Dr.

Stewart Addington Saint-David, MTS, CertTESOL, FRAS, FINS (Excerpted from Heaven's Mandate: Collected Essays on Aspects of World Religious Traditions) An Indelible Mark: Do Traces of Ancient Nestorian Belief Exist in Modern Rural Chinese Catholicism? One of the most fascinating trends in the current scholarship that deals with Chinese civilization is the investigation of the many residual foreign influences that continue to persist, even at a time when China is increasingly reacquainting herself with the fundamental elements of her history that have helped to establish her unique cultural identity in todays world. Among the many modern scholars of Chinese culture, there exist a significant number who are delving deeper into the sociological ramifications of foreign religious influence throughout Chinas long and varied history. In this brief paper, it is my aim to provide something of an overview of ideas put forward by these scholars, as well as to put forward elements drawn from my own field research in some of the small villages and towns of Shaanxi Provinces Zhouzhi County, located about one hour outside the large modern Chinese city of Xian. Although a regional study can hardly be said to provide any comprehensive notions about the growth and spread of either Nestorianism or Catholicism throughout the length and breadth of this vast and complex nation, it may perhaps shed some measure of light on the nature and origin of some rather unusual notions about the divinity of Jesus that are held by modern Chinese Catholics living in the deep countryside. Thus, the opening sections of this paper will provide an outline of some elements of the histories of both religious traditions since the time of their introduction into the Chinese sphere. I will then provide direct evidence of some of the current beliefs of the Catholic parishioners of rural Zhouzhi County, drawn from a series of interviews that I conducted in this area, and will focus in particular on their notions regarding the origin and nature of the divinity of Jesus. Finally, I will put forward a few observations on the possible origins of the somewhat heterodox beliefs that prevail among the Roman Catholic believers of Zhouzhi, and will also advance a hypothesis regarding the persistence 1

of these divergent beliefs in this rural population. Section One: The Nestorian Skein When discussing the introduction of Christianity to the Chinese empire, the general scholarly consensus since the discovery of the famous "Nestorian Stele" in the early decades of the 17th century has been that the first of the most important Christian missions occurred in 635 CE, during the reign of the great Tang emperor Taizong. This widely-recognized missionary activity had as its eventual target the vast and immensely powerful capital city of the Great Tang Empire, Changan, known today as Xian. At the height of its power and influence, a period exactly contemporaneous with the arrival of Nestorian Christianity at the imperial court, the great 7th century Chinese city of Chang'an, capital of the Tang dynasty, numbered well over one million inhabitants and was the absolute nexus of imperial might during the era of ancient China's greatest prosperity. "During its existence," writes historian Victor Cunrui Xiong, "Chang'an was the most spacious and often the most populous urban center in the world. Laid out as the terrestrial abode of the Son of Heaven, the axis mundi from which he sought and received divine sanction from Heaven, Earth, ancestral spirits, and other gods, Sui-Tang Chang'an was the medieval Chinese city at its most splendid."1 Founded under the name of Daxingcheng by Wendi, the first sovereign of the Sui dynasty (581-618 CE) in 583 CE, and later renamed Chang'an in 653 CE, by the third Tang emperor, Gaozong (r. 649-683 CE), it was the center of imperial power. However, it was eventually to be abandoned by one of the last monarchs of that dynasty, Zhaozong (888-904 CE) in 904 CE, as the dynasty, and thus the nation itself, descended once more into chaos, fragmentation and strife. Describing the sheer dimensions of the central gate of the ancient city, author and Sinologist Martin Palmer writes, "Rising over twenty yards high and being some twelve yards thick, [the gate] was made of rammed earth, faced with brick and topped by stone. It formed part of a wall twenty2

three miles long, embracing a city of some one million people."2 B Although powerfully defended, this vast urban site was, however, comparatively open to foreign influence, both intellectually and spiritually, as it was also the eastern starting point of what a 19th century geographer, the German Wilhelm von Richtofen, was in 1877 to dub the Seidenstrasse, or Silk Road, a series of ancient trade routes joining China with the markets of Central Asia, and eventually, with those of the Middle East.3 As the imperial capital, Chang'an was also home to a vast array of religious and philosophical schools, chief among them those of Taoism, Confucianism and Buddhism. "The two established religions, Buddhism and Daoism" writes Xiong, "had long been entrenched in the city and competed for ideological supremacy and imperial patronage."4 Indeed, this period in Chinese religious history is of primary importance, for it was in 645 CE, during the reign of the emperor Taizong, that the wandering Buddhist monk, Xuanzang, was to settle in the imperial capital, where he would eventually undertake the gargantuan task of translating literally thousands of ancient sutras from Sanskrit into Chinese. It was into the religio-cultural fabric of this genuinely prosperous and cosmopolitan imperial center that missionaries of the Nestorian Christian Church of the East, who journeyed in 635 CE from their home in Persia, sought to introduce the teachings of Jesus, and to expound to the people of Chang'an the core elements of the Christian path of salvation. The head of the mission, a bishop called Rabban (a name rendered in most Chinese sources as Aluoben or Aleben, and possibly bearing a connection to the Hebrew designation of rabbi) was greeted in the western suburbs of the city by Tang officials, and the pious travelers soon found themselves ushered into the presence of the Son of Heaven, Lord of Ten Thousand Years, the mighty Emperor Taizong himself. The Nestorians had endured extremely difficult conditions on the road to the Tang court. Although a certain measure of mystery persists regarding their exact starting point, scholars commonly place the origin of their trek in Mesopotamia. "They went out from Beth Nahrin, 3

