AP world geography
1/4/16
Period 1
Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci: Italy and china exchange philosophy and astronomy
The history of missions of the Jesuits in China in the early modern era stands as one of the notable events in the early history of relations between two cultures and beliefs system in the pre modern age. The missionary and Jesuits between the sixteenth century and seventeenth century played a significant role by introducing the science and culture to china. Most of the members from the Jesuit delegation to the Christian missionaries in the country which perhaps had the most influential on the Christian missionaries during the earliest period through the nineteenth century while the numbers of catholic and …show more content…
By the sixteenth century very little were known about china by the Europeans during the time of the ancient times and the middle ages. China was essentially Buddhist during the Tang dynasty and people in the Assyrian church of the east were introduced to Christianity and more were traders than missionaries who settled near the Silk Road. Later in the seventeenth century several religious orders got involved in the missions of china and later created major problems as the cultural approach of Matteo Ricci was not shared by some of them. In China the Europeans exchanged the presence of Christian communities in China between the Roman Empire and the Han dynasty. Matteo Ricci’s work in china to see the education that he received in his native Italy. Matteo joined the Jesuits when he was eighteen and studied in the roman college where he had astronomer author of the Gregorian that was accepted in 1582 and the Italian theologian Robert Bellarmine. When Matteo quickly volunteered to go to china he first spent the three years in India during the time period of 1578 to 1583 before …show more content…
To the testimony furnished by the Christian philosophy and theology Ricci added numerous proofs from the ancient Chinese books which did much to win credit for his work. The most difficult problem in the evangelization of china had to do with the rites or ceremonies, in use from time immemorial to do honor to ancestors or deceased relatives and the particular tokens of respect which the educated felt bound to pay their master Confucius. Matteo’s solution of this problem caused a long and heated controversy in which the Holy See finally decided against him. This famous controversy which was singularly complicated and embittered by passion. The Jesuits rose shortly after the death of father Ricci and being formulated by the Japanese Jesuits. Ricci’s successor as superior general of the mission who however did not depart in anything from the lines laid down by its founder. Ricci was also opinion that a broad toleration was permissible without injury to the purity of the Christian religion. He believed that this tolerance thought licit should be limited by the necessity of the case whenever the Chinese Christian community should enjoy sufficient liberty