The Rise and Fall of Catholicism in Hainan During the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties

The Rise and Fall of Catholicism in Hainan 129

Chapter 4 The Rise and Fall of Catholicism in Hainan during the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties

The Ming (1368–1644) and Qing (1644–1911) dynasties were a crucial period in the history of the spread of Catholicism in Hainan 海南. However, with the exception of Joseph Dehergne (1903–90), this subject has thus far received lit- tle attention from scholars in the West.1 Moreover, while Chinese scholars have engaged in some research on the Catholic missionary endeavors in Hainan—including Wang Yu’s “Missionaries in Hainan Island,”2 and Wei Jingzhao’s “The Spread of Christianity in Hainan”3—these works are slightly vague with regard to particulars, they lack footnotes, and the names of missionaries are sometimes translated incorrectly. This essay consequently seeks to re-examine the history of Catholicism in Hainan during the Ming and Qing dynasties.

1 The Rise of Catholicism in Hainan

Catholicism first entered China in 1557 when the Portuguese arrived in Macau to establish a residence for foreigners in China. After the Jesuits built a residence in Macau in 1560, they made a number of attempts to enter mainland China. By the 1630s, through the efforts of Italian fathers such as Michele Ruggieri (1543–1607) and Matteo Ricci (1552–1610), Catholic missionaries had entered many places including Zhaoqing 肇慶 and Shaoguang 韶關 in Guangdong, Shaoxing 紹興 and Hangzhou 杭州 in Zhejiang, Nanjing 南京 in Jiangsu, Nanchang 南昌 in Jiangxi, Beijing 北京 and Xi’an 西安 in Shaanxi, Shanghai 上海 and Ji’nan 濟南 in Shandong, Kaifeng 開封 in Henan, and

1 Joseph Dehergne, Les origines du Christianisme dans l’île de Hainan, vol. 5 (Beijing: Beijing Vetch, 1940); “A Christandade de Hai-nan e o antigo cemiterio Portuguez de Kium-cheu,” Ta- Ssi-Yang-Kuo 2 (1901): 733–46. This article mainly discusses the deeds and graveyard of three fathers buried in Qiongzhou: Jean Forget 傅滄溟, Stanislao Torrente 瞿篤德, and Joachim Calmes 金玉敬. 2 Wang Yu 王禹, “Missionaries in Hainan Island” [傳教士在海南島], in Research on History of Qing Dynasty [清史研究] 2 (1997). 3 Wei Jingzhao 韋經照, “Spread of Christianity in Hainan” [基督教在海南的傳播], Journal of Hainan University [海南大學學報] 4 (1987).

Fuzhou 福州 in Fujian. By 1615, there were five thousand Catholics, a figure that rose to thirteen thousand in 1617 and to thirty-eight thousand in 1638.4 The available documents show that while Catholic missionaries reached Hainan at an early date, formal missionary work in Hainan commenced later than in many other places in China. According to the available sources, Portuguese father Baltasar Gago (1515–83) was the first missionary to reach Hainan. In 1552, he was dispatched by his superiors to Japan. In 1560, after doing missionary work in Japan for eight years, he sought to return to Portugal. However, during his journey he was caught in a storm and the ship drifted to Hainan Island: “After engaging in missionary work in Japan for eight years, [Gago] returned from Japan on October 7, 1560 because of exhaustion. He encountered a hurricane and drifted to Hainan Island.”5 After staying in Hainan for less than two months, Fr. Gago was sent to Macau. According to another record, twenty-three years later, in 1583, a few missionaries traveled close to Hainan, also because of storms, but they did not remain there. “In 1583 [the eleventh year of the reign of Emperor Wanli 萬曆 (r. 1573–1620)], Fr. Diego de Oropesa [d.1590] [who was sent from the Philippines to Hanoi in Vietnam], and seven Franciscan missionaries drifted close to Haikou because of [a] storm. Later, they returned to the Philippines via Macau, Guangdong.”6 In these two cases, missionaries went to Hainan entirely by chance and did not engage in any missionary work there. Moreover, the maritime ban along the Chinese coast at that time prohibited them from engaging in missionary work. Catholicism began to be introduced into Hainan as a result of the activities of a senior scholar-official, Wang Honghui 王宏誨 (1541–1617), from Xian’gou town 仙溝鎮, Dingan County 定安縣, Qiongzhou prefecture 瓊州府, Hainan. In 1589 (the seventeenth year of Emperor Wanli’s reign), he worked as a minis- ter at the Ministry of Rites 禮部 in Nanjing, and was an influential figure in the history of Hainan during the Ming dynasty. In 1593 (the twenty-first year of the reign of Emperor Wanli), Wang “resigned from his post and went back to his hometown because of illness.”7 When he passed Shaozhou 韶州 he went to Shaozhou church to visit Ricci, who was engaged in missionary work there. According to Ricci’s Regni Chinensis descriptio‎,

4 Zhou Xiefan 周燮藩, Christianity in China [中國的基督教] (Beijing: Commercial Press, 1997), 86. 5 Louis Pfister, Notices biographiques et bibliographiques sur les Jésuites de l’ancienne mission de Chine 1552–1773, trans. Feng Cheng Jun (Beijing: Chinese Publishing House, 1995), 15. 6 Kobata Atsushi 小葉田淳, History of Hainan Island, trans. Zhang Xunqi (Taipei: Xuehai Press, 1979), 315. Joseph Sebes, “The Precursors of Ricci,” in Macau RC 21 (1994): 63. 7 Ming Yi 明誼 and Zhang Yuesong 張嶽松, (Daoguang) Qiongzhoufu zhi （道光）瓊州府[ 誌], vol. 34 (Taipei: Chengwen Press, 1967), 33.