birthplace of Abraham, the father of all believers," writes historian John M.L. Young. "The missionaries traveled on foot; they had sandals on their feet, and a staff in their hands, and carried a basket on their backs, and in the basket was the Holy Writ and the cross."5 Theirs was a distinctly different sort of Christianity from that practiced by other Western believers, particularly those living within the confines of the now-decrepit Western Roman Empire. "As Persian Christians,'" observes Biblical scholar Ray Riegert, "Aleben and his band believed Mary was the mother of Jesus the man, not the god. They were captivated by the historical Jesus and treated his teachings like those of a sage."6 It was this belief in the fundamental duality of the human and divine in Jesus that resulted in the expulsion of the sect's founder, Nestorius, a leader of the Antiochean branch of the Christian faith, from his position as archbishop of the Roman imperial city of Constantinople. Nestorius and his followers fundamentally rejected the notion of Mary as "Mother of God," or theotokos, claiming instead that she was simply the progenitor of the earthly emanation of Christ, as manifested in the physical person of Jesus. In 431 CE, the Council of Ephesus found in favor of the concept of Mary as the Mother of God, and Nestorius was exiled to the remote regions of the southern Egyptian desert, where he died some twenty years later. The church he left behind was ideally suited to the task of evangelizing the heart of China, as "Christianity in the East accepted the legitimacy of other faiths, and concentrated on Jesus' message rather than church doctrine."7 It was this flexibility of approach that was to serve Aluoben and his party extremely well in their dealings with the imperial court in Chang'an, for they were to step into a world that was alive with cultural cross-currents from a wide variety of sources and orientations. Palmer claims that "[t]he Tang court was used to exotic foreigners coming to trade with China, for example, musicians and performers seeking their fortune in the rapidly expanding Chinese empire."8 These were no mere itinerant musicians, however, and Taizong himself must have found something of great interest in the teachings of the white-robed priests and acolytes who visited his court, for he was soon to order the founding of a Nestorian monastery within the walls of Chang'an 4

itself, and in fairly close proximity to the imperial enclosure of the Xingqing Palace. Palmer cites Song Min Jiu's 11th century Atlas of Chang'an, in which can be found the following entry: "In the north-east of the Yining Ward there was the Persian temple. In the twelfth year of Cheng-kuan (638 CE), the Emperor Taizong had it built for... a foreign monk from Da Qin [the Great Western Land]."9 In addition, the Nestorian Stele of 781 CE, erected in or near Chang'an to commemorate the arrival of this mission, and later discovered by local workers in 1625 CE, records the following words of an imperial edict of Taizong: "The Way does not have a common name and the sacred does not have a common form...Aluoben, the man of great virtue from the Da Qin [Great Western] Empire, came from a far land and arrived at the capital to present the teachings and images of his religion."10 Earlier in the body of the selfsame inscription, it is noted that "the Sutras [of the True Way] were translated in the Imperial library. [His Majesty] investigated 'The Way' in his own Forbidden apartments, and being deeply convinced of its correctness and truth, he gave special orders for its propagation."11 This, too, seems to be in keeping with the modus operandi of the inquisitive and gifted Taizong, who requested that the manuscripts brought by the Nestorian travelers should be translated from Syriac into Chinese, an undertaking that entailed considerable time and effort to complete, as the first small volume, The Sutra of Jesus, was issued in 638 CE. Chinese scholar Li Tang believes that the impetus for the mission of the Persian Nestorians may in part have originated in the rising threat posed to their homeland, located deep within the confines of the Sassanian Empire, by the spread of Islam. In 636 CE, not long after the arrival of Aluoben and his companions in Chang'an, the Muslim assault on the Persian Empire was to commence, and in 652, with the occupation of Merv, Balkh and Harat, the Muslim takeover of Persia was completed. "The Arab conquest of Persia and the rule of Islam," writes Tang, "pushed more Nestorians to move eastward... Furthermore, the political situation in China in the 7th century, together with its successful foreign policy, for example the good relationship with between Persia and the Chinese Tang court and the tolerant religious policy of the Emperor Taizong, served as 5

