Christian Literature in Chinese Contexts

• Main Author: Lai, John T. P. (auth)
• Format: Electronic Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI - Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute 2019
• Subjects: Religion & beliefs; Prohibition of Christianity; postliberal theology; politics-religion relationship; The Gospel; Jingjiao Christianity; Figurism; rhetoric Jesuits Sino-Western literary relations; translation history in China; Marxism; Jesuit Figurists; Haiguo Quyu; Chinese Islam; sage; sheng ren; Shi Wei; Confucianism; Qing dynasty; Shakespeare; Lü Liben; baptism; Bei Cun; Ha Zhidao; Xian Stele; Chinese Christianity; Chinese Christian literature; Passion narratives; Christianity; The Yijing (The Book of Changes); Political Theology; comparative literature; Missionary in China; Yijing; Shixi de he; spiritual literature (shenxing xiezuo); Dao; Isaac Mason; Life of Jesus; Jesus the Proletarian; intertextuality; theology of religions; Tang Dynasty; Zhu Weizhi
• Online Access: DOAB: download the publication; DOAB: description of the publication

Christianity in China has a history dating back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE), when Allopen-the first Nestorian missionary-arrived there in 635. In the late sixteenth century, Matteo Ricci together with other Jesuit missionaries commenced the Catholic missions to China. Protestant Christianity in China began with Robert Morrison, of London Missionary Society, who first set foot in Canton in 1807. Over the centuries, the Western missionaries and Chinese believers were engaged in the enterprise of the translation, publication, and distribution of a large corpus of Christian literature in Chinese. While the extensive distribution of Chinese publications facilitated the propagation of Christianity, the Christian messages have been subtly re-presented, re-appropriated, and transformed by these works of Chinese Christian literature. This Special Issue entitled "Christian Literature in Chinese Contexts" examines the multifarious dimensions of the production, translation, circulation, and reception of Christian literature (with "Christian" and "literature" in their broadest sense) against the cultural and sociopolitical contexts from the Tang period to modern China. The eight articles in this volume cover a variety of intriguing topics, including the literary/translation endeavors of Western missionaries in Chinese, the indigenous works of the Chinese Christians, the interaction between the Christian and Chinese literary traditions, Chinese reception of the Bible, and numerous other relevant concepts.