At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Western concept of the New World, represented by the theory of the circle of the earth and the theory of the five continents, was first introduced to China through Jesuit missionaries.
However, compared with the same period in Japan, Japan basically suspended its activities in Japan after Toyotomi Hideyoshi's "Companion Heaven Lian Posthumous Release Order" was issued, and the Jesuits preached in China for a long time, until the dispute between China and the West over the "Great Rite" arose sharply, and in 1773, the Holy See announced the ban on the Society of Jesus, and basically ended its activities in China. During this period, there were other Catholic missions active in China, but the Jesuits were in an overwhelming position.
The Jesuits had long planned to go into China as missionaries, and their first stop, the missionary Xavier, went to Japan, and the first missionary to reach China was also Xavier.
According to Matteo Ricci's Chinese Notes: ".When Xavier worked among the idolaters in Japan, he noticed that whenever the Japanese engaged in heated debates, they always appealed to the authority of the Chinese
So, after a period of missionary work in Japan, Xavier prepared to enter China. In 1552, he arrived on the island of Shangchuan in Guangdong, but was never able to enter Chinese mainland and died of illness on the island soon after.
The first to attract Chinese mainland people with the concept of the new world was Matteo Ricci.
In 1583, Matteo Ricci's world map displayed during his mission in Zhaoqing, Guangdong, attracted the attention of the Chinese. As a result, Matteo Ricci introduced the theory of the circle of the earth and the five continents of the world to China in detail. The Five Continents Theory, the Earth Circle Theory, and the Five Belt Theories have broadened the Chinese's vision and impacted the traditional Sinocentric view. At that time, Xu Guangqi, Qi Guangzong, Guo Zizhang and others wrote prefaces to the Ritchie World Map, which contributed to the spread of Western ideas in China.
Guo Zizhang's "The Complete Map of Mountains and Seas: Preface": ".Or said: Lisheng Waiyi also, its picture and its words, may not be one by one with the heaven and earth, and the son Hu Xuan is in Zizi'Guo Zi said: Not really. Tanzi can speakThe name of the young official, Zhong Ni heard it and got used to it;He told people that the Son of Heaven lost his official position and learned in Siyi. '”
Fang Yizhi: ".The west map is unprecedented", "to the west of Tai, the beginning is a combined map, and the supplement is unprecedented. ”
Matteo Ricci himself also described the changes in the world concept of the Chinese at that time:
When they first saw our map, they couldn't help but be a little puzzled to find that their empire was not on the top of the map but on the easternmost edge. ...However, now most of the Chinese admit their previous mistakes and laugh at them. - Matteo Ricci's Chinese Notes, p6, translated by He Gaoji et al. Beijing Zhonghua Book Company, 1983
The "majority" that Ritchie refers to is, of course, the Chinese he came into contact with, especially some enlightened intellectuals, who are actually only a part of the scholars, but they also clearly reflect the trend of changing Chinese world concepts. This change is more fully demonstrated in the Italian missionary Julius Julius's Outer Chronicles, published 40 years after the introduction of the Ritchie map into China.
Yang Tingyun, Li Zhizao, Qu Shiyu, Xu Xuchen, Ye Xianggao, etc. Among the ** and scholars of the Ming Dynasty at that time, people who were deeply influenced by Western studies wrote prefaces and poems for the "Outer Discipline of the Staff", among which radicals completely denied the concept of traditional China.
Yang Tingyun: "People in the West, unique through the ages, create a family, saying that heaven and earth are poor and real are endless, with their shapes are all big and round, so there is no beginning and end, no middle." (P4).
Qu Shiji: "The one who laughs at Confucianism does not go out of the court, but when he talks about the country, he often talks about Yixia and Yixia." If it is said that the middle earth is outside, it is all the domain of the left side, and the place where the king is turned into Ferbin. Woohoo, what a word!"Try to say according to the diagram, China is one tenth of Asia, and Asia is one-fifth of the world, so it is from Chixian Shenzhou, such as Chixian Shenzhou, and nine out of ten, and if you hold this side, Xu Tianxia will be denounced as a barbarian, and there will be no confusion and frogs!(Interpretation of the Outer Discipline of the Staff, p9). This sounds like a satire on the notion that some Chinese people now regard the outside of China as the West.
