「自分の心の舵をしっかり保っていこう！」
"Steer your heart!"

矢嶋 楫子　女史
Ms. Kajiko Yajima
1833 - 1925　
熊本県上益城郡益城町杉堂　生誕
Born in Masuki-gun, Kumamoto-ken

矢嶋楫子女史は婦人参政権・廃娼・禁酒運動の草分けです。日米の女性の架け橋として女性の地位向上に奔走、教育者そして社会事業家として活躍しました。
Yajima Kaneko was a pioneer in the women's suffrage movement, the abolition of prostitution, and the prohibition movement. She served as a bridge between Japan and the United States, tirelessly working for the advancement of women's rights, while also excelling as an educator and a social worker.

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「仏頂面の渋柿」
　勝子は熊本有数の惣庄屋の8人兄弟姉妹に生まれ、女5人男1人のあとの望まれない女児として親から名前も付けられず、笑顔の少ない仏頂面の「渋柿」とあだ名されます。勝子は母の鶴子からは自筆の百人一首、古今和歌集、三十六歌仙などを与えられ、兄・直方からは家族で唯一の惜しみない愛情を与えられます。兄は多くの門弟を輩出する横井小楠の高弟であり、姉妹は次々と小楠の門弟に嫁し、最先端の知的な人脈を形作ります。勝子も敬愛する兄・直方のすすめで、既に2男1女を儲けていた富豪林七郎の後妻として嫁ぐも、夫の酒乱で何度も死に目にあいながら極度の疲労と衰弱で半盲状態に陥って、三人の子を連れ家を出ます。周囲の冷たい批判を受けつつ妹たちの間を転々とする間、勝子は兄の看病のために子供達を置いて上京。旅中に大きな船も小さな楫で動く様子を見て、「自分も今後この楫を以って我が生活の羅針としよう」という決意のもと、「勝子」から「楫子」へ改名。40歳の再出発です。
「我弱ければ」
　兄の看病と放漫財政を正しながら、教員伝習所に通い訓導試験に合格した楫子は芝の桜川小学校（現・港区立御成門小学校）で教員として働き始めます。ところが、楫子は妻子持ちの書生・鈴木要介との間に女児を出産、きょうだいは堕胎を迫り、書生は妾の戸籍登録を迫りますが、梶子は女児に妙子(湯浅清子の母)と名付けて練馬の農家に預けて独り下宿生活に戻ります。「女は何て弱いのだろう」。楫子はある日、米国宣教師で炎の教育者・マリア・ツルー夫人と出会います。築地居留地にある新栄女学校の教師に請われ同女学校の寄宿舎監室に移った矢先、孤独から煙草をたしなむようになっていた梶子は不注意でボヤ騒ぎを起こします。以降、梶子は煙草をきっぱりと止め、ツルー夫人と共に女子教育向上はじめ看護教育また幼児教育に力を注ぎます。さらに櫻井ちか女史から櫻井女学校を託され校主代理に就任すると、楫子は校則を作らず「あなたがたは聖書を持っています。だから自分で自分を治めなさい」と女生徒ら個人の尊重ならびに自治を促します。櫻井女学校と新栄女学校は合併して女子学院となり、梶子は初代院長になります。ミッションスクールで初めて皇后誕生日を「地久節」として祝日にしたり、禅僧を招いて国語や漢文の教師とします。
「天国は日本からでも、アメリカからでも、距離は同じでしょう」
　楫子は46歳のとき築地新栄教会で洗礼を受けると、婦人矯風運動（禁酒運動）に率先して参加するようになります。米国の禁酒運動家メアリー・レビット夫人来日を期に、平和・純潔・酒害防止を三大目標に掲げて東京キリスト教婦人矯風会を組織。国会開設と共に「一夫一婦制の確立」「海外醜業婦（からゆきさん）の取締・防止」を2大誓願として提出、さらに「婦人参政権」「廃娼・禁酒運動」を始めます。 東京大久保に娼妓をやめた女性の支援施設「慈愛館」を設立、婦人救済運動を起こします。60歳のとき矯風会の全国組織を結成、日本キリスト教婦人矯風会会頭となって、アメリカはじめ欧州・台湾・満州・朝鮮まで婦人福祉のために奔走します。日清・日露戦争下で楫子は、兵士を助けるよう会員に献金を勧めたり、戦地に赴いた軍人たちに慰問袋を送ったり、徴兵された家族を保護して妻を教育し職業を斡旋します。ならびに満州・朝鮮へ視察を兼ねた講演に赴き、大連・旅順・奉天・京城・仁川・平壌などに主に日本人による矯風会支部を設立。しかしながら楫子は満州・朝鮮への公娼制導入に反対の声をあげることなく、日露戦争の勝利ならび植民地化政策を支持します。一方、梶子90歳のときに日本婦人平和協会（現在の婦人国際平和自由連盟日本支部）理事長の井上秀女史とともにワシントン軍縮会議に出席、ハーディング大統領と面会し、平和を祈る日本のキリスト女性信者１万人が署名した嘆願書を手渡します。翌年、楫子は平和を求めるアメリカ女性宣教団体「戦争の原因究明と解決策創出のための全国委員会NCCCW」から日米相互理解について一致して努力することを誓う電報を日本女性代表として受け取ります。

