Matteo Ricci (36 page)

Ricci asked Ai Tian if he could confirm what he had heard from Muslim merchants about the existence on Chinese soil of Christian communities whose members were called “worshipers of the cross.”
30
Ai Tian answered that there were some in Kaifeng and in other parts of China, characterized by their practice of making the sign of the cross over everything they ate or drank and marking their children’s foreheads with a small black cross. His somewhat vague information was that they had been living in China for a long time and had distinguished themselves in the past as fearsome warriors. Fear of persecution had, however, caused most of them to abandon their ancient faith and to adopt Chinese religions or Islam.

Ricci was happy to learn that there were still communities of Christian origin in China, as he had always hoped, and he realized that Marco Polo had told the truth when he had claimed that there were Christians in Cathay, unquestionably in large numbers during the Yuan era. He hastened to inform Superior General Acquaviva in a letter dated July 26, 1605,
31
which also contained yet another exposition of his thesis that China and Cathay were certainly the same country, albeit with some confusion about the dates and names of the leaders of the Mongol invasions.

Three years after his meeting with the Jew, Ricci asked a Chinese Jesuit to trace these “worshipers of the cross” in the hope of being able to receive them into the Catholic Church. The mission proved a complete failure, however, as they had now forgotten their ancient religion, they wished to be considered Chinese in all respects, and they were afraid that contact with foreigners could prove harmful.

Equally disappointing was Ricci’s contact with the rabbi. When the Jesuit wrote that he had the books both of the Old Testament and of the Gospel, which talked about the coming of Christ, the rabbi stated in his reply that the Messiah had yet to appear on earth and that the Jews would have many centuries to wait. He did, however, very obligingly offer the Jesuit the place of leader of the synagogue on condition that he altered his diet and moved to Kaifeng.

Notes

1. OS II, p. 262.

2. See the section “Examinations and Baptisms” in this chapter. FR, book V, ch. III, p. 308.

3. FR, book V, ch. III, p. 308. Ricci’s remark led to the three most important Chinese converts, namely Li Zhizao, Xu Guangqi, and Yang Tingyun, being referred to as the “Three Pillars of Christianity in China.”

4. W. J. Peterson, “Why Did They Become Christians? . . . ,” in Charles E. Ronan and Bonnie B. C. Oh (eds.), op. cit., p. 146.
The translation of this passage is more emphatic in the Fonti Ricciane:
“a veil had suddenly been torn apart and all indecision vanished.” FR, book V, ch. II, p. 288, no. 3.

5. W. J. Peterson, “Why Did They Become Christians? . . . ,” in Charles E. Ronan and Bonnie B. C. Oh (eds.), op. cit., p. 147.

6. FR, book IV, ch. XIX, p. 252.

7. Letter to Girolamo Costa, May 10, 1605; OS II, p. 273.

8. Letter to Girolamo Costa, p. 253.

9. Letter to Fabio de Fabii, May 9, 1605; ibid., p. 263.

10. Letter to Fabio de Fabii.

11. Letter to Giulio and Girolamo Alaleoni, July 26, 1605; OS II, p. 295.

12. Letter to Fabio de Fabii, May 9, 1605; OS II, p. 266.

13. Letter to Fabio de Fabii.

14. Cf. Christofer Spalatin, “Matteo Ricci’s Use of Epictetus’
Enchiridion
,” in
Gregorianum
56 (1975): pp. 551–57.

15. Letter to Ludovico Maselli, February 1605; OS II, p. 257.

16. Letter to Ludovico Maselli.

17. FR, book V, ch. II, pp. 286–87.

18. FR, book V, ch. VIII, p. 356.

19. Letter to Girolamo Costa, May 10, 1605; OS II, p. 274.

20. Letter to Girolamo Costa, p. 285.

21. Cf. H. Bernard, op. cit., ch. IV.

22. Letter to João Alvares, May 12, 1605; OS II, pp. 284–85.

23. FR, book V, ch. VIII, pp. 353–54.

24. Letter to Ludovico Maselli, February 1605; OS II, p. 258.

25. Letter to Ludovico Maselli, p. 273.

26. Letter to Fabio de Fabii, May 9, 1605; ibid., p. 262.

27. FR, book V, ch. IV, p. 316, no. 1.

28. FR, book V, ch. IV, p. 315.

29.
Hui
is the name still used for one of the Muslim ethnic minorities in China today.

30. This term was used officially for the first time during the Yuan era in an imperial decree of 1289 to designate the followers of various Christian churches in China. The earliest “worshipers of the cross” were the Nestorians, the first Christians to penetrate China from the Byzantine empire through Persia in the seventh century and settle there permanently until the fall of the Mongol dynasty.

