Alessandro Valignano

Alessandro Valignano (born February 1539, Chieti, Kingdom of Naples—died Jan. 20, 1606, Macau) was an Italian Jesuit missionary who helped introduce Christianity to the Far East, especially to Japan.

Born into an influential Italian family and educated for the law, Valignano joined the Society of Jesus in 1566 after undergoing a religious experience. In 1573 the Society appointed him to the Far East to help supervise the growth of its missions there. He arrived in Portuguese India in 1574 and spent most of the rest of his life in the service of missions in Goa, India; Macau, off the China coast; and in Japan. Among the missionaries he helped to prepare for work in China was the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci, who was responsible for the tremendous influence of Catholicism at the Chinese court in the 17th century.

It was in Japan, however, that Valignano made his major contribution to the propagation of Christianity. On his first visit he arranged for the Jesuit mission to receive a portion of the highly profitable silk trade between Japan and Macau. In this way, he not only made his mission self-supporting but also was able to convert several of the Japanese daimyos (hereditary feudal lords), who also hoped to share in the trade. Further, Valignano’s priests dressed like Zen Buddhist monks to accommodate themselves in every possible way to Japanese culture. So highly esteemed was Valignano that he was received by two successive rulers of Japan and was permitted to establish a centre to train native priests. The four young Japanese Christian samurai he sent to Rome in 1582 comprised the first Japanese diplomatic mission to Europe. They were feted by the king of Spain, received by the Pope amid much ceremony, and painted by Tintoretto.

Although Christianity was suddenly proscribed in Japan in the early 17th century, Valignano’s work had a tremendous influence. By the time of his death, there were an estimated 300,000 Christians and 116 Jesuits in the country.