During the 13th Century, Genghis Khan (1167-1227) and his offspring, after conquering Asia, extended the Yuan Dynasty's Mongol empire into Eastern Europe, making possible for the first time, large-scale communication between China and the West. Christianity spread to China. At that time, it counted almost as many followers as Buddhism and Taoism.
The reports of Italian traveler Marco Polo (1254?-1324?), who stayed on in China for 23 years, and of Jesuit missionaries pieced together a picture of a vast kingdom covering the broad territory to the east of Persia, south from the Tartar homelands, to the southern mountains and eastern seas. This land, China, contained many large cities, long and broad rivers, and boundless plains. And the people living therein were employing such new inventions as gunpowder, coal, paper money, and printing facilities. This "China" was indeed an incredible land!
However, burgeoning land contact with the West was later cut by the rise of conquering Turkish tribes in Central Asia, and remained so from the late Yuan Dynasty to middle Ming (1368-1644) times. Christian missionaries did not again come eastward until the Portuguese discovered new sea routes to China in the 16th Century.
Catholic missionaries began arriving in China by sea at the end of the Ming Dynasty, which marked the beginning of a period of great influence.
Actually, China's earliest contacts with Christianity date back to the reign of the Tang Emperor Chenkuan (627-649). The Christianity introduced at the time was known as Nestorianism. This early version of the religion enjoyed considerable popularity in China to the time of the Tang Emperor Wutzung (841-846), when all foreign religions shared the overflow effects of his persecution of Buddhism. Nestorian Christianity, however, never recovered.
Following the Portuguese discovery, of the new sea routes to Asia, a great number of Catholic missionaries sailed to the new lands, fired with their purpose of converting Asian peoples. In 1540 one such missionary, Francis Xavier, left Rome and went to India to proclaim the Gospel. He intended to travel on to China to carry on his sacred work there. However, he was never allowed to set foot on the continental soil of "forbidden China." In 1552, in a tiny hut on a small island seven miles from the mainland, accompanied only by a Chinese attendant, he died watching the China coast, so close—yet impossible to approach.
Thirty years after St. Francis' death, his intentions were finally realized by another Italian—Fr. Matteo Ricci, who unveiled the mystery of China and became the first foreigner to truly explore Chinese culture. At the time, Western merchants were flocking to the East in search of such precious commodities as spices, silk, silver, and sandalwood incense; but Fr. Ricci came for human souls. Perhaps it should be said that he came not for gaining, but for giving.
Four centuries ago, Ming Dynasty China was a self-centered, highly centralized, very exclusive kingdom, highly suspicious of foreigners. Yet, when Fr. Ricci died 28 years after his first sight of the China coast, he had not only converted important people and organized widespread missionary work, but he had also introduced to the Ming world the marvelous and profound scientific knowledge of the West, opening the "complacent" minds of the successful Chinese people.
Certainly, Fr. Ricci made an immense contribution to China via his service as the vanguard of Sino-Western cultural interchange. He pioneered the exchange of knowledge and culture between East and West, adding to his unique mastery of Western science, a deep understanding of the Chinese language and Chinese philosophy. But even these accomplishments would have availed nothing at all in the absence of his exceptional determination and spirit. He overcame tremendous obstacles in ways that have excited posterity's profoundest admiration.
Ricci's contributions were centered in four areas: geography, mathematics, astronomy, and philosophy. He had great knowledge of geography and cartography, and he used it to draw a large and detailed map of the world, revolutionizing early-Ching Dynasty cartographic and geographic knowledge. His scholastic attainments in two worlds enabled him to translate Western mathematical classics, such as Euclid's Elements of Geometry, into Chinese. And he also collaborated with others to produce a treatise on comparative measurements.
Fr. Ricci was, in addition, an expert fabricator of astronomical instruments as well as an expert on chronographical and calendrical calculations. He made his own clocks and his own telescope, and published numerous Chinese-language monographs on astronomical subjects. His works received the excited and serious consideration of Chinese scholars.
Ricci's major work in the area of religious philosophy was his book The True Idea of God. Comparing and combining the essences of Confucian and Catholic thought, he sought to distinguish the material from the spiritual by means of both inductive and deductive reasoning.
Western knowledge introduced to China by the Catholic missionaries was most deeply influential in the arts and sciences. From Sung times down to the late Ming Dynasty, Chinese scholars had grown increasingly preoccupied with the concepts of "enlightenment of the mind and realization of the true nature of all things;" they were not seeking empirical knowledge as such. With the notable exception of the scholar Wang Yang-ming (1472-1528), China's learned men focused on lofty and abstract intellectual discussion, contributing little to the solution of the harsh social realities developing in their country. Western empiricism was thus introduced at a fortuitous moment in Chinese history.