31. OS II, pp. 291–92.

v

Beijing, 1606–1607

The Master said, “Reviewing the old as a means of realizing the new—such a person can be considered a teacher.”

—Confucius,
Analects
(2, 11)

Nothing could be done without this book [Euclid’s
Elements
], not least because its proofs are so clear.
1

—Matteo Ricci

The Death of Valignano

Alessandro Valignano, who had done more than anyone else to inspire and encourage Ricci, decided to visit the China mission and see the results obtained for himself. Despite their constant contact by letter, Ricci had met him only once since his arrival in the East and had long been awaiting this moment. Now he would finally be able to take justified pride in showing his superior and particular point of reference the progress that had been achieved in the twenty-two years since the founding of the first residence in Zhaoqing.

Valignano’s visit was to take in the three residences in Shaozhou, Nanchang, and Nanjing before culminating in the capital. He would be accompanied by Lazzaro Cattaneo, now resident in Macao since 1603 after moving there from Shaozhou to recover after an illness, and Francisco Martines, the eldest of the Chinese lay brothers. The missionaries prepared Valignano’s journey with the utmost care. Xu Guangqi used his influence to obtain the indispensable permits to travel through the provinces and cities, and Minister Wang Zhongming secured authorization for the Visitor of Missions to travel at the state’s expense, receiving horses and provisions at the posting stations and transport on vessels along the Imperial Canal free of charge.

The letters with the permits were entrusted to Martines, who set off from Nanjing for Macao, where Valignano was awaiting a ship from Japan carrying valuable objects and silver for the missions, which was expected to arrive in February or March.

When everything was ready, the kidney problems from which Valignano had been suffering for some years suddenly returned, and he died on January 20, 1606, at the age of sixty-six. The China mission was plunged into mourning. Like Frances Xavier forty-four years earlier, he had arrived on the threshold of China but had been unable to enter. As Ricci wrote with great sorrow in his history of the mission, “His death was felt and wept over by the fathers of the two Christian missions in Japan and China.”
2

Ricci knew that there would not be another Valignano, a superior with such a thorough understanding of the peculiarities and difficulties of missionary work in China and with such a capacity to inspire him “with great love and hard work.” He felt like an orphan without this support, as he wrote to Superior General Acquaviva,
3
and he wondered how the gap could ever be filled.

While the Jesuits were still grief stricken at the death of their superior, some tragic events took place in Macao that endangered the continued existence of the missions in China. The peace of the city on the coast, where Portuguese merchants and priests of various congregations lived alongside the local population, had always been balanced on a knife edge. The Chinese fear of foreigners as potential invaders was held in check so as to allow trade, but it remained a latent source of friction.

The situation of comparative calm enjoyed by Macao for a few years began to deteriorate particularly when the Dutch arrived on the scene fired with determination to carve out a niche on the Asian markets. Having already attacked the Portuguese settlements in the Moluccas, Mozambique, and Malacca, they landed in the Chinese province of Fujian in the summer of 1604 in a bid to establish a trading outpost but were repulsed by the local population. Fearing a possible attack on Macao as well, the Portuguese built new fortifications, thus heightening tensions that led to manifestations of intolerance between the Chinese population and the missionaries. The most serious events, which also involved members of the Society of Jesus, were sparked off, however, by a dispute between Augustinians and Franciscans.

