Jesuit criticizes the pagan apotheosis ceremony of Roman emperors, he consistently depicts the martyrs in Roman costume throughout his speech. Beatification is a trophy (trophaea) for the heroic Japanese Jesuits, and the personified idea of eternity (aeternitas), closely associated with consecratio,^[60] places a laurel wreath on the martyrs’ heads (“in congruam fronti lauream aeternitas revinxit”) as a reward for their “divine military service” (militia divina).^[61] Japanese martyrs like ancient Roman generals in a triumphal procession ride in a chariot (“currus illorum”) and proceed to the forum,^[62] while “curious barbarians […] glorify their names among the palms.”^[63] The palm tree serves three functions in the last sentence: it is an ancient symbol of victory, a Chris- tian symbol of martyrdom, and an element of exoticism; according to the author and his audience, it is fitting for distant Japan. However, Kisai, Goto, and Miki themselves are adapted to Polish culture through Romanization. They are compared favorably to the Alps, which were “tempered by the wrath of Carthaginians” (i.e., Hannibal’s army) and are portrayed as braver than Mucius Scaevola and Curtius, the heroes of the early Roman Republic.^[64]

The second concept on which Temberski based his Oratio XVI, in addition to the metaphor of the Japanese martyrs as Roman veterans celebrating their triumph, is their ennoblement and the granting of the coat of arms of the cross. The Polish Jesuit writes in one of the first sentences:

Hence when this bleeding seal has already crowned our world and graced everything, its honor has also reached Japan, where it adorned the seasoned veterans who fight for heaven. Well then, Paul, John, and James: others may burn their crest with shields, so that, having covered themselves with the reflection of valor, they may terrify their enemies; you carry it as engraved in your breastplate, nay, in your triumphant body between your wounds.^[65]

The bracketed composition is evident here, as the entire speech concludes with the recognition of three Japanese martyrs as “true companions of Jesus” (“vere socios Jesu”) and the exhortation “Incite us also to claim a similar charisma, that we may be named and become knights of the cross.”^[66] This element is crucial for Japanese inculturation, especially considering that the recipients of Temberski’s Orator sacro-civilis—other Polish Jesuits and college students—were overwhelmingly recruited from among the nobility. Additionally, the coat of arms of the Nagasaki martyrs aligns with the tradition of describing the martyrdom of Japanese Christians through images and emblems. In his De Christianis apud Japonios triumphis sive de gravissima ibidem contra Christi fidem persecutione exorta anno MDCXII usque ad annum MDXX (On the Christian triumphs among the Japanese or the severest persecution of the faith in Christ there from the beginning of the year 1612 to the year 1620 [Munich: Sadeler, 1623]), Nicolas Trigault (1577–1628) does not describe the events of 1597, but he does describe the death on the cross of the Japanese Christian Dominicus in Hiroshima in 1616. The description of his execution is accompanied by an engraving with a scene of the martyr’s crucifixion.^[67] In the Imago primi saeculi (The image of the first century) of 1640, fire (also in the form of a phoenix), rather than a cross, is the main symbol of all four emblems associated with the Jesuit martyrdom in Japan (Iaponum in igne alacritas [Eagerness in the fire of the Japanese]; Martyrum pretiosa mors [Precious death of the martyrs]; Martyres vasa Dei electa, quibus Iaponia triumphat [Martyrs are God’s chosen vessels, by which Japan triumphs]; and Carlus Spinola lento igne comburitur [Carlo Spinola is burned on a slow fire]).^[68] This is linked to the predominant way missionaries were put to death in Japan after 1612. Temberski, who glorifies the first Japanese martyrs, returns to the symbol of the cross, which is more powerful because it ties the executed Jesuits to Christ himself.

Polish Knowledge of Japan and the Japanese Jesuit Mission in the Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries

Was the Romanization of the Japanese martyrs a deliberate rhetorical device? Japan and China held an interest in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, much like in Western Europe. This interest is demonstrated, among other things, by prints published in Kraków and Vilnius as early as 1585. As Justyna Łukszewicz-Haberkowa observes:

The earliest piece of information about the Jesuit mission in Japan to be published in Poland come out in Kraków in 1585, Casper Gonzalez’s (dates unknown) Japoniorum regum legatio Romae coram Gregorio XIII 1585 habita (The Japanese king’s mission to Gregory XIII, the pope in Rome, which took place in 1585), which was also published in Rome and Bologna at the same time.^[69]

