学長からのメッセージ等

　Congratulations on your entering Doshisha University. It is my great pleasure to welcome you here at the Kyotanabe Campus in the beautiful season of fresh green and cherry blossoms. Welcome to Doshisha University. I would like to express my profound respect to all of you gathering here today for your past efforts. I would also like to extend my congratulations to the families and acquaintances who have nurtured and watched over you until this day.

　Doshisha will celebrate its 150th anniversary on November 29 this year. You are entering Doshisha University in this commemorative year, but I would like us to think of the meaning of the 150 years of history on this occasion, with the hope that entering our university will be a special experience for each one of you. If we can perceive Doshisha’s history of 150 years as something relatable and meaningful to ourselves, it may bring about a change to the way we live and think.

　While the flow of time itself is not divided into parts, it was humans who have somehow separated it into periods and given meanings to times that have passed and times that will come in the future. From another viewpoint, it means that if we do not set breaks in the flow of time and stop there to reflect on the past or envision the future, we will just end up going with the flow of the times without thinking anything in particular.

　Interestingly, there are two different words in the New Testament that represent time. In Greek one is called “chronos” and the other is “kairos.” “Chronos” is the kind of time that ticks steadily and mechanically, in other words the kind of time that is managed by a clock or a calendar. On the other hand, the New Testament uses the word “kairos” for the sense of time that is “fulfilled,” which cannot be measured by chronos. “The time (kairos) is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” This is said to be Jesus’ first words of mission. Since there are very frequent mentions of the growth of plants and the subtleties of nature in Jesus’ words, the sense of time becoming “fulfilled” can be regarded as linked with the wonder of the birth and rebirth of life.

　In my childhood, I loved catching insects and often went out at night or early morning during summer vacation to catch beetles, when I witnessed the molting of cicadas many times. After crawling out of the soil, a cicada larva takes almost an hour to cast off its old skin, and it takes another hour until its wings dry and body color gets darker. As a boy, I was somehow captivated by this slow process and watched the molting holding on to the tree just like the cicada did. The process of a cicada boldly breaking its own shell and shifting its form after spending a long time underground not only stimulated my curiosity, but also seemed to have given me a foundational experience of kairos, of waiting patiently and relishing the fulfillment of time.

　The present society operates based on chronos, requiring us to have time management skills and the ability to process a large amount of information as efficiently as possible. In an age in which it is so difficult to wait and pause, it is not easy to find moments of kairos when “the time is fulfilled“ in our everyday life. However, all the more because of that, the 150th anniversary of Doshisha, when the time is fulfilled, may be a perfect opportunity to witness “Doshisha’s kairos.”

　The history of Doshisha is marked by the turbulent history of modern and contemporary Japan. Having opened in Kyoto just two years after the removal of the signs prohibiting Christianity in 1873, Doshisha Eigakko (Academy) faced criticism from conservative citizens and religious world of Kyoto as an “alien presence” unfitting to Kyoto. During the wartime when loyalty to the state and the emperor was strongly required, demands of withdrawal of Christian principles came from both within and outside of the school, jeopardizing its existence as a school.

　If you connect the starting point of Doshisha, opening 150 years ago with two teachers and eight students, and its current status as a comprehensive educational institution with about 1,800 faculty and staff members and about 42,000 students and pupils, its history may look smooth sailing. But we should not forget that the reality was the opposite, and that the present Doshisha exists because of the hard work of many predecessors.

　An event that took place on February 16 this year made me think of this in particular. On that day, Doshisha University conferred an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters on the late poet Yun Dong-ju upon the 80th anniversary of his death. The ceremony was reported widely by major news outlets in both Japan and Korea.

　Known as Korea’s most beloved poet, Yun Dong-ju was born in 1917 in former Manchuria. After initially studying in Korea under Japanese colonial rule, he entered Rikkyo University in April 1942 and then transferred to Doshisha University in October that year, while at the same time continuing making poetry in Korean, a prohibited activity at that time. He was arrested by Kyoto Shimogamo Police Station in July 1943 as an ideological offender engaging in independence movement and died in Fukuoka Prison on February 16, 1945. Since his poems first got published in the liberated Korea in 1947, his most famous poem collection Sky, Wind, Star and Poem has been read widely and his poetry and way of life have influenced many people in Korea. 

 　As a victim of the wartime, Yun Dong-ju is one of the people that represent the tragic side of history. On the other hand, however, the way he lived and the poems he left are empathized by many people of later generations, many of whom gathered at the Doshisha Imadegawa Campus on February 16. I personally felt that February 16 this year became a kairos in the history of Doshisha, in the sense that it was the day we could share the hope and vision for the new era at the same time as looking back on the wartime through the life of Yun Dong-ju. We cannot envision a responsible future without facing our history. There was a sense on that day that the time was being fulfilled as people gathered there with a shared interest in that issue.

　In order to witness the special moment of breaking the “shell” of the ordinary and transforming into a new entity, we cannot just remain a bystander. Looking back on its history, Doshisha is now ready to celebrate its 150th anniversary as kairos, a special moment of breaking the previous “shell” and transforming into its new form. 

 　Just like we look back on the history of Doshisha on its anniversary, I hope that today gives you all an opportunity to not only celebrate but also to look back on the days in your life leading up to today. I also hope that entering Doshisha University will be a kairos of your life. It is my belief that something new will happen when Doshisha’s kairos and your kairos coincide. I would like to conclude my address by congratulating you on your enrollment and wishing you a fruitful and productive student life.