The Franciscan friars of the monastery of Our Lady of the Angels clashed with the vicar of the parish of Saint Lawrence and asked Valentim Carvalho, the rector of the Jesuit college, to arbitrate between the two sides. This choice angered the new bishop of Macao, the Augustinian Miguel Dos Santos, a former Jesuit expelled from the order, who felt that his authority had been slighted. After a reciprocal exchange of accusations, the bishop placed an interdiction on Macao and excommunicated a number of people, including Carvalho, and the city became the scene of a bitter struggle between the two rival factions. There was fighting in the streets, “not only with spiritual arms,” Ricci wrote in dismay, “but also at times with swords and harquebuses, which caused a great shock and confusion and was a scandal for nonbelievers and new Christians alike.”
4

The clash between religious orders had serious consequences. A member of the faction hostile to the Jesuits took advantage of the turbulent situation to inform the Chinese authorities that members of the Society of Jesus led by Lazzaro Cattaneo were plotting to invade the Guangdong province and then penetrate the Chinese interior with a force of Portuguese and Dutch soldiers. News of these accusations reached Canton, and the provincial authorities took radical measures without bothering to ascertain the veracity of the accusations. The governor assembled the troops, and the
haidao
, the official in charge of the coastal areas, evacuated all the houses in Macao close to the Portuguese fortifications, thus causing panic among the population. All trade between Macao and Canton was forbidden, and the Chinese were ordered to receive no one with a tonsure into their homes. Rumors spread, and some even claimed that Cattaneo was really the famous Li Madou in disguise.

One innocent victim of this fraught situation was Francisco Martines, who arrived in Canton and was ready to continue to Macao with documents for Valignano when he was informed of the Visitor’s death and stopped in the city despite the danger. Confined to bed by an attack of malaria, he had been in Canton for a month when he was captured, along with some servants and his host, and imprisoned as a spy working for enemies of China. The prisoners were all tortured, and the youngest sought to save his skin by claiming that the Jesuit had transported gunpowder from Nanjing for the rebels. When the Chinese discovered a tonsure hidden beneath the Jesuit’s long hair and Western-style clothing in his baggage, his explanations were all rejected out of hand, and his permits were dismissed as forgeries. Subjected repeatedly to torture, he died in prison in March 1606 at the age of thirty-eight. The first Chinese to enter the order as a lay brother, Martines followed the Jesuit cause faithfully for fifteen years. Coming just two months after Valignano’s, his death was another serious loss for the mission.

Hostility toward the Jesuits spread to the town of Shaozhou, where Niccolò Longobardo, who had tried in vain to help Martines through the local authorities, was falsely accused of adultery with a married woman. Even though the charge was dismissed, the continued presence of the mission there was in serious doubt.

Just when everything seemed to be on the verge of collapse, however, an investigation ordered by Zhang Deming, the provincial inspector of Guangdong, on his return from Beijing, where he had met Ricci, proved that the accusations against the Jesuits were wholly groundless. The governor and the
haidao
, who were behind the false accusations made against the Society of Jesus, were removed from office and from the Guangdong province, and peace finally returned to Macao as well. The Jesuits had their brother’s body exhumed and transported first to Shaozhou for the funeral service and then to Macao for burial. Completely cleared of any wrongdoing, Lazzaro Cattaneo was able to enter China and proceed to the residence in Nanjing, to which he had been assigned. He traveled together with a thirty-one-year-old missionary from Lecce, Italy, named Sabatino de Ursis, who was to continue to Beijing, where he arrived in the first half of 1607.

The Search for Cathay: Confirmation of Ricci’s Conjecture

Less than a month before the end of 1606, Ricci received a letter from Suzhou in the present-day Gansu province, bordering Mongolia in the northwest. It was signed by the Jesuit lay brother Bento de Góis, who said that he had been traveling for years in search of Cathay and had asked the missionaries to send money to help him continue his journey and escape from the Muslims who had robbed him. All trace had been lost of “Brother Benedict” since he set off from India five years earlier, and Ricci had been waiting for a long time for news. He realized immediately from the tone of the letter that the situation was desperate and hastened to send help. Even though Gansu was a three-month journey away and it was inadvisable to set off in the freezing cold of winter, he instructed Zhong Mingli (called João Fernandes in Portuguese and simply Giovanni in Italian
5
), a Chinese lay brother in his early twenties who was about to begin his novitiate, to leave for Suzhou with another convert to act as a guide and enough money to cope with any eventuality.

