Paul Miki

Life events

1. Born

   Paul Miki was born around 1562 into a wealthy Japanese family.

2. Educated

   Miki received his education from the Jesuits in Azuchi and Takatsuki, the two principal Jesuit mission centers in central Japan.

3. Ordained

   Miki joined the Society of Jesus and became a well-known and successful preacher, gaining numerous converts to Catholicism.

4. Imprisoned

   Toyotomi Hideyoshi, ruler of Japan, ordered the arrest of Miki and his fellow Catholics amid a campaign of persecution driven by fear of Jesuit influence and European intentions.

5. Pilgrimage

   After arrest, the prisoners were forced to march 966 kilometers (600 miles) from Kyoto to Nagasaki, singing the Te Deum throughout the journey.

6. Martyred — 1597

   On 5 February 1597, Miki was tied to a cross at Nagasaki and killed by a lance thrust to the chest. He delivered a final sermon from the cross and is reported to have forgiven his executioners. Twenty-five companions were crucified alongside him.

7. Other — 1862

   Pope Pius IX canonized Paul Miki and his twenty-five companions in 1862, collectively recognized as the Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan.

Relationships

Documented claims

• Miki preached his final sermon from the cross at Nagasaki moments before his death, reportedly forgiving his executioners — an act preserved in the martyrdom accounts. (plausible)
• The condemned group sang the Te Deum throughout the forced 966-kilometer march from Kyoto to Nagasaki, one of the most distinctive details of the martyrdom narrative. (plausible)
• Nagasaki, where Miki was executed, today holds the largest Catholic population in Japan — a demographic legacy traceable in part to the early Jesuit mission in which Miki participated. (likely)
• Among the twenty-six crucified at Nagasaki were three Jesuits — Miki, Joan Soan de Gotó, and Santiago Kisai — and twenty-three other clergy and laity, all canonized together in 1862. (certain)