In the same year, the oldest original book on the same topic was published by Joannes Velicensis in Vilnius: Epistola de legatorum Japonicorum orientalium adventu ad Gregorium XIII. pontificem maximum paucos dies, antequam moreretur (Letter on the arrival of Japanese oriental envoys to Gregory XIII, the pope, a few days after the visit).^[70] Then, in 1606, Catalogus quorundam e Societate Iesu, qui pro fide vel pietate sunt interfecti (The catalog of some Jesuits who were killed for faith or piety) was published in Kraków. This book addresses all Jesuit victims from 1549 to 1603 and includes brief information on the martyrs in Japan,^[71] including Kisai, Goto, and Miki. In the next century, as Łukaszewicz-Haberkova points out, “books about Japan and martyrs were rather few in number; however, letters from missionaries were considered a form of official documentation and served as reading material.”^[72] Nevertheless, annual mission reports (Litterae annuae) and works on the history of the Society, such as Historiae Societatis Iesu by Francesco Sacchini (1570–1625), which devotes much attention to missions in the Far East, were read regularly in Polish Jesuit colleges. The works of Jesuit missionaries^[73] and historians were the inspiration for Jesuit drama in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the second half of the seventeenth century and the first half of the eighteenth century.

Temberski himself is the author of at least two Japan-themed plays staged in the Jesuit college in Sandomierz in the 1700–1 school year that are currently kept in the Jagiellonian Library in Kraków (codex no. 2384): Constantia coronata in iudicio regis Bungi gentilis (Constancy crowned at the final verdict of the pagan king of Bungo) inspired by events in Japan in 1590–91 and the story of a Japanese Christian who, even in extreme circumstances in front of Japan’s pagan ruler, does not deny his faith, and Novus Mercurius ex ligno Iaponensi, in quo crux Deifica reperta (The new Mercury from a Japanese tree, in which a divine cross was found). By the mid-eighteenth century, at least five more Jesuit plays had been written on the theme of the brave Japanese Chris- tian who resisted the pagan king of Bungo, of which works by Jan Bielski (1714–68) and Stefan Łuksina (1725–93) are also preserved in print. Thanks to this, we know that Bielski, as the author of the tragedy in Polish Tytus Japończyk (Titus the Japanese), staged in Poznań in 1748, undoubtedly benefited from Joseph de Jouvancy’s (1643–1719) Historiae Societatis Jesu.^[74] As Monika Miazek-Męczyńska points out:

The play Novus Mercurius is especially interesting, as it presents a specific anecdote from the history of the Jesuit mission in Japan: in the prologue, the Ro- man god Mercury looks for a tree with which to make a scepter. Many trees give him advice, but with no good result. The main action starts when a Japanese prince comes to a forest with his sons and courtiers looking for some wood that he has seen in a dream the night before. Finally, his son stops by one tree, the workers cut it down, and they find a cross inside. The prince and his family take the cross as their symbol and promise to hold it all their life. At the end of the performance, Mercurius declares that this was the tree he was looking for at the beginning of the play.^[75]

Thus, we see here a motif already known from Oratio XVI: a combination of the tradition of ancient Rome, widely known in the circles of Polish Jesuits and the noble youth educated in their colleges, with the display of the emphasis of the cross as a key symbol of Christianization. On the other hand, both of Temberski’s “Japanese” plays prove his genuine interest in Japan, which he shares with other Jesuit authors, often anonymous, from whom the programs of plays staged in Braniewo (1686), Grodno (twice in 1712), Vilnius (1693, 1710, 1713, and 1714), Warsaw (1713), and Żodziszki (1716) have survived.^[76]

Conclusion

Since Temberski’s Oratio XVI clearly emphasizes the indigenousness of the Japanese martyrs as an important asset in their mission of Christianization, it is worth asking why he highlighted this very element in the context of the entire “Jesuit” section of the Orator sacro-civilis. The section deliberately provides several examples of Jesuit piety, from which the audience can choose those closest to them. In the case of the speech about the Japanese martyrs, it seems that we are dealing more with discouraging readers from undertaking a dangerous mission in distant Asia (missions to Japan itself were no longer undertaken in the late seventeenth and eighteenth century, but there was still ongoing missionary activity in China and India), since the indigenous peoples themselves, by their example, are best able to attract their countrymen to the Catholic faith. This interpretation corresponds well with the mostly negative responses of the Society’s superior general to the litterae indipetae of young Jesuits from Poland, which Miazek-Męczyńska has recently analyzed.^[77] She also points out that

the religious authorities of the Polish province, obeying the guidelines set down in Rome, did not undertake wide-ranging measures to increase the number of missionaries in East Asia. Their main missionary destination was the Orthodox East, mainly Rus, but also other “spiritually neglected” countries (Lithuania, Livonia, Samogitia) or areas under Islamic influence (Crimea, Moldova, Constantinople, and Persia). The superiors of the Society tried to convince younger members that a career in Europe, demanding tasks for the Society, education of socially excluded groups, and other duties were equally valuable for a Jesuit: they were to be a different kind of martyrdom.^[78]