Despite his concern for the life of De Góis, Ricci was pleased because his arrival provided definite proof that China and Cathay were the same country, as he had suspected at least since his first journey to Nanjing twenty years earlier. Even though his superiors in Europe and India had been informed of this conjecture and of all the evidence gathered since, they were still not convinced. The belief in the existence of another country to the north of China that could be reached by following the silk roads, as the Polo family had in the thirteenth century, was so deeply rooted in European culture that Ricci’s communications in sporadic letters that took years to reach their destination carried no conviction. Moreover, it was still commonly believed that Christian communities existed in Cathay, whereas Ricci claimed that there were only the “worshipers of the cross,” who could no longer be called Christians, in China.

The strongest believers in the presence of fellow Christians lost in the immense Asian continent, cut off from the Western world and in need of the Church’s support, were the Jesuit missionaries in India. The first to suggest that a mission should be sent beyond the Himalayas in search of Cathay was Rodolfo Acquaviva, one of Ricci’s companions on the voyage from Portugal to India. Jerome Xavier, the nephew of Francis Xavier, then organized an expedition to ascertain the existence of the country described by Marco Polo and establish whether Ricci was right or wrong. His idea was to send a representative of the order with the caravans of merchants traveling the silk roads to Cathay. If the brother found Ricci at the end of his journey, it would prove beyond all doubt that China and Cathay were one and the same. The task fell on Bento de Góis, a Portuguese lay brother aged forty, who spoke excellent Persian and was familiar with Muslim customs.

The Jesuit set off on his mission to discover the
finis terrae orientalis
, the indefinite location of Cathay according to the ancient sources, from Agra in India on October 29, 1602, bound for Lahore, the capital of the Mughal empire. It was from there that a caravan of merchants left every year for Kabul, the present capital of Afghanistan, the first stage of a long journey to the easternmost parts.

Ricci was informed of this initiative and confidently expected to see “Brother Benedict” turn up one day safe and sound in Beijing. As the years went by with no news, he began to feel apprehensive and to ask all the merchants from Central Asia that he met in the capital whether they had come across a man called Bento de Góis in their travels. No information was forthcoming, however, until the arrival of the letter from Suzhou. Having sent out a rescue party, all he could do now was wait for them to return with De Góis.

João Fernandes returned to Beijing on October 29, 1607, with the news that Bento de Góis had passed away in Suzhou on April 10. Having buried him there, Fernandes had finally overcome a series of obstacles and had succeeded in leaving for the capital together with the Armenian servant Isaac, who had accompanied Bento all through his travels. He handed over to Ricci the gold cross that Bento had worn on his breast, the permits, and the letters from Jerome Xavier, jealously preserved to the very end. He then took from his bag a bundle of torn and crumpled sheets of paper that he had collected around the lay brother’s deathbed, which proved to be fragments of his travel journal. Isaac explained through an interpreter that the journal in which De Góis kept a record of his long journey had been torn up by a group of Muslim merchants in order to eliminate all trace of the sums they owed the Jesuit. Ricci patiently reconstructed the writings and filled in the gaps with the help of Isaac, who stayed with the missionaries for a month to help them retrace the steps of the journey, of which he was the sole surviving witness.

The Armenian said that they had traveled four thousand kilometers in three years on foot and horseback, proceeding through the Mughal empire and the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts. He spoke of crossing some of the world’s highest and least hospitable mountain ranges, frozen expanses of ice and snow, bleak, torrid steppes, and barren, burning deserts, and of scrambling across stony ground, up and down slopes of sheer rock, negotiating steep paths, and wading across raging torrents. He told of meeting peoples with bizarre customs that spoke incomprehensible languages, of fighting with bloodthirsty bandits, and of audiences with the sultans of kingdoms hidden in the innermost depths of Asia. During the journey they had encountered some Persian merchants returning from Cathay who had told them about a Christian missionary living in the capital and enjoying privileges unheard of for any foreigner, such as traveling in a litter and being admitted to private audiences with the Son of Heaven. Having recognized Ricci from the description, De Góis realized that China and Cathay were certainly the same country. He reached Suzhou on December 22, 1605, and tried to contact Ricci for the first time but with no success, not least because he did not know Ricci’s Chinese name. After waiting three months for an answer in vain, De Góis sent a second letter, which is the one that Ricci finally received.