Japan in Transition by Loretta L. Shaw

Loretta L. Shaw offers a Christian perspective on Post WWI Japan in the hope that this new World Power would be transformed by the Gospel. My thanks Redcliffe College for providing me with a copy to digitise and to the Church Mission Society for their kind permission to place it on-line.

Loretta L. Shaw, Japan in Transition. London: Church Missionary Society, 1923. Hbk. pp.128. [Click to download complete book in PDF]

Contents

1. The Land and its People
2. The Rise of Democracy
3. New Ideas in Commerce
4. Woman: Her Heritage From the Past
5. Woman: New Ideals
6. The Meeting of the Currents
7. The Spread of Christianity
8. Methods of Work
9. The Way of Power

• Bibliography

Foreword

Japan is in rapid transition. Much has been published recently descriptive of the political and social changes taking place so rapidly in that land, but there is place for a book in which these changes are considered from the standpoint of the Christian missionary. In the past, the fascination of Japan sprang from the picturesqueness of the country and people, and still more from the sudden emergence of an eastern people into the light and ways of western civilization. A change so complete, and apparently so successful, was unique in history. The confusion and chaos attendant on great changes in Russia and elsewhere only serve to increase our wonder at the smoothness with which Japan has in a generation readjusted herself to modem conditions. To-day the fascination is none the less real, but for another reason-Japan, recognized as one of the great Powers, is passing through a spiritual conflict upon the issue of which depends her future greatness. [Continue reading]