Emphasizing the indigenous origins of the Jesuit martyrs from Japan can therefore be read as an indirect signal to young Polish Jesuits to focus on their mission in Central and Eastern Europe rather than in Asia. Additionally, this emphasis highlights the global profile of the Society. The use of ancient, mainly Roman, metaphors and comparisons serves to align them with the ethos of post-Tridentine Catholicism. Oratio XVI serves as an excellent conclusion to the entire “Jesuit” section of Temberski’s work, in which Xavier’s missionary activities in distant Asia were intertwined with praise of the local college in Jarosław, and the premature deaths of both the devout Polish nobleman Stanisław Kostka and the Italian aristocrat Aloysius Gonzaga make them models of Jesuit piety for others. Overall, the speeches demonstrate the widespread activities and successes of the Jesuits in Poland, Europe, and the world, even if their spiritual achievements were sometimes paid for with premature death. The Jesuit section in Temberski’s Orator sacro-civilis draws from the earlier tradition of Jesuit writing but enriches it with original content. This is well illustrated in the sixteenth speech, where the description of the triumph of the Japanese martyrs goes beyond the traditional image of soldiers, and contrary to the tradition of Imago primi saeculi, the central symbol of their coat of arms is a cross, not fire.

Notes:

[1] I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions. See Stuart D. B. Picken, Christianity and Japan: Meeting, Conflict, Hope (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1983), 37 and Miyazaki Kentarō, “Roman Catholic Mission in Pre-modern Japan,” in Handbook of Christianity in Japan, ed. Mark R. Mullins (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 1–18, here 7.

[2] It is worth noting here that Hideyoshi was said to have planned the execution of 176 Christians; the apparent reduction was influenced by the intervention of his esteemed translator, the Jesuit João Rodrigues (c.1562–1633). See Michael Cooper, S.J., Rodrigues the Interpreter (New York: Weatherhill, 1974), 136.

[3] Frederick Vincent Williams, The Martyrs of Nagasaki (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1956), 39; Kentarō, “Roman Catholic Mission,” 7. See also Carlota Miranda Urbano, “The Paciecidos of Pereira S.J. (Coimbra 1640): A Neo-Latin Epic Paraphrasing a Vita,” in Bilinguismo e scritture agiografiche, ed. Vincenza Milazzo and Francesco Scorza Barcellona (Rome: Viella, 2018), 207–21, here 214.

[4] See Kentarō, “Roman Catholic Mission,” 7, and Rady Roldán-Figueroa, The Martyrs of Japan: Publication History and Catholic Missions in the Spanish World (Spain, New Spain, and the Philippines, 1597–1700), Studies in the History of Christian Traditions 195 (Leiden: Brill, 2021), 22.

[5] Roldán-Figueroa, Martyrs of Japan, 27.

[6] M. Antoni J. Üçerler, The Samurai and the Cross: The Jesuit Enterprise in Early Modern Japan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022), 271.

[7] Üçerler, Samurai and the Cross, 285.

[8] Roldán-Figueroa, Martyrs of Japan, 1.

[9] Hitomi Omata Rappo, “From the Cross to the Pyre: The Representation of the Martyrs of Japan in Jesuit Prints,” Journal of Jesuit Studies 10, no. 3 (2023): 456–86, here 457.

[10] See the commented edition of this work: Paul Gwynne, Francesco Benci’s Quinque martyres: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary (Leiden: Brill, 2018).

[11] See Gwynne, “Introduction,” in Francesco Benci’s Quinque martyres, 1–9, here 5.

[12] Gwynne, “The Lerer Reception of Quinque martyres,” 94–103, here 94.

[13] Both the number of books and the title seem to refer to Vergil’s Aeneid.

[14] Urbano, “Paciecidos of Pereira S.J.,” 215.