It can be said that the above-mentioned remarks of the scholars and doctors who wielded power in the Ming Dynasty show that China's traditional concept of the world is gradually changing.
However, these people were actually only a minority among the millions of scholars in the Ming Dynasty. Until the dissolution of the Society of Jesuits, there were many voices against the theory of the circle of the earth and the five continents.
Take the famous scientist Song Yingxing at the end of the Ming Dynasty as an example, although he wrote "Heavenly Creations" and became famous in history, but he was good at technical work, and was obviously more traditional and conservative in basic science.
In addition to Song Yingxing's "Heavenly Creation", he also has "Ten Kinds of Dialects", "Painting and Sound Return", "Variegated Text", "Original Consumption", "American Notes", "Music Rhythm" and other works, most of which have been lost. In the collection of cultural relics, modern Jiangxi Province found four Ming inscriptions written by Song Yingxing: "Ye Yi", "On Qi", "Talking about the Sky" and "Poetry of Mercy".
The Discussion is a political work that discusses the current situation, exposing and criticizing the corrupt phenomena in politics, economy, military, ideology, and culture in the late Ming Dynasty, and putting forward some reform proposals. "Poems of Compassion" includes 10 poems of "Simei" and 42 poems of "Compassion and Foolishness", reflecting the author's feelings of cynicism and concern for the people. "On Qi" and "Talking about the Heavens" are works on natural science, and judging from the titles of these two articles, it is likely that they are part of the "Ten Kinds of Dialects".
Song Yingxing's views on the earth's circle were published in "Talking about the sky. In the article "The Legend of the Day": "Westerners take the earth as a sphere, hanging in the middle, everything is attached to ants on all sides, and the people of Ma Ba are against the Chinese people. The celestial bodies are slandered, and they are cool to Xuan Ye and Zhou Ji. ”
Song Yingxing's point of view in the book is basically the theory of Xuanye in traditional Chinese culture, explaining that the earth is like a chicken floating in the water, because the surrounding area of the earth is close to the sea and is low, ** the bulge is like an egg, and he does not intend to explain what is going on in the part where the earth is soaked in the water.
In order to convince people of the scientific nature of Western studies, Xu Guangqi and other people influenced by Western studies hoped that Western missionaries such as Matteo Ricci would import more "novel and proven" Western science, which was also an important reason for them to translate the Geometric Originals.
Li Zhizao also tested the deviation and time difference of the sun's irradiation angle due to the different latitude and longitude of Western science, and "tested according to law, and it was good." However, the vast majority of Chinese have not increased their trust in the Western world concept because of this, and still believe that the world concept propagated by Matteo Ricci and others "directly deceives people with their eyes cannot see, can not reach enough, and cannot be tested by their ears, and the so-called painting of the painter is ghostly." ...China should be in the middle, and it is useless to put the map a little west." - Yang Guangxian.
During the Kangxi period, Yang Guangxian declared that he would rather make Zhongxia have no good calendar than have Westerners in Zhongxia, although he instinctively warned Westerners from the concept of national political security, but this view of distinguishing between good and bad is very ridiculous. Emperor Kangxi liked Western learning, but even so, most scholars still held such an attitude, and you can imagine what happened to the Western world concept in China.
This is because the defenders of the traditional concept of the world do not judge right and wrong based on science, but judge right and wrong based on the values of Chinese culture, so as to maintain the traditional Sinocentric view.
Reference: Xiong Yuezhi. The Rise of Western Learning to the East and the Society of the Late Qing Dynasty, 1994
Song Yingxing, Four Kinds - Shanghai People's Publishing House, 1976
Summary of the Four Libraries - Zhonghua Book Company.
Qing Dynasty people's biography. Ming Bookstore, 1985
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