真理大學校長室

Chancellor Mizuta, dear graduates and colleagues, honorable guests:

I’m most honored today to be able to receive the degree of Doctor honoris causa at Josai International University .  It has been 38 years since I was last conferred the degree of Doctor of Science in Mathematics in 1969, at Kyushu University .  Hence I feel most grateful for this occasion.

The origin of modern universities can be traced back to the medieval times when universities began to emerge in Europe , among which the University of Paris in and University of Bologna in were of the earliest, followed by the University of Oxford and University of Cambridge in , the University of Heidelberg and University of Cologne in .  Some of the most praiseworthy features that characterized these universities at that time were their ‘world spirit’ and their ‘borderless’ characteristic.  With Latin as their common language and biblical faith their shared belief in the fourteenth century, teachers and students might travel freely afar from Bologna to Paris, or from Paris to Oxford, exchange their research and thoughts under one world, one God, and were heartily entertained by the universities they visited.

In 1852, John Henry Newman, an Oxford scholar and the first president of the Catholic University of Ireland, illustrated in his The Idea of a University that a university is a place that provides liberal education and fosters a real gentleman—a culturally aware person who is ‘at home in any society,’ well-mannered, and has every commonsense.  The purpose of education is about the build of one’s personality, that is, ‘character formation.’  Newman’s idea of a university has significantly influenced the British education, and has further become a classic that influenced the universities around the world.

In 1997, the Ministry of Education in began to allow more universities to be established, which resulted in a sharp increase in total number of universities, from 67 then up to 145 in 2007.  A prevailing awareness among the universities has it that, under such keen competition, crises would arise if fewer students would come to enroll, and that student recruitment would become a key factor to a university’s survival.  Hence many universities have adopted different kinds of incentives in order to attract more students.

However, I regarded that, the crisis of a university is not caused by the lack of student enrolment—as the lack of student enrolment is a direct result after the crisis has taken place.  What really risks a university is whether it has maintained its quality and spirit.  It would be an unwise and false approach should a university appeal to the commercial value or a job market-oriented society for the sake of student enrolment, at the expense of its spirit and quality.

During my thirty-six years’ tenure as a president, I have devoted myself to university education and theological research, and to combining the theological philosophy with my service in the university’s education and administration.  Therefore, I have maintained the idea of medieval university education, and believed that, in addition to committing to internationalization and globalization, a university should provide an education that helps students’ character building through learning.     

Particularly, university education nowadays tends to weigh more on materialism and science that the pursuit of liberal arts education has remarkably fallen behind, which has seriously undermined the fundamental spirit and quality of a university.  University education in our times has thus risked in becoming commercialized and vocationalized, and a call for emphasizing the importance of building a person’s ethical value and character formation has become ever urgent.

Ten years ago, based on this ideology, I firmly believed that only by maintaining the spirit and quality of our University could we continue to survive and to attract enough students to come to enroll.  In order to serve the purpose and solve the prospective crisis of our University, I cited the words from the Bible, ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;’ and ’Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God;‘ as the central philosophy of the idea of our University.  And, in 1997, I declared that the Idea of the establishment of Aletheia University as follows:

1.      to teach knowledge, arouse potentiality, research the bases of new knowledge, and discuss freely the Truth, in order that the faculty and students will be Humble, Humane, and Humorous, the 3-H characteristics of building a fully developed person;

2.      in tolerant attitude, to show concern for society, protect the Earth, adjust to the world’s changing trends, and facilitate the international interflow of culture and technology; at the same time, to create new and wider academic and technological experience, expanding opportunities for people already working in society and for the provision for life-long education.

I believed if we followed our Idea of University, the recruitment crisis could be avoided and resolved.  As a matter of fact, ever since its announcement, we have never failed to reach the targeted student number.  The Idea of Aletheia University has properly safeguarded us of our prosperity for now and the future.

On April 13^th of 1999, Chancellor Mizuta and I signed the partnership agreement between our two universities and marked the beginning of formal exchange activities on both sides.  On August 1^st the same year, we changed our name as Aletheia University .  ‘Aletheia’ is a Greek word meaning ‘Truth.’  Incidentally, I came to realize that Josai International and Aletheia share a similar idea that we both emphasize character formation and international exchanges.  As you preserve your spiritual legacy as ‘character building through learning’ and are committed to ‘forming the characters of young people with dreams and noble visions of working for the benefit of both local and international communities,’ I believe this common ground between us would bolster a smooth operation in all our exchange activities, and to contribute to more fruitful harvests and developments in the future.

I would like to congratulate on all the graduates here today for I believe from here you have procured bountiful knowledge and fostered a positive personality, under Josai International University ’s caring education and the influence of its spiritual legacy.  As character building is a ceaseless process, I encourage you to continue to polish your character through career planning and self-education.

Finally, I wish all of you good health, and a prosperous and ever-growing Josai International.  Thank you.