[15] Mariano Lecina, ed., Monumenta Xaveriana: Scripta varia de sancto Francisco Xaverio, Monumenta historica Societatis Iesu 43 (Madrid: Typis Augustini Avrial, 1912), 705–6, 715. See Rachel Miller, “From ‘Apostle of Japan’ to ‘Apostle of All the Christian World’: The Iconography of St. Francis Xavier and the Global Catholic Church,” Journal of Jesuit Studies 9, no. 3 (2022): 415–37, here 416.

[16] Miller, “From ‘Apostle of Japan,’” 416.

[17] See Miller, “From “Apostle of Japan,’” 417–31.

[18] See his oil paintings St Francis Explains His Missions to the Indian King and St. Francis Preaches the Faith in Sint-Pieters-en-Pauluskerk (Mechelen).

[19] Miller, “From ‘Apostle of Japan,’” 437.

[20]Miller, “From ‘Apostle of Japan,’” 437.

[21] See Andrzej Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis divisus in tres partes: Parte prima continet Dei-Hominis, matris ejus et divorum laudes; Parte secunda suae religionis sanctorum panegyres; Parte tertia praefationes rhetoricas et Poloniae gentis nonnulla singlaria (Poznań: Typis Collegii Soc. Jesu, 1715), 227–36.

[22] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 234, “quescebat Franciscus Goae, et Japonem, Piscariam, Brasiliam, caeteraque Antipodarum regna obire sibi videbatur; classica Fidei detonare, vincere, triumphare.”

[23] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 236–54.

[24] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 297–307.

[25] See Anna Królikowska, Profesorowie jezuickich seminariów nauczycielskich od XVI do XVIII wieku: Słownik biograficzny (Kraków: Wydawnictwo WAM, 2017), 155–56.

[26] On Polish Jesuits on mission in China in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, see Monika Miazek-Męczyńska, “Polish Jesuits and Their Dreams about Missions in China, according to the Litterae indipetae,” Journal of Jesuit Studies 5, no. 3 (2018): 404–20, here 405–6, which also lists further literature on the subject.

[27] Jakub Niedźwiedź, “Jesuit Education in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1565–1773),” Journal of Jesuit Studies 5, no. 3 (2018): 441–55, here 446.

[28] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 1–153.

[29] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 1–9.

[30] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 156–307.

[31] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 310–402.

[32] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, [):( 5r]: “Hactenus artem Scholis, hodie artis opus multiplex Civili auri, id est professae artem offero, Amice Lector.”

[33] Tirso González de Santalla (1624–1705) was elected the thirteenth superior general of the Society in 1687 and held the office until his death. Temberski’s speech is a homage not only to Loyola but also to González as a successor to the legacy of the order’s founder.

[34] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 157–88.

[35] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 188–227.

[36] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 189.

[37] See also Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 199: “Prostere, tandem, Provincia Paolona, te, Borgianam esse, id est, trabea virtutum illius ornatam: gravem, et ciuque Nomini literatorum, sanctorum, parem.”

[38] Borja was canonized on June 20, 1670.

[39] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 209.

[40] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 254–63.

[41] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 263–74.

[42] The relic of the head of the young Polish Jesuit, beatified in 1606, was sent to Poland at the request of King Sigismund III (r.1587–1632) after the Polish victory over the Turkish army at Chocim 1621. In 1637, the relic rested in the Jesuit Church of Saints Peter and Paul in Kraków.

[43] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 274–80.

[44] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 280–97.

[45] See Vita et mors gloriose suscpeta R.P. Alberti Męcinski, Poloni e Societate Iesu: In odium Santae Fidei Catholicae apud Iapones una cum aliis quattuor ex eadem Societate Patribus interempti; Anno Dni. MDCXXXXIII 23. Martii (Kraków: Vidua et Haeredes Francisci Cezary, 1661).

[46] See Cicero (Rep. 2, 3), Sallust (Cat. 6), and Livy (1, 1).

[47] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 306: “Intitulet proinde Paulum, Joannem Jacobumque Crux, et gentem insigniat futuram; nam tres etiam illi Aborigines sunt populi caelitus electi.”

[48] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 298, 301, 306.

[49] See Lewis & Short: https://alatius.com/ls/index.php?id=48978 (accessed January 31, 2025).

[50] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 301 (in an apostrophe to Urban VII): “Sed haec nomina tuae gloriae Triarii nostri splendide coronarunt.”