Born in October 1552, in Italy, Matteo Ricci was the oldest of fourteen children. His father, a physician, wanted him to study law in Rome so that he might become a politician. However, at 19, Matteo became an admirer of the lifestyle and mission of the Jesuits and entered the Society of Jesus. He studied philosophy, theology, mathematics, astronomy, and geography in Rome while preparing for the priesthood.
In 1582, we find him in the Portuguese enclave of Macao, preparing himself seriously for an immense task—he was making an exhaustive study of both written and spoken Chinese, to enable him, with Father Michele Ruggieri, to break through to the Great Han Empire, which now closed its entrances to all Christian missionaries and to their faith.
On September 10, 1583, Ricci arrived in Chaoching, Kwangtung Province, where he presented himself and his companion, Fr. Ruggieri, in garb which identified them with the Buddhist monks, not to hide their religion, but to express their mission in a culturally accepted way. The effect, however, was limited, a major reason being that monks in China were not as respected as in Japan, where the Jesuits had been more successful. Besides, the monks he was now meeting were neither learned nor well respected, and Ricci quickly saw this situation as a significant obstacle to the proclamation of the Gospel.
Since China was heavily influenced by Confucianism, and Confucian scholars were highly respected in Chinese society, Ricci in 1592 began to wear the beard and long hair and robes of the Confucianist, deliberately choosing Chinese scholarship and attention to virtue as the primary route of entrance for the Gospel of Christianity into Chinese society.
Confucianism was for Ricci the "gateway" to the heart of China, and he became a Confucian scholar of note.
In 1584, after Ricci and Ruggieri built a church at Chaoching, Wang Pan, the magistrate of the prefecture, sent them two inscribed wooden tablets, one reading Hsienhua Ssu (Fairy Flower Monastery) for the beam over the entrance, the other Hsi Lai Ching Tu (Pure Land from the West) for the door to the parlor.
At the Fairy Flower Monastery, an image of the Madonna was initially worshipped. However, very often, Chinese parishioners took her for the Chinese Goddess of Mercy or a female Bodhisattva. Therefore, the Maddona was later replaced by a portrait of Jesus.
Ricci had brought many objects with him from Europe—prisms, lace fabrics, etc.—but a world map erected in the main hall of the monastery aroused the most interest from scholarly visitors: it was completely different from the Chinese versions. On Ricci's map, China was not in the center of the world. But what surprised educated Chinese the most was that in addition to the Chinese Empire, there were many other big empires and countries.
At the suggestion of the scholars, Ricci copied the map and translated all the names of the nations, islands, oceans, etc. into Chinese. This was the original version of Ricci's famous world map—Yu Ti Shan Hai Chuan Tu—first carved, then printed in 1584. A second edition was produced 16 years later. And with the assistance of Li Chih-tsao, Ricci published in 1602 and 1603, third and fourth editions of his world map, now titled Kun Yu Wan Kao.
Ricci wrote in his book about China: "The world map carved and printed by the Chinese themselves, showed China with 15 provinces. And besides China, there were seas and some small islands. The total area of these island nations was no bigger than a province of China."
Commenting on Ricci's world map, the History of the Ming Dynasty, authored by Chang Ting-yu and others in the time of the Ching Dynasty, under express Imperial orders, states in Vol. 326: "Situated in the Atlantic Ocean, Italy had not been able to send travelers to China since ancient times. During the reign of Emperor Shentzung, Matteo Ricci came to Peking from that country and drew a world map, on which five continents were indicated...."
Through Ricci's world map, the Chinese, more than 100 years after Columbus, came to the sudden realization that the earth was round, that it could be marked off in degrees of longitude and latitude, with North and South Poles and an Equator, and that there were five known continents. Furthermore, the Chinese learned for the first time of the existence and names of many previously unknown countries.
The publication of the world map revealed a basic Ricci technique toward his principal mission of proclaiming the Gospel—to entice curiosity by means of novel objects and concepts.
Among Ricci's disciples, Chu Tai-su (whose father had been Minister of China's Ministry of Rites) really deserves first mention. He first met Fr. Ricci at the Fairy Flower Monastery in Chaoching in the fall of 1589, when Ricci was already quite well known in Kwangtung Province. They met again several years later when Ricci moved to Shaochou, and this time, Ghu, in full dress and bringing presents, came to become a formal student of Ricci's via a solemn ceremony. Using the math textbooks he had brought from Rome, Ricci taught Chu for two years, and Chu was a diligent and accomplishing student.
