Book Description

It might be said that Jesus Christ was the "type" that the New Testament planned for the birth of Prince Shotoku in Japan, in other words, Prince Shotoku was "antitype" of Jesus Christ. From the Christian theology, if the preordained certain persons, events, and institutions of the Old Testament bear to corresponding persons, events, and institutions in the New Testament, what is depicted in the Old Testament is called "type" and corresponding description in the New Testament is called "antitype." The descendants of the gods, including the Nakatomi(中臣) and Mononobe(物部) clans who accompanied Nigihayahi-no-Mikoto(饒速日命) and Ninigi-no-Mikoto(邇邇藝命) when they descended from Takamagahara(高天原), appear to have already had contact with Judaism, but Ishikawa Maro(石川麿), the grandson of Takeuchi Sukune(武内宿禰), is thought to have converted to Nestorianism, which was brought to Japan by the Hata clan(秦氏) who came to Japan during the reign of Emperor Ojin(応神天皇), and changed his surname to Soga(蘇我), which symbolizes the "resurrection of Jesus." Soga no Iname(蘇我稲目), the fifth generation successor to Ishikawa Maro, tried to introduce and promote Buddhism that was fused with Nestorianism, but this led to friction with the Nakatomi and Mononobe clans, who were in charge of religious affairs. With the rise of the Soga clan(蘇我氏), who were descendants of immigrants, the Mononobe clan(物部氏), who had been in power since the descent of the heavenly grandson(天孫), was wiped out from central politics, and the government system based on the two pillars of the Oomi(大臣) and Omuraji(大連) collapsed, but the Soga clan's tyranny did not last long, and the authority of Oomi was later divided between the left and right ministers. As the status of the Takamagahara clans(高天原系氏族) was threatened by the rise of immigrant clans, Prince Umayado appears to have been expected by both factions to be a savior who would bring about reconciliation within the Yamato court(大和朝廷). The Soga clan understood better than anyone that they could be the in-laws of the Emperor because of the unbroken imperial line based on male lineage succession. This tradition, that is, the imperial system of single line from time immemorial (万世一系の天皇制), established by Prince Shotoku and the Soga clan was continued by the Fujiwara clan, who succeeded the Soga clan as the in-laws, and by the Kamakura, Muromachi and Tokugawa Shogunates, and the Meiji, Taisho and Showa periods (probably the postwar GHQ).