[51] See Bartolomeu Guerreiro, Gloriosa Coroa de esforçados religiosos da Campanhia de Iesu (Lisbon: Antonio Alvarez, 1642), 1–16.

[52] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 299: “Proinde haud dubito tres Patricios nostros caeli Japonici sidera fuisse et gentiles noctes face mentis honestae accendisse.”

[53] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 299: “Quamvis autem non inaugurasset illos titulo martyrum judex Roma, jam celebriter initiaret Nomina Heroum Mons ipse, qui etiam abolito vocabulo antiquo in Calvariam succrevit, tam sublimes animos sideribus inferendo.”

[54] See Urbano, “Paciecidos of Pereira S.J.,” 219.

[55] The reading of these Roman authors is recommended by the Ratio studiorum, especially in the class of humanities and in the highest grammar class. See Claude Pavur, S.J., ed. and trans., The Ratio studiorum: The Official Plan for Jesuit Education (St. Louis, MO: Institute of Jesuit Sources, 2005), 166–67 [395], 173–74 [405].

[56] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 300: “Nescio porro, quantum fastu processerat superstitio vetusta, quae Caesares suos ut Divos coleret, e rogo ferali per Aquilas sideribus importabat.”

[57] See, for instance, Johann Georg Gräve (Graevius), Thesaurus antiqulitatum Romanarum, 1st ed. (Leiden: Peter van der Aa, 1694–99) or Willem Hendrik Nieupoort, Rituum, qui olim apud Romanos obtinuerunt, suc- cincta explicatio, 1st ed. (Utrecht: Gulielm Broedelet, 1712), 193–94, whose presence is attested in Polish libraries of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. See also Jacek Pokrzywnicki, “Kompendium starożytności rzymskich Willema Hendrika Nieupoorta jako popularny osiemnastowieczny podręcznik do kultury antycznej: W perspektywie gdańskiej,” in Gdańsk nowożytny a świat antyczny, ed. Maria Otto and Jacek Pokrzywnicki (Gdańsk: Bernardinum, 2017), 79–114.

[58] See Bartolemeu Pereira, Paciecidos libri duodecim (Coimbra: Emmanuel de Carvalho, 1640), 2.

[59] See Krystyna Stawecka, Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski: Prozaik i poeta (Lublin: Wydawnictwo Towarzystwa Naukowego KUL, 1989), 14–25.

[60] See Katarzyna Balbuza, Aeternitas Augusti: Kształtowanie się i rozwój koncepcji wieczności w (auto)prezentacji cesarza rzymskiego (od Augusta do Sewera Aleksandra) (Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 2014), 101–12.

[61] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 300–1.

[62] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 302, 305.

[63] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 304: “barbaries aurita […] nomina virorum celebrat inter palmas.”

[64] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 304: “Ergo vos Alpibus fortiores, quas maceravit ira Paenorum; ergo Scaevola vel Curtius animosiores?”

[65] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 298–99: “Unde sanguinarium hoc sigillum, cum jam nostrum coronasset orbem ac omnia nobilitasset, in Japonem quoque devolutus est illius honor, ubi militantes pro caelo Triarios decoraret. Agite igitur, Paule, Joannes et Jacobe: clypeis alii suum inurant stemma, ut virtutis objecto vultu hostes terreant, vos pectori, imo corpori inter vulnera triumphanti, insculptum fertis.”

[66] Temberski, Orator sacro-civilis, 307: “Accendite nos quoque ad simile charisma aemulandum, ut Crucis Equites et dicamur et simus.”

[67] The descriptions and accompanying engravings of the aforementioned Latin edition and the 1624 French edition have been carefully analyzed by Omata Rappo, “From the Cross to the Pyre,” 458–66.

[68] See Imago primi saeculi Societatis Iesu a provincia Flandro-Belgica eiusdem Societatis representata (Antwerp: Balthasar Moretius, 1640), 579–580, 726–727, and Omata Rappo, “From the Cross to the Pyre,” 468–74.

[69] Justyna Łukaszewicz-Haberkowa, “Early Christian Japanese Sources of Jesuit Theater in the Polish– Lithuanian Commonwealth,” in Japan on the Jesuit Stage: Transmissions, Receptions, and Regional Contexts, ed. Haruka Oba, Akihiko Watanabe, and Florian Schaffenrath (Leiden: Brill, 2022), 266–85, here 268.

[70] See Łukaszewicz-Haberkowa, “Early Christian Japanese Sources,” 269.

[71] See Łukaszewicz-Haberkowa, “Early Christian Japanese Sources,” 268.