In Shaochou, after Ricci had doffed his image as a monk from the West and adopted the image of the Confucianists, he also began to study Chinese classics and to practice calligraphy. In 1594, he wrote to a friend in Italy, "For eight years I have been burdened by too many miscellaneous duties. However, beginning this year, I have been able to learn from a Chinese teacher to write in Chinese. And I have started to write a book...."
The book was The True Idea of God (sometimes translated as The True Notion of God), completed in 1596 when Ricci was residing in Nanchang, Kiangsi Province, and published in 1603. Only at the end of the book does Ricci discuss the mystery of Redemption through the death and resurrection of Christ. In the same year, Ricci completed four years of previous work, translating into Latin the Confucianists' Four Books (the Great Learning, the Doctrine of the Mean, the Analects, and the Book of Mencius).
After 15 years in China, Ricci had still never been to Peking, the capital and seat of the Ming Dynasty; in 1598 he decided to visit the Forbidden City and ask for the Emperor's official permission to proclaim the Gospel in China. On September 7, Ricci arrived in Peking and, as he approached the city gate: noted with awe the grandeur and majesty of the city's walls. When he saw the Forbidden City, the Imperial Palace enclave, its red columns and shining yellow roof tiles again conquered Ricci.
Ricci could touch the walls of the Forbidden City and realize that the Emperor was just measurable feet away. However, for Ricci, Emperor Shentzung may as well have been at the most distant corner of the earth. In Kwangtung, Ricci had thought that if only one day he were permitted to travel to Peking, he would surely be received by the Emperor. Now, he realized that to see the Emperor in person was much more difficult than, as the Chinese say, "climbing to heaven"—not because the palace moat was wide and deep and the walls of the Forbidden City too high and thick, but because the court eunuchs blocked the way.
Deeply disappointed, Ricci returned to Nanking.
The world map produced by Fr. Matteo Ricci in Chaoching had already reached Nanking, and scholars and high ranking officials there had already developed the habit of coming to discuss astronomy and geography with Ricci. At the time, most people still thought the earth to be square and flat, and the sky, round. And they believed without doubt that solar and lunar eclipses were omens of disaster. But when Ricci took out the astronomical instruments he had made and offered his explanations, his Chinese friends had no choice but to bow to his knowledge in the field. Later, Ricci viewed the astronomical instruments of the Chinese at the Peichi Chamber in Nanking, and went on to visit the organization in charge of astronomy, astrology, divination, and related disciplines in Peking. He records that he was impressed by the fine equipment there, and that he later learned that the astronomical instruments in Peking and Nanking were made by Kuo Shou-ching of the old Yuan Dynasty.
Ricci's first mission to Peking, though he had offered tribute, was a failure, but he was not despondent. He tried again three years later, entering Peking on January 24, 1601. That night he was allowed to stay at the hall for court eunuchs outside the gates of the palace, and in the middle of the night, Ricci, under the faint light, later recorded that he opened the wooden chests containing tribute items, among them portraits of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, two clocks, eight glass mirrors and glass bottles, colored glass stones, a European musical instrument, a rhinoceros horn, an hourglass, cloth, etc.
Early next morning, the court eunuchs sent the tribute to the palace, and Ricci waited patiently for the result. When two days had passed without word from the Emperor, Ricci wrote a ritual memorial to Emperor Shentzung discussing his trip to China, what he had accomplished in the past 18 years, the gift items he had brought from Italy, and his expectations of meeting the Emperor, thereby to request his permission to proclaim the Gospel in China.
When the tribute items reached the Emperor, he examined them one by one; as soon as he saw the portraits of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, he reportedly turned pale and cried without thinking, "A living Buddha!" He ordered that the portrait of Jesus be put into the treasury immediately and presented the portrait of the Virgin to the Empress Dowager, Tzusheng. Tzusheng, a Buddhist, reportedly became frightened when she viewed the vivid Madonna. She ordered that it be placed in the palace treasury.
The two clocks struck the hours and were particularly favored by the Emperor, who considered them to be the most novel objects in the world. Eight days later, when both clocks suddenly stopped, the Emperor sent an eunuch to ask Ricci what should be done, and Ricci taught him how to set them. A few days later, Emperor Shentzung dispatched four eunuchs from the organization overseeing astronomy to learn the "secret" of the striking clocks.
