Harada Tasuku (1863-1940)

Japanese pastor and educator. Harada was born into the samurai class in Kumamoto and recieved his earliest education in the clan school for foreign studies under the Christian influence of Captain Leroy Lansing Janes. In 1880 he entered Doshisha, a Congregational school in Kyoto, and was baptized a year later. Ordained in 1885, he studied in America at the University of Chicago Divinity School and at Yale University (1888-1891) and then in England and Germany before returning to Japan in 1896. Pastor of major Congregational churches and active in Christian journalism, the YMCA movement, and interdenominational cooperation, he was one of four official Japanese representatives at the Edinburgh World Missionary Conference in 1910. He was called to the presidency of Doshisha in 1907 and served as such for 13 years, during which time the school received official university accreditation from the government. In 1920, Harada was invited to the University of Hawaii to set up a department of Asian studies and served as its dean until 1932. During these years and until his death he was active in movements to promote international understanding and peace. He was the author of numerous works, including The Faith of Japan (1914), and received honorary degrees from Edinburgh University, the University of Hawaii, and Amherst College.

John W. Krummel, “Harada Tasuku,” in Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions, ed. Gerald H. Anderson (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 1998), 279.

This article is reprinted from Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions, Macmillan Reference USA, copyright © 1998. Gerald H. Anderson, by permission of Macmillan Reference USA, New York, NY. All rights reserved.

Bibliography

Primary

Tasuku Harada. The Faith of Japan. New York: Macmillan, 1914.

——–. Japanese Character and Christianity. Honolulu: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1929.

Secondary

Stanley, Bryan. The World Missionary Conference, Edinburgh 1910. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009.