[72] Łukaszewicz-Haberkowa, “Early Christian Japanese Sources,” 270.

[73] The letters of João Rodrigues (1561–1633) and Matteo Ricci (1552–1610), for example, were translated into Polish by Szymon Wysocki (1546–1622) and published in Kraków as early as 1611. In 1616, an updated version of Wysocki’s book was published, taking into account De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas (On the Christian expedition to China), published just a year earlier (Augsburg: Christoph Mangius, 1615). See Łukaszewicz-Haberkowa, “Early Christian Japanese Sources,” 268–69.

[74] See Jan Belski, Tytus Japończyk: Tragedia (Poznań: Drukarnia Collegium Societatis Jesu, 1748) and Jesephus Juvencius, Historiae Societatis Jesu, pars quinta, tomus posterior (Rome: Georgius Plachus, 1710), 580 (book 20, 5), where the brave Japanese Christian is named Mancius Itus, not Titus. For other tragedies about Titus the Japanese, see Monika Miazek-Męczyńska, “Not Only Titus the Japanese: Japan and the Japanese on the Jesuit Stage in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” in Oba, Watanabe, and Schaffenrath, Japan on the Jesuit Stage, 248–64, here 252–54.

[75] Miazek-Męczyńska, “Not Only Titus,” 259.

[76] See Miazek-Męczyńska, “Not Only Titus,” 254–57.

[77] See Monika Miazek-Męczyńska, “Polish Jesuits and Their Dreams about Missions in China, according to the Litterae indipetae,” Journal of Jesuit Studies 5, no. 3 (2018): 404–20.

[78] Miazek-Męczyńska, “Polish Jesuits,” 411.

APA

Awianowicz, B. (2025). Reception of the sixteenth-century Jesuit mission in Japan and Japanese martyrs in early eighteenth-century Poland: Oratio XVI; Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admissi seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis]J[esu] by Andrzej Michał Temberski, S.J. In A. Corsi, C. Ferlan, & F. Malta Romeiras (Eds.), Circa missiones: Jesuit understandings of mission through the centuries (Proceedings of the symposium held at Lisbon, Portugal, June 12–14, 2023) [Special issue]. International Symposia on Jesuit Studies, 3(1), 1–15. https://doi.org/10.51238/ISJS.2023.03

CMOS

Awianowicz, Bartosz. “Reception of the Sixteenth-Century Jesuit Mission in Japan and Japanese Martyrs in Early Eighteenth-Century Poland: Oratio XVI; Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admissi seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis]J[esu] by Andrzej Michał Temberski, S.J.” In “Circa Missiones: Jesuit Understandings of Mission through the Centuries (Proceedings of the Symposium held at Lisbon, Portugal, June 12–14, 2023),” ed. Alessandro Corsi, Claudio Ferlan and Francisco Malta Romeiras, special issue, International Symposia on Jesuit Studies 3, no. 1 (2025): 1–15. https://doi.org/10.51238/ISJS.2023.03.

MLA

Awianowicz, Bartosz. “Reception of the Sixteenth-Century Jesuit Mission in Japan and Japanese Martyrs in Early Eighteenth-Century Poland: Oratio XVI; Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admissi seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis]J[esu] by Andrzej Michał Temberski, S.J.” Circa Missiones: Jesuit Understandings of Mission through the Centuries (Proceedings of the Symposium held at Lisbon, Portugal, June 12–14, 2023), edited by Alessandro Corsi, Claudio Ferlan, and Francisco Malta Romeiras, special issue of International Symposia on Jesuit Studies, vol. 3, no. 1, 2025, pp. 1–15. https://doi.org/10.51238/ISJS.2023.03.

Turabian

Awianowicz, Bartosz. “Reception of the Sixteenth-Century Jesuit Mission in Japan and Japanese Martyrs in Early Eighteenth-Century Poland: Oratio XVI; Tres heroes ad stemma crucis admissi seu Nobilitas martyrum Japonensium S[ocietatis]J[esu] by Andrzej Michał Temberski, S.J.” In “Circa Missiones: Jesuit Understandings of Mission through the Centuries (Proceedings of the Symposium held at Lisbon, Portugal, June 12–14, 2023),” ed. Alessandro Corsi, Claudio Ferlan, and Francisco Malta Romeiras, special issue, International Symposia on Jesuit Studies 3, no. 1 (2025): 1–15. https://doi.org/10.51238/ISJS.2023.03.