Living Kirishitan icons of early modern Japan

The period of underground Christianity in Japan from 1639-1873 produced a distinctly Japanese sect of the Catholic religion. The icons produced during period reflect the Japanese Christian believers' deep Buddhist roots. Most scholarship focuses on the European Jesuit and Japanese primary textual sources, and Christian paintings from this period have largely been dismissed as folk art. An examination of the Buddhist practices and iconography that influenced the underground Japanese Christians reveals aspects of their belief that has yet to be addressed. The Buddhist and Catholic parallels in belief and practice were key factors in the continuation of the underground Christians, who creatively redefined their beliefs within a Buddhist pictorial language.