The two clocks worked well, and the Emperor was delighted. He ordered the smaller one placed in his residence and the bigger one in the Huangshou Palace. He again dispatched a eunuch, this time to ask about Western customs, and he ordered court painters to draw Ricci's portrait. Each time thereafter when the clocks were out of order, the Emperor would order Fr. Matteo Ricci to come to his palace to repair them. Later, the Emperor decreed that Ricci was to visit the palace once every season to check the clocks. But in spite of all these visits to the palace, Ricci never saw the Emperor face to face. He attained only his purpose of settling down in Peking.
During ten years in the Imperial capital, Ricci made the acquaintances of many high ranking officials and scholars; among them, Feng Ying-ching, Li Chih-tsao, and Hsu Kuang-chi became his close friends. And if Ricci is considered the pioneer in introducing Western culture and science to China, then Minister Hsu Kuang-chi's contribution in this area should not be left unrecognized. If in the Ming court there had not been such a man as Hsu, with keen insight and open intelligence, then Ricci's role would have been greatly narrowed.
They first met in 1600 in Nanking, when Hsu was on his way to participate in the general examination for employment at the Ministry of Rites in Peking. Since Ricci's arrival in China, he had been attempting to translate Western books on astronomy and mathematics into Chinese. Nevertheless, he had yet to meet a local person he could work with on the translations. Although in Shaochou, his student, Chu Tai-su, had begun to translate Euclid's geometry into Chinese, Chu devoted only limited time and energy to the task. When Ricci met Hsu in Peking, he had the feeling of acquiring a rare treasure. In 1606, they began working together on translations: Ricci taught Hsu Western sciences and the latter took copious notes. The first translation Hsu completed was Euclid's Elements of Geometry.
Living in China as a Westerner from a distant land, Ricci, although he dressed and lived like a Chinese scholar, in the bottom of his heart was still lonely. He was constantly aware that the Emperor controlled his movements, and that none of the eunuchs and other high ranking officials of the court was trustworthy. Therefore, Ricci regarded his friendship with Hsu as especially important. He consigned his hope of promoting the mission's work in China to Hsu.
The task of translating Euclid's geometry text was completed in 1607, and the same year, Ricci also collaborated with Hsu in writing his Treatise on Measurements.
Six years earlier, in 1601, when Ricci first offered his tribute to the Emperor and wrote the memorial stating his purpose for entering Peking, he had revealed in the memorial his hope of working with the organization concerned with astronomy. He was trying to amend the Chinese calendar system, which could no longer support calculations of the dates of solar and lunar eclipses. However, it 'was not until November of 1610, the year Ricci died—when the Chinese calendar system failed to calculate a solar eclipse—that the Emperor finally accepted the suggestions of enlightened, high ranking officials to undertake large scale revision of the Chinese calendar. It took more than ten years to complete this work, which was never put into practice due to the obstructions of those opposed to change.
After 28 years' consecration to his China mission, on May 11, 1610, when Ricci was about to die, he could only say to his companions: "I leave before you a door open to great merits, but not without great dangers and much pain." Ricci died peacefully, as if he had no need to make the stride from life to death. One hour later, the sun set outside the Hsian Gate of Peking.
On All Saintsday, Ricci was buried in a special place granted by Emperor Shentzung about one li from the Imperial capital. The four Chinese characters mu yi li yien (Admiring Righteousness and Acheiving Glory by Writing) were inscribed on a memorial tablet sent by Huang Chi-shi, governor of Shuntien Prefecture. To the east of the burial site, the yellow roof tiles of the Forbidden City glistened in the sun, and when the noise of the city reached the area, it was but a murmur....
To commemorate the 400th Anniversary of Matteo Ricci's arrival in China, the ROC postal directorate issued two commemorative stamps on April 3. Both stamps bear the portrait of Fr. Matteo Ricci, but background objects on each feature different aspects of his life and interests. The issuance of the two stamps underlines two significant facts: First, that the Republic of China fully acknowledges the contributions of Western missionaries in introducing the knowledge and techniques of the West to China; second, that China has benefited much from the introductions.
Towards the same purpose, a recent international symposium on Chinese-Western cultural interchange was held in Taipei, with more then 60 Chinese and Western scholars in attendance.
Pope John Paul II sent a congratulatory message, in which he remarked: "The example of Father Ricci, who is considered by the Church, by the Western World, and by China as their common heritage, may be a firm and meaningful point of reference for a constructive interchange between Western culture and the wonderful reality of traditions and culture of profound humanity and of rich spirituality that constitutes the historical and present inheritance of the great Chinese nation...."