Introduction

Abstract

This book is the first scholarly study and translation of the famous Jesuit Chinese children’s primer, the Four Character Classic (Sizijingwen 四字經文), written by Giulio Aleni (1582–1649) while living in Fujian, China. This study and translation of a missionary catechism in China that was published during the Qing provides new insights into an area of the Jesuit mission in early modern China that has so far been given little attention, the education of children. The Jesuit enterprise in China employed the genre of children’s primers for religious instruction, and this work contributes a new dimension to the extensive body of scholarly works that have chiefly analyzed the scientific endeavors of such Jesuits as Johann Adam Schall von Bell (1591–1666) and Ferdinand Verbiest (1623–1688). The Jesuit accommodationist strategy in China disposed the missionaries to produce their texts along traditional Chinese lines, utilizing China’s extant woodblock technology and relying on customary genres of Confucian didactic and pedagogical literature. This chapter considers how Aleni’s Four Character Classic inspired and influenced later missionaries who also imitated this traditional Chinese genre to teach Christian ideas to young Chinese students.