``Astringent Persimmon with the Buddha's Top Face''
Katsuko was born to eight brothers and sisters in one of Kumamoto's leading soshoya families, and as an unwanted girl after 5 girls and 1 boy, her parents did not give her a name. is nicknamed. Katsuko's mother, Tsuruko, gives her the Hyakunin Isshu in her own handwriting, the Kokin Wakashu, and the 36 Poems, and her older brother, Nogata, gives her the only unstinting love in her family. Her older brother is a senior disciple of Kogusu Yokoi, who produced many of her disciples, and her sisters marry into Kogusu's disciples one after another, forming her cutting-edge intellectual network. At the recommendation of her older brother, Nogata, whom Katsuko adores, she married Shichiro Hayashi, a wealthy man who had already fathered two sons and one daughter, but she suffered death many times due to her husband's alcohol abuse, and became half-blind due to exhaustion and weakness. I became depressed and left home with my three children. While receiving cold criticism from those around her and moving between her sisters, Katsuko leaves her children and goes to Tokyo to take care of her older brother. During her journey, she saw how even a large ship moved with a small oar, and with her determination, ``From now on, I will use this oar as a compass for my life.'' Changed her name from "Katsuko" to "Kareko". She is 40 years old and starting over.
``Because I'm weak''
while taking care of her older brother and correcting her self-indulgent finances, Kareko attends a teacher training center and passes the training exam. She begins working as a teacher at Sakuragawa Elementary School in Shiba (currently Onarimon Elementary School in Minato Ward). However, Kajiko gives birth to a baby girl with Yosuke Suzuki, a school student who has a wife and children.The siblings demand an abortion, and the student demands that the student register her as a concubine, but Kajiko gives birth to a girl named Taeko (Kiyoko Yuasa's mother). I gave him a name, left him with a farmer in Nerima, and returned to living alone in a boarding house. She said, ``Women are so weak.'' One day, Kazuko meets Mrs. Maria True, an American missionary and educator of fire. At the request of a teacher at Shinei Girls' School in the Tsukiji Settlement, she moves to the girls' school's dormitory room, but Kajiko, who has begun to enjoy cigarettes out of loneliness, inadvertently causes a fuss. . From then on, Kajiko completely stopped smoking, and she and Mrs. True focused their efforts on improving girls' education, nursing education, and early childhood education. Furthermore, when she was entrusted with the responsibility of Sakurai Girls' School by Chika Sakurai and assumed the role of school principal, Kazuko did not make any school rules and told the female students, ``You all have the Bible, so govern yourself.'' We encourage respect and self-government. Sakurai Girls' School and Shinei Girls' School merged to become Girls' School, and Kajiko became the first director. She became the first mission school to make the Empress's birthday a public holiday, and invited Zen monks to teach Japanese and Chinese.
``The distance to heaven will be the same whether it's from Japan or America.''
When Kazuko was 46 years old, she was baptized at Tsukiji Shin'ei Church, and she began to take the lead in participating in the Women's Prohibition Movement (temperance movement). On the occasion of the visit of American temperance activist Mrs. Mary Levitt to Japan, she organized the Tokyo Christian Women's Association with three major goals: peace, purity, and prevention of alcohol abuse. When the Diet was established, she submitted her two major vows: ``establishing monogamy'' and ``controlling and preventing obscene women overseas.'' Start exercising. She established Jiaikan, a support facility for women who had quit working as prostitutes, in Okubo, Tokyo, and started a women's relief movement. When she was 60 years old, she formed a national organization of Kyofu-kai, became the president of the Japan Christian Women's Kyofu-kai, and worked hard for women's welfare in America, Europe, Taiwan, Manchuria, and Korea. During the Sino-Japanese and Russo-Japanese wars, Kazuko encouraged members to donate money to help soldiers, sent comfort bags to soldiers who went to war, and protected the families of conscripted soldiers, educating their wives and caring for their girlfriends. We will arrange jobs for you. She also went to Manchuria and Korea to give lectures and to observe, and established Kyofu-kai branches, mainly made up of Japanese people, in Dalian, Lushun, Mukden, Gyeongseong, Incheon, and Pyongyang. However, she did not voice opposition to the introduction of licensed prostitution in Manchuria and Korea, and she supported the victory of the Russo-Japanese War and the colonization policy. Meanwhile, at the age of 90, Kajiko attended the Washington Disarmament Conference with Hide Inoue, the president of the Japan Women's Peace Association (currently the Japan branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom), met with President Harding, and was a Japanese Christian woman who prayed for peace. Hand over a petition signed by 10,000 believers. The following year, Kazuko, as the Japanese women's representative, received a telegram from the National Committee for the Investigation of the Causes of War and the Creation of Solutions to the National Committee for the Investigation of the Causes of War and Creation of Solutions from the American women's missionary organization seeking peace, pledging to make concerted efforts for mutual understanding between Japan and the United States.

-日本キリスト教婦人矯風会　KYOHUKAI
-四賢婦人記念館　Shiken Fujin Memoria Museum
-アメリカ大使館　U.S. Embasssy Japan
-婦人国際平和自由連盟（WILPF）　Women's  International League for Peace and Freedom JAPAN Section

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Share your story of a woman that inspires you!