Theology: Mount Fuji and Mount Sinai by Kosuke Koyama.

This is one of the first books I read after arriving in Japan in 2018, trying to acquaint myself with both Japanese Christianity and Japan’s religious traditions more broadly. I just revisited it as I prepare to leave Japan. Not surprisingly, I got more out of it this time than the first time. But you don’t need to be a Japan afficionado of any type to appreciate the depth and generosity of Koyama’s work. He wrestles mightily with affection for his people and land, along with forthright horror and repentance at what sucked them into the imperial ideology resulting in the travesty of the Second World War. But he holds Westerners and Christians no less responsible for the horror of the nuclear bombs dropped on civilian targets in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And that in turn leads to larger questions of religious heritage and religious difference, and what it can mean to know and love God within this fallen humanity. You might even find it easier to wrestle with such questions in your own setting by seeing them refracted through the lens of such a different one.

Novel: Deep River by Shusaku Endo.

Endo is best known for his novel Silence—or perhaps for the Martin Scorcese film adaptation thereof. But I suspect Deep River is more accessible to readers, and also gets closer to the heart of Endo’s lifelong spiritual struggle. I would judge it the most sophisticated, thoughtful, and nuanced attempt I’ve ever come across to present the conviction that all religions lead to the same place and believe the same thing. I would also have to say it doesn’t convince me, for many reasons. But Endo’s story forces its reader past a facile reason for disagreeing with his conviction toward a serious one. He finally lands on the side of the common plight of humanity, our sufferings and longings—and so far as that goes, no argument here. The question is whether there is another, and divine, player in this drama, and on what basis we could ever claim to know. Endo manages profound appreciation of several world religions (along with some tactical omissions notable by their absence), while also critiquing them from within. If what he presents here as Christianity were in fact the content of the gospel, I think he’d be will within his rights to be dissatisfied! But the problem may be as much, or more, a theological problem within Christianity, rather than a cultural problem between, say, Europe and Japan. However, all that aside, I encourage you to read this book for its astounding portraits of very different people suffering from very different spiritual woes. I recognized some distinctive Japanese types of suffering, but the story is so well told that they are universally accessible.

Cookbook: Japanese Soul Cooking by Tadashi Ono and Harris Salat.

Last time I recommended Japanese-authored or -themed books, the cookbook of choice was Elizabeth Andoh’s Washoku. Not only do I still recommend it, I have to brag that I just recently finished cooking every single recipe from it (see photo below). Few cookbooks are worth that level of devotion! So if you have any interest at all in traditional Japanese cooking, by all means check it out (and all her other great books and website, too). However, most Westerners come to know Japanese cooking not through its venerable traditions but through Tokyo’s noodle shops, convenience stores, and street food. If that’s the taste you’re pining for, then what you want is Ono and Salat’s collection of slurpy soba, deep-fried croquettes, savory pancakes, and even the baffling (to this Westerner, anyway) Japanese versions of Western food… the converse of a Benihana steakhouse, as it were. The main reason I haven’t cooked all the way through it yet is because of the tripe recipe. But everything else I’ve made has been great, so don’t let a little cow stomach deter you.