Jesuit Missionaries Research Articles

Gravity’s eastern voyage: the introduction, transmission, and impact of Newtonian mechanics in late imperial China (1727–1912)

This study traces the intricate journey of Newtonian mechanics in Qing China from 1727 to 1912, elucidating the complex interplay of science, religion and politics in cross-cultural knowledge exchange. Initially introduced by Jesuit missionaries through lunar theory in calendrical reform, followed by cometary and heliocentric concepts, the dissemination of Newtonian mechanics gained momentum after the Opium Wars (1839–1842). Subsequently, Protestant missionaries and Chinese scholars collaborated to translate and propagate Newton’s laws of gravitation and motion, often contextualized within natural theology, through Western texts, popular science literature, and periodicals. This process culminated in the integration of Newtonian principles into national educational curricula in the early twentieth century. Significantly, Newtonian mechanics transcended its scientific realm, infiltrating political discourse as reformist thinkers leveraged mechanical terminology to advocate for sociopolitical change. This historical episode illustrates how the assimilation of Newtonian mechanics was influenced by missionary approaches, indigenous intellectual traditions, pragmatic national interests, and the tumultuous political landscape of Late Qing. By challenging Eurocentric narratives and highlighting Chinese agency in adapting Western knowledge, this study contributes to a more inclusive history of Newtonian science, offering a nuanced perspective on global scientific circulation.

Publishing the Works of Jesuit Missionaries in Europe: the First Edition of the 'Chou king' and the Validation of Knowledge on China During the Enlightenment

Publishing the Works of Jesuit Missionaries in Europe: the First Edition of the 'Chou king' and the Validation of Knowledge on China During the Enlightenment

Animating the Jesuit mission while using education as a form of humanitarian aid: A case-study on the Jesuit Refugee Service in Lebanon

The Jesuit Refugee Service provides education programmes as a form of humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees in Lebanon. The Jesuit Refugee Service is called to support the mission of the Jesuits and the vision that Saint Ignatius of Loyola had for the Society of Jesus and Jesuit schools. The Jesuit Refugee Service needs to have a distinct service that separates them from simply offering aid in the same manner as a secular Non-Government Organization. This case study on the work of one project by the Jesuit Refugee Service in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon helps to illustrate how a Jesuit organization can animate the mission of the Jesuits and the Catholic Church while offering education as a form of humanitarian aid to non-Catholics.

Missionizing on the Edge: Religion and Power in the Jesuit Missions of Spanish Amazonia, written by Francismar Alex Lopes de Carvalho

Missionizing on the Edge: Religion and Power in the Jesuit Missions of Spanish Amazonia, written by Francismar Alex Lopes de Carvalho

The invisibility of indigenous names in the place names of the Jesuit missions of the Pampas (Buenos Aires, present-day Argentina)

The invisibility of indigenous names in the place names of the Jesuit missions of the Pampas (Buenos Aires, present-day Argentina)

From Sacred Doctrine to Confucian Moral Practice: Giulio Aleni’s Cross-Cultural Interpretation of “Goodness and Evil of Human Nature”

This paper explores the cross-cultural interpretation of “the goodness and evil of human nature” by Jesuit missionary Giulio Aleni in the late Ming Dynasty, and it examines the intersections and complementarity between Catholicism and Confucianism in moral ethics based on Aleni’s integration. The study finds that Aleni, while basically adhering to the Catholic “original sin”, connected the “spirituality” endowed to humans at the beginning of God’s creation with the Confucian ontological concepts such as “ultimate good” (zhishan 至善); centering on “self-mastery” (zizhuan 自專), “sharpening” (dili 砥礪), and “overcoming nature” (kexing 克性), he actively guided the goodness–evil debate towards a Confucian practical morality, and sacred doctrines are served as an impetus of moral practices. The redemption, together with reward and punishment of God, further intensifies the ultimate concern and the way of transcendence. Aleni’s bridging and synthesizing of the two traditions is highly significant: concerning both sanctity and practicality of ethics can to some extent overcome the risks brought by the instrumentalization of ethics or the illusory issues of existence. This has important implications for the self-development and integration of Christian and Confucian morality.

Lexical Language Contact Phenomena: A Combined Model Based on the Vocabulario español-guarani (18th century)

Abstract The purpose of this work, which falls within the areas of lexicography (studying missionary linguistics) and sociolinguistics (studying cultural contact), is to analyse the linguistic and cultural contacts between Spanish and Guarani, based on lexicographic material extracted from the Vocabulario español-guarani by Pablo Restivo (1728). The basis of the analysis is provided by the names of animals—one of the ‘secular’ fields where the highest frequency of borrowings is found (Cerno & Obermeier 2013). The methodology applied is the Haspelmath model (2009) and the Gruda model (2018). The premise is that the arrival and work of the Jesuit missionaries created cultural contact that is reflected in the codified language and, in turn, in this dictionary of the time. The main contribution is a new combined model of lexical reflections in a situation of cultural contact that can be applied in the analysis of this kind of lexicographic work, while an additional section provides a presentation of Restivo’s work and its background.

God in Tibetan: On the Use of an Impersonal Concept as a Translation for “God”

The word for God used in many Bible translations in Tibetan-related languages is dkon mchog, a Tibetan Buddhist concept originally designating the so-called “Buddhist Trinity”: Buddha, dharma (the teachings), and sangha (the community of disciples). The expression was first used by Jesuit missionaries in the eighteenth century, and a review of their argumentation shows that its use is due to more than simply its superficial resemblance to the Christian Trinity. Expressions used in translation for unknown concepts undergo over time a semantic shift, by which the concept is reinterpreted and filled with new content corresponding to the biblical understanding. This shift can take place via metonymic or metaphoric extension, and the change is relatively unconstrained. The metonymic shift required in order for the concept dkon mchog to convey the biblical meaning is not likely to result in polysemy and may therefore give less cause for misunderstanding than the polysemous expressions (God/god) used in most other Bible translations.

The Tea Ceremony and Christian Mass: Encounter between the Tea Masters and Jesuit Missionaries

The Tea Ceremony and Christian Mass: Encounter between the Tea Masters and Jesuit Missionaries

From sanctus to shengren: mediating Christian and Chinese concepts of human excellence in early modern China

ABSTRACT In the 1580s, when the Jesuit missionaries Michele Ruggieri (1543–1607) and Matteo Ricci (1552–1610) established the first Jesuit mission in China, the terms “translatability” and “cultural incommensurability” were yet to enter the European lexicon, but these questions were addressed implicitly through the translation choices employed in the mission field. For the early missionaries, translatability had immense ramifications for their missionary practice. One of the foremost challenges was how to communicate in Chinese the concept of “sanctity,” which was central to Christian soteriology. There was a range of terms in Chinese intellectual and religious traditions that the Jesuits drew upon to translate sanctus such as shengren 聖人 zhenren 真人, and xian 仙, but each of these terms implied a certain commensurability between Christian and indigenous Chinese conceptions of human excellence. This paper will present a microhistory of early Jesuit attempts to translate sanctus in Chinese, and reflect upon the significance of these translation choices for the development of the Jesuits’ missionary strategy.

Animals, Wonder, and “Order Trouble” during the Jesuit Mission to Japan

When Jesuit missionaries began arriving in Japan in the sixteenth century, they brought not only a new religion, Christianity, but also several domestic and exotic animals. Not only did these animals provoke feelings of curiosity and wonder, but they became a site of epistemic contestation between Christian and Buddhist views on human‐animal relations. In Buddhist thought, humans and animals were conceived of as interrelated, as both were thought to be trapped in an endless cycle of death and rebirth. On the other hand, in Christian thought, humans and animals were stratified according to Aristotelian hierarchies, according to which the former were viewed as superior to the latter. After the Jesuits arrived in Japan, it soon became clear that their proselytes' pre‐existing modes of relating to and classifying the natural world would need to be converted to Aristotelian ones in order to propagate a Christian way of life. Thus, animals became a central part of Jesuit evangelism. Many of these creatures were deployed as tribute gifts, which altered the emotional landscape between the European and Japanese humans who used them as a buffer. This paper explores how animals, wonder, and religious epistemologies intersected to transform Japanese Christian attitudes towards animals during the Jesuit Mission to Japan.

Moral Education and Heaven–Human Relationship in Jesuit Translations of Chinese Poetry (17th–18th Centuries)

The 17th and 18th centuries were a period of extensive cultural interaction between China and the West, and also the beginning of Chinese poetry translation in the West. Jesuit missionaries were pioneers in introducing Chinese poetry to Europe. Influenced by the Confucian poetic thought of Siwuxie 思無邪 (no depraved thoughts) and Ricci’s accommodation strategy, the Jesuits translated poems from the Shangshu 尚書, the Shijing 詩經, and the Emperor Qianlong’s Imperial Odes on Shengjing 禦制盛京賦, as well as works by Fan Zhongyan 范仲淹, Du Fu 杜甫, Shao Yong 绍雍, and even the poems in the exhortations of the Ming and Qing dynasties into European languages. These poems predominantly dealt with themes of moral education, the image of virtuous monarchs, and the Chinese concept of the Heaven–human relationship. Through intentional omissions and rewriting, the Jesuits incorporated their religious and political views into the Chinese poetry. Their translated works not only enriched European knowledge of Chinese culture but also demonstrated the complexity of Chinese–Western cultural exchange.

The Influence of Qiu Jun on Jesuit Missionaries and Chinese Christian Texts in Ming–Qing China

The Influence of Qiu Jun on Jesuit Missionaries and Chinese Christian Texts in Ming–Qing China

An Analysis of Jesuit Missionary Aleni’s Interpretation of Aristotelian Theory of Perception: Based on Xingxue Cushu in Late Ming China

An Analysis of Jesuit Missionary Aleni’s Interpretation of Aristotelian Theory of Perception: Based on Xingxue Cushu in Late Ming China

W8banaki Subsistence Patterns During the 18th and 19th Centuries at the Fort Odanak Site, Québec, Canada

ABSTRACT Built in the early eighteenth century on the banks of the Saint-François River (Québec, QC, Canada), the fortified Jesuit mission of Saint-François-de-Sales was an important W8banaki centre during the colonial period. Between 2010 and 2021, archaeological excavations conducted by the W8banaki Nation led to the discovery of the mission’s remains at the Fort Odanak site (CaFe-7) in the historical centre of the village of Odanak. They revealed numerous pit features (used for food storage or refuse disposal), post moulds and hearths, along with diverse artifact assemblages. The analysis of plant macro-remains found in six pits and two hearths at the site was undertaken to document the evolution of culinary practices at the mission and to reconstruct the local environment and its exploitation by the mission’s inhabitants. Results suggest the persistence of traditional Indigenous subsistence patterns during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as well as the integration of European foods into the Abenaki diet via trade and close contact with Canadien (i.e. French Canadian) farmers in the region.

An Encounter of Incommensurables: European Cosmological Knowledge in the Fenye Chapters of Chinese Local Gazetteers (1660-1820)

Abstract It has often been argued that the introduction of early modern European cosmology at the turn of the seventeenth century by Jesuit missionaries—subsumed under the generic term “Western learning” (xixue 西學)—signalled the demise of traditional fenye (分野, or “field allocation”) theory, as the concept of Earth’s sphericity and the widened sense of world geography are fundamentally at odds with the Sinocentric worldview underpinning fenye. However, the fenye chapters in Qing dynasty local gazetteers tell a different story: in comparison with earlier Ming gazetteers their proportion increased. These chapters rarely take a stance against Western learning. Rather, they invoke Western learning as part and parcel of the imperially sanctioned astronomy to be reckoned with, or even suggest it as a remedy for flaws in traditional fenye techniques, leading to a plurality of discourses in which Sino-Western relationships become entangled with tension between the imperial and the local. This phenomenon is particularly visible in the peripheral regions of the empire, such as Guangxi, as these were traditionally marginalised in the Sinocentric cosmology of the fenye system. This paper explores cosmological discourses to answer the following questions: What were the agendas that Western learning was made to serve in these gazetteers? How did local endeavours relate to court-sponsored imperial projects? What were their sources of knowledge on matters of Western learning, and how can we map out the geography of Western learning based on these local sources?

A History of Jesuit Missions in Japan: Evangelization, Miracles, and Martyrdom, 1549–1614 by Guillaume Alonge (review)

A History of Jesuit Missions in Japan: Evangelization, Miracles, and Martyrdom, 1549–1614 by Guillaume Alonge (review)

근세일본의 남만무역과 예수회 선교사추방령에 대한 연구

Purpose: This paper is an investigative study of the process from the introduction of flintlock guns by Polpogal trading ships in 1543, to Francisco Xavier's arrival in Japan six years later, to the edict expelling Jesuit missionaries in 1587. Research design, data, and methodology: This was the period when Nobunaga of Japan appeared and ruled the country, and Nobunaga committed suicide due to the Honno-ji incident and Hideyoshi Toyotomo became his successor. Then came the Azuchi-Momoyama period, when Hideyoshi unified Japan and there was serious conflict between trade with Portugal and Christian missionary work. Results: During the early modern Japanese Christian century (1549-1650), Christianity experienced an initial missionary period, a period of growth and development, and finally the appearance of martyrs. Nobunaga embraced Christianity to get rid of Buddhism, and Hideyoshi distributed an edict expelling Jesuit missionary Christianity to protect trade. During the Kirishitan century (1549-1650) in early modern Japan, Christianity went through a period of growth, a period of secrecy, and ultimately the emergence of martyrs. Nobunaga accepts Christianity to eliminate Buddhism, and Hideyoshi to promulgate an edict expelling Jesuit missionarie Christianity to protect trade. Implications: Starting with Sumitada Omura in 1563, Yoshitaka Kuroda in 1577, Sorin Otomo in 1578, Harunobu Arima in 1580, Yukinaga Konishi in 1584, and others were baptized and a group of so-called Christian daimyo emerged. They burn down Japan's shrines and Buddhism, dedicate Nagasaki as an ecclesiastical ordinance, and Hideyoshi expresses his disquiet and promulgates an expulsion order for the Jesuit missionaries.

Indigenous bodies, gender, and sexuality in the Jesuit Missions of South America (17th–18th centuries)

Many studies tend to apply categories of gender and sexuality to indigenous peoples in the same way as they are used in the West. This ignores the fact that indigenous peoples have their own notions of people, which are often at odds with Western binary standards. The issue at stake in this article is the inclusion of the analytical categories of gender and sexuality in South American communities, starting with the Jesuit Missions that spread across present-day Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina, and Uruguay during the 17th and 18th centuries. To this end, it uses as historical sources a set of 1212 Jesuit writings, including manuscripts and books, as well as architectural, sculptural, and pictorial remains. Using techniques specific to paleography to read manuscripts, the project’s methodology makes use of ethnohistory guided by Content Analysis, thus producing a reading that starts from contemporary indigenous problems in order to build an Indigenous History. The study’s discussion considers that indigenous bodies, once produced by village collectives made up of extended families, were forged in the Jesuit missions according to the parameters of the colonial project. The article therefore demonstrates the genealogy of the bodies of indigenous men, indigenous women, and abject indigenous people, concluding that the current scenario of gender and sexual violence in South America has its origins in the colonial process, and not in indigenous cultures.

The Jesuit mission in early modern Ireland, 1560–1760. Edited by Mary Ann Lyons and Brian Mac Cuarta. Pp 269, illus. Dublin: Four Courts Press. 2022. €55.

The Jesuit mission in early modern Ireland, 1560–1760. Edited by Mary Ann Lyons and Brian Mac Cuarta. Pp 269, illus. Dublin: Four Courts Press. 2022. €55.