Uchimura Kanz ?? was one of Japan's foremost thinkers, whose ideas influenced contemporary novelists, statesmen, reformers, and religious leaders. He lived at a time of increasing modernization and rapid social change. Known as the originator and proponent of a particularly "Japanese" form of Christianity known as muky ??kai, Uchimura struggled with the tensions between his love for the homeland and his love for God. Articulate, prolific, passionate, and profound, he earned a reputation as the most consistent critic of his society and the most knowledgeable Japanese interpreter of Christianity and its Bible. In addition to teaching and giving public lectures, he wrote numerous books and articles -- in both English and Japanese -- edited newspapers and periodicals, and founded several magazines. Through the prism of this exceptional man's life, John Howes charts, in this tour de force, what it meant to live during the introduction of Christianity to Japan.