favorable prerequisites for the acceptance of the Nestorians in China."12 Thus it was that practical political considerations, clearly operative in the policies of Taizong regarding foreign minorities within his own empire, may also have played an important rle in the Nestorians' decision to strike out for the East along the Silk Road. It can therefore reasonably be argued that this record of regular and positive relations between foreign peoples from the West and the imperial Chinese authorities may have helped to convince the Persian missionaries that they would ultimately find a favorable reception in the realms of the Great Tang. Nestorian Christianity, with its relatively flexible notions regarding doctrine and textual adaptation, was ideally suited to the socio-political climate of 7th century China, and it soon found itself the willing recipient of significant imperial patronage, both during the reign of Taizong, and during that of his immediate successor, Gaozong (r. 649-683 CE). There were various storms to be weathered, however, particularly during the reign of the Empress Wuzetian (r. 690-705 CE) who, for reasons both personal and political, undertook to persecute many of the foreign religious sects present in her kingdom, including those of the Zoroastrians, Christians and Manicheans. After her death in 705 CE, however, and those of her successors Zhongzong (r. 705-710 CE) and Ruizong (r. 710-712 CE), the danger had largely passed, and in 744 CE the emperor Xuanzong called for Nestorian priests to perform their religious rites within the confines of the Xingqing Palace.13 This signaled the return of the sect to a certain degree of imperial favor, and further encouraged its followers to propagate and commemorate the establishment of the faith within the borders of the Great Tang Empire. Thus it was that in 781 CE, during the reign of emperor Dezong (r. 779-805 CE), believers of the newly-prosperous Nestorian sect arranged for the installation of a commemorative stele on what are now believed by some scholars, such as Martin Palmer, to have been the grounds of a Nestorian monastery in the countryside, in what is the Lou Guan Tai area of todays Zhouzhi County, roughly 50 miles from Xi'an. The text of this stele, which records the coming of the first Nestorian mission 6

under Aluoben, was inscribed in both Chinese and Syriac characters, and offers an intriguing glimpse of various tenets of this faith, as practiced by its devotees in Tang China. Entitled the Daqing jingjiao liuxing Zhongguo bei (Monument to the Spread of Nestorianism in China), its theological elements present a version of Christian doctrine that is at once distinct and fundamentally innovative, and which draws heavily on native Taoist influences, as well as Buddhist textual genres and structures14 for both its presentational style and its content. In the age to follow, and despite its distinctly minority status within the Chinese empire, the foreign faith of Nestorianism managed to stay afloat throughout the rising and falling political and social tides of the 9th through the 14th centuries, and there were clearly at least a few believers left in China at the time of the Catholic missions of the early 15th century. According to Cambridge Universitys Mark Dickens, however, ...[T]he Nestorians... [n]ever truly gained a foothold in Chinese soil, so that when the Mongol dynasty fell to the Ming dynasty in 1368 and foreign religions were once again persecuted, Christianity again died out in China. There are records of Ongut Christians converting to Taoism and Confucianism. However, apparently there were still some Nestorians near Cathay as late as 1440, according to Nicolo Conti, who travelled throughout India.15 Thus it was that the stage was set for the next wave of Christian missionary activity in China, which was to come in this instance from emissaries of the Roman Catholic Church. Section Two: The Catholic Skein The story of the Catholic presence in China is a somewhat different, yet equally intriguing one, and is a tale which dates back, at the very least, to the time of John of Monte Corvino (1247-1328), first of the Franciscan missionaries sent to Asia in 1291 by Pope Nicholas IV. He arrived in Dadu in 1294, coming from Quanzhou to the Yuan capital, where he eventually handed over a letter from the 7

pope to Emperor Chengzong [Mongolian name: Temur Khan] (1294-1307 CE). This ruler was in time to prove a useful friend of the Catholic presence in China, and granted the missionaries permission to perform their religious activities publicly within his domains.16 This spirit of openness on the part of the Chinese regime, in many ways quite similar to the imperial Tang zeitgeist of centuries before, was to lead in the fullness of time to the conversion of other Christians already present in China at that time, including the Nestorian leader Kuo Li Ji Si of Wang Bu Gu, where John was eventually to build a Catholic church. In a further sign of the Catholics desire to attract the favor of the Yuan imperial establishment, John of Monte Corvino translated a number of documents, including the New Testament, the Psalms and various Latin rituals and prayers into the Mongolian dialect.17 In its way, this activity can be seen as something of an echo of the Nestorians' various translation projects at the height of the Tang dynasty, which were themselves devoted to bringing elements of the Christian scriptures within reach of the literate elite(s) of the Chinese empire. According to Chinese Catholic scholar Yan Kