Abstract
This chapter introduces the Qu Pi Xun Meng 取譬訓蒙 (Catechism illustrated with examples or Using Parables to Instruct the Ignorant Children, 1869–1870), a catechism teaching basic prayers and concepts concerning Roman Catholic Christianity to Chinese students, published between 1869 and 1870 in Zi-ka-wei. This text is particularly important because it shows the efforts by Zottoli to explain, in a simplified way, the concept of creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing) to a Chinese audience adopting a terminology that has been clearly influenced by Confucianism and Neo-Confucianism. An important example of this terminology is the usage of hua cheng 化成 (completed transformation) as a synonym for “creation out of nothing” or “to create out of nothing,” which is rooted in the Neo-Confucian discourse and in the ancient Confucian texts.
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Notes
- 1.
The text that I will adopt for my translation and my quotations has been retrieved from the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris (National Library of France, Paris), Département des manuscrits (Department of manuscripts), Chinois 7081 (Chinese 7081), https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b90065249/(consulted on June 29, 2018). See Angelo Zottoli, Qu Pi Xun Meng 取譬訓蒙 (Catechism illustrated with examples or Using Parables to Instruct the Ignorant Children, Shanghai: Ex Typographia Missionis Catholicæ in orphanotrophio Tou-sè-wè, 1869–1870, 3 vols.). I also consulted the physical version in the Bibliotheca Zi-ka-wei in Shanghai.
- 2.
See Catalogus librorum venalium in Orphanotrophio Tou-Sai-Wai (Catalogue of the books at hand at the Tushanwan 土山灣 Orphanage) (Zikawei: Ex typographia missionis Catholicae, 1882).
- 3.
Lin Yutang, Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage, online version: http://humanum.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/Lexis/Lindict, 846A50 60A.22-2/149 (for the term 訓蒙) and 774A40 52.40/149 (for the term 取譬). Consulted on October 8, 2021. The term meng 蒙 can also be related to the popular genre of qimeng (啟蒙), or mengshu (蒙書). See Anthony E. Clark, A Chinese Jesuit Catechism: Giulio Aleni’s Four Character Classic 四字經文 (Singapore: Springer Nature, 2021), 17.
- 4.
See Liu Jian You 陆建猷, “Chumeng, zhengmeng, xinmeng, zhimeng—Zhangzai zhengmeng sixiang dui xianshi guannian de jixu” 處蒙·正蒙·新蒙·治蒙-張載正蒙思想對現實觀念的激促 (Being Ignorant, Rectifying Ignorance, Present Ignorance, Treat Ignorance. Reflecting on Zhang Zai’s Theory of Correcting Discipline for Ignorance), Nanchang daxue xuebao: renwen shehui kexue ban 南昌大學學報: 人文社會科學版, vol. 45, no. 2 (2014), 8–12.
- 5.
In particular, in the Yi Tong Shu 易通書 (Penetrating the Book of Changes), Zhou Dunyi provided a detailed interpretation of the hexagram
(meng 蒙). See Tze-ki Hon, “Zhou Dunyi’s Philosophy of Supreme Polarity”, in Dao Companion to Neo-Confucian Philosophy, edited by John Makeham (Boston: Springer, 2010),10. - 6.
See Zottoli, Cursus litteraturae sinicae, vol. 3, 520–619.
- 7.
For the Chinese version, see Zhu Xi 朱熹, Zhouyi Yizhu 周易本義 (The Original Meaning of the Zhouyi) in Zhuzi quanshu 朱子全書 (The Complete Works of Master Zhu) (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2002), 35. For the English version, see The Yi Jing: Or, Book of Changes, translated by Richard Wilhelm (New York: Pantheon Books, 1961), 21–24. See also, I Ching, translated by David Hinton (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014), 8–9.
- 8.
See Zottoli, Cursus litteraturae sinicae, vol. 3, 540–543.
- 9.
Zottoli’s Romanization.
- 10.
See Zottoli, Cursus litteraturae sinicae, vol. 1, 875.
- 11.
“The I Ching”, edited by James Legge, 66, f. iv.
- 12.
“The I Ching”, edited by James Legge, 217, f. iv.
- 13.
“The I Ching”, edited by James Legge, 218, f. iv.
- 14.
Catalogus librorum venalium in Orphanotrophio Tou-Sai-Wai.
- 15.
Retrieved at: Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris (National Library of France, Paris), Département des manuscrits (Department of manuscripts), Chinois 7081 (Chinese 7081), https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b90065249/ (consulted on June 29, 2018), preface.
