Noël Peri

Noël Péri (; 22 August 1865 - 25 June 1922) was a French Catholic priest. A missionary and author, he was responsible for translating the Gospels into Japanese and published the first research journal devoted to Japanese topics. He read and wrote broadly about Japanese culture, including studies of Buddhist history and mythology, and as a result came into conflict with some members of the Catholic missionary community. He was ordained a priest in 1888 after being educated by the Jesuits. He spent four years serving in the Paris Foreign Missions Society, resigning from the Mission in 1902 but continuing to regularly return to Japan until shortly before his death in 1922. In addition to his teaching and other translation work, he published studies of Japanese opera and Noh in 1909 and 1912. He continued to write on topics in Asian history, Buddhist literature and myth, and Japanese culture. He wrote a comprehensive survey of various versions of the myth of the demonic/ogre goddess Hariti and examined her relationship with Guanyin, the East Asian form of Avalokitesvara. He also wrote about the deity Weituo, the historical dating of the commentator Vasubandhu, and the ambiguous identification of Gotama Buddha's wife, generally known as Yasodhara.

His unfinished manuscript on Japanese music theory and structure, Essai sur les gammes japonaises, was published posthumously.