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Jesuits and Chinese Atheism: Back and Forth Between Europe and China

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Inexcusabiles: Salvation and the Virtues of the Pagans in the Early Modern Period

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Abstract

When the word ‘atheism’ landed in China with Matteo Ricci, it had no negative connotation. Ricci adopted it for the Confucian mandarins, the Celestial Empire’s elite who were one of the ‘wonders’ of the newly discovered worlds. Their use of sound reason, their adoption and practice of moral values inspired by Confucius’s teachings made them the privileged interlocutors of Christianity. Full of curiosity for the sciences and demonstrating the principles of good governance, the mandarins embodied a political atheism that was well suited to the missionary’s activity. Ricci saw the mandarins’ capacity to use religions as tools of politics and of the government. The word atheism also had the benefit of denying the religious meaning of Chinese rites, and was still lacking some of the negative connotations that would be redefined in Europe at the turn of the sixteenth century, until such a point that the atheist coincided with the ne plus ultra of immorality. With Machiavelli and the division of European Christianity on the one hand, and with Jean Bodin and the revival of scepticism on the other, resistance arose and concentrated against this first interpretation of Chinese atheism, and discussions and second thoughts intensified when China became part of the libertine and Enlightenment debate. Could such a large atheist empire, gifted with such remarkable morality, exist? The way in which the meaning of the word atheist changed in Europe thus finally altered, and reversed, the interpretation of the new worlds.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Bianca , 1980; Frajese 2010.

  2. 2.

    For examples, see Harnack 2004, 342–343 and, more generally, see also Bremmer 2007.

  3. 3.

    Catto 2018.

  4. 4.

    On the first interpretations of Buddhism see Etiemble 1975.

  5. 5.

    There are many studies about Matteo Ricci, so I refer to the most recent: Hsia 2010.

  6. 6.

     Meynard 2011a.

  7. 7.

    See Simonutti 2006 and Pastine 1981.

  8. 8.

    Ricci 2000, 95–96: ‘I letterati, se bene ricognoscono questo suppremo nume del Cielo, non gli fanno però nessun Tempio, né gli hanno diputato nessun luogo per adorarlo; e per il conseguente non hanno sacerdoti, né ministri della religione, né riti solenni per guardarsi da tutti, né precetti o comandamenti dati per osservare, né Prelato che habbi il carico di dichiarare, primulgare la loro dottrina, o gastigare quei che fanno qualche cosa contra essa; per questo mai recitano niente né in commune né in particulare’.

  9. 9.

    Ricci 2000, 93, 106.

  10. 10.

    Plutarch 2007, 103–121.

  11. 11.

    For some considerations about the Jesuit concept of tolerance and intolerance in China and in Europe see Minuti 2006, 7.

  12. 12.

    See Cavaillé 2013, 19–24 and for the longue durée Lecaldano 2015.

  13. 13.

    Gentillet 1968. On the literature against Machiavelli, see Bireley 1990 and Stewart 1969.

  14. 14.

    Machiavelli 2000, II,2, 141.

  15. 15.

    Berlin 2007, 43.

  16. 16.

    See Catto 2016.

  17. 17.

    Identified at the beginning of the twentieth century and first published by Pietro Tacchi Venturi 1911.

  18. 18.

    On the alterations made in the translation of Ricci’s work, see Fezzi 2000, and Gernet 2003.

  19. 19.

    On the generalization of the word ritus, relating to any social behaviour so as to include the so–called étiquette as well, see Ginzburg 2011, 139.

  20. 20.

    For these considerations I refer to Rossi 1969, 138–141.

  21. 21.

    See Meynard 2011b, 3–76 and Lundbaek 1983. On its spread cf. Catto 2014.

  22. 22.

    Locke 1963, 93. See also Rose 2013.

  23. 23.

    App 2012, 91–110.

  24. 24.

    I am quoting Catto 2015.

  25. 25.

    On the dual teaching, see Stroumsa 2010.

  26. 26.

    A fundamental reference is still Gernet 1985.

  27. 27.

    This interesting expression is found in Longobardo 1768, 143.

  28. 28.

    Bodin 2003, 374. On this question see Parinetto 2002.

  29. 29.

    On the long and complicated rites controversy, see Mungello 1994.

  30. 30.

    On Leibniz see Lach 1945, and more in generally Roy 1972, 63–72.

  31. 31.

    Bayle 1740, III, 296 (translation mine): ‘The ablest missionaries of China, some of whom are of your society, maintain, that the greatest part of literati there are Atheists, and that they are idolaters only through dissimulation and hypocrisy, like many of the Pagan Philosophers, who adored the same idols with the common people, tho’ they did not believe in any of them, as may be seen in Cicero and Seneca. The same missionaries inform us, that these literati do not believe anything to be spiritual, and that the King above, which your Mattew Ricci took for the the true God, is nothing but the material Heaven; and that what they call the spirits of the earth, rivers, and mountains, are nothing but the active virtues of those natural bodies. Some of your authors say that they fell into this Atheism some ages ago, by having suffered the great discoveries of their Philosopher Confucius to be lost. But others, who have studied these matters with greater care, as your Father Longobardi, maintain, that this Philosopher said many fine things about morality and politics; but, as to the true God, and his law, he was as blind as the rest’.

  32. 32.

    See Weststeijn 2007.

  33. 33.

    See Israel 2014 and 2007.

  34. 34.

    Pinot 1932 and Zoli 1989.

  35. 35.

    Bayle 2000, 220 (§ 177, ‘The Reason Why Atheists Are Represented as Extraordinarily Vicious’).

  36. 36.

    Bayle 2000, 212 (§ 172, ‘Whether a Society of Atheists Would Make Laws for Itself Concerning Decency and Honor’).

  37. 37.

    This definition, an ultimate attempt to counter permanently the Jesuit theory, was coined by Charles Maigrot, the apostolic vicar of Fujan (Maigrot 1700, 318).

  38. 38.

    On the impact of the Lettres édifiantes et curieuses 34 volumes, see for instance Reed 2010.

  39. 39.

    See Ribard 2005.

  40. 40.

    Tournemine 1717, 39: ‘On n’est pas athée pour oublier Dieu, pour douter de Dieu, pour s’éforcer de n’en point croire, pour faire profession extérieure de n’en point croire; on est athée quand on s’est convaincu qu’il n’y a point de Dieu, il n’y a donc point d’athée, il n’y en a jamais eu, ce n’est que dans son cœur que l’impie nie l’existence de Dieu, il souhaitte qu’il n’y en a it pas, il ne peut se persuader qu’il n’y en a pas, sa raison dément ses souhaits, dixit insipiens in corde suo non est Deus; insensé de se donner tant de peines inutiles pour s’arracher la plus consolante de toutes les veritez du fond de son esprit, où la nature l’a gravée’.

  41. 41.

    Le Comte 1700b, ‘Préface’: ‘Avant que de finir cette Préface, je dois avertir que la manière dont je me suis exprimé dans la première édition de cet ouvrage, en parlant des sçavans de la Chine, qui reconnoissent et adorent le vray Dieu, n’a pas esté assez exacte; puisque quelques personnes s’y sont trompées, et ont pris dans un sens tout contraire à ma pensée le terme de véritables Adorateurs, dont je m’étois servi. Ce que j’ay entendu par ces paroles, c’est que les gens de Lettres de la Chine, qui selon la doctrine de leurs Ancestres, reconnoissent et adorent un Estre superieur, intelligent, éternel, tout puissant, enfin le Seigneur du Ciel et le maistre de toutes choses, adoroient le vray Dieu. Et quand je les ay appellez veritables Adorateurs, ce n’a esté comme il est aisé de le voir, qu’en les comparant avec ceux qui font profession des autres sectes, lesquels ou n’adorent aucun Dieu parce qu’ils sont Athées, ou n’adorent que de fausses Divinitez parce qu’ils sont Idolatres’.

  42. 42.

    Le Comte 1700a, 14: ‘Ne seroit–il pas au contraire bien plus dangereux de condamner ce qu’on reprend icy dans mon Livre, en disant, que les anciens Chinois, comme ceux d’apresent, étoient Athées. Car les Libertins ne tireroient–ils pas avantage de l’aveu qu’on leur seroit, que dans un Empire si vaste, si ancien, si éclairé, établi si solidement, et si florissant, soit par la multitude de ses Habitans, soit par l’invention de presque tous les Arts, on n’auroit jamais reconnu de Divinité. Que deviendroient donc les raisonnemens que les saints Peres, en prouvant l’éxistence de Dieu, ont tiré du consentement de tous les Peuples, ausquels ils prétendent que la nature en a imprimé si profondément l’idée, que rien ne la peut effacer?’.

  43. 43.

    See Mori 2016, 261.

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  1. Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy

    Michela Catto

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  1. Dipartimento di Filosofia ‘P. Martinetti’, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy

    Alberto Frigo

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Catto, M. (2020). Jesuits and Chinese Atheism: Back and Forth Between Europe and China. In: Frigo, A. (eds) Inexcusabiles: Salvation and the Virtues of the Pagans in the Early Modern Period. International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d'histoire des idées, vol 229. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40017-0_12

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