- 16.
Williams, “Angelo Zottoli’s Cursus litteraturæ sinicæ as propedeutic to Chinese classical tradition”, 331.
- 17.
Wu Mengqian 吳孟謙, “Wanming ‘shenxin xingming’ guannian de liuxing: Yi ge sixiang shi guandian de tantao” 晚明「身心性命」觀念的流行: 一個思想史觀點的探討 (The Popularity of the Concept Shenxin Xingming [“Body-Heart-Nature-Life”] during the late Ming: A discussion from the Perspective of Intellectual History), Qinghua xuebao 清華學報, vol. 44, no. 2 (2014), 217.
- 18.
See Zhu Xi, Zhouyi Yizhu, 153; Chung Wu, The Essentials of the Yi Jing (St. Paul: Paragon House, 2003), 77.
- 19.
The rendering of the term xingming dushu into English follows the one suggested by Hiu Yu Cheung intended as “the practical aspect of statecraft, including policy making, administration and bureaucratic operation.” See Hiu Yu Cheung, “Sequence of Power. Ritual Controversy over the Zhaomu Sequence in Imperial Ancestral Rites in Song China (960–1279)” (Ph.D. dissertation, Arizona State University, Phoenix, 2015), 264.
- 20.
The translation of the passage 「如影隨形, 則又不可得而分別也」 (“the shadow follows the shape, it was impossible to separate them”) follows the one by Hiu Yu Cheung. See Cheung, “Sequence of Power. Ritual Controversy over the Zhaomu Sequence in Imperial Ancestral Rites in Song China (960–1279)”, 267.
- 21.
Here with Anshi zhi xue 安石之學 (Anshi’s teachings) Zhu Xi is probably alluding to Wang Anshi’s philosophy denominated New Learning (Xinxue 新學). See Hiu Yu Cheung, “The Way Turning Inward: An Examination of the ‘New Learning’ Usage of daoxue in Northern Song China”, Philosophy East and West, vol. 69, no. 1 (2019), 1–34. For a detailed account of Wang Anshi’s achievements and ideas with translations of his original texts, See Sources of Chinese Tradition, edited by Theodore de Bary, Wing-tsit Chan and Burton Watson (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), 464–476.
- 22.
On this issue, Hiu Yu Cheung gives an account of Chen Guan’s 陳瓘 (1057–1124) view on Wang Anshi’s philosophy that diverges from Zhu Xi’s interpretation, and he explains the dichotomy between the exterior art of governance (waiwang 外王) and the interior cultivation of morality (neisheng 內聖):
Song conservatives tended to associate New Learning with Buddhist, Daoist, and Legalist doctrines, yet few of them were able to look squarely at its potency in bridging the exterior art of governance (waiwang 外王) and the interior cultivation of morality (neisheng 內聖) within the ideological framework of Confucianism. The obstinate conservative Chen Guan tended to view Wang Anshi’s scholarship as two distinct parts: one dealt with moral cultivation (daode xinming 道德性命); the other concerned the practical aspect of statecraft, including policy making, administration and bureaucratic operation. (xinming dushu 刑名度數)
Cheung, “Sequence of Power. Ritual Controversy over the Zhaomu Sequence in Imperial Ancestral Rites in Song China (960–1279)”, 264.
- 23.
See Zhu Xi 朱熹, Huian xiansheng Zhu wengong wenji 晦庵朱文公文集 (Collected Works of Sir Huian Zhu Wengong) in Zhuzi quanshu, 3382.
- 24.
Chen Liang 陳亮, Longchuan wenji 龍川文集 (Collection of Longchuan) (Beijing: Zhonghua, 1985, 巻十一, 三). Translation by the author.
- 25.
Yu Ying-shih, “Qing Confucianism”, in Chinese History and Culture, edited by Josephine Chiu-Duke and Michael S. Duke (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016), 118.
(meng 蒙). See Tze-ki Hon, “Zhou Dunyi’s Philosophy of Supreme Polarity”, in Dao Companion to Neo-Confucian Philosophy, edited by John Makeham (Boston: Springer, 2010),10.Author information
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De Caro, A. (2022). The Qu Pi Xun Meng 取譬訓蒙 (1869–1870) and a summary of Zottoli’s Chinese Roman Catholic Cosmogony. In: Angelo Zottoli, a Jesuit Missionary in China (1848 to 1902). Christianity in Modern China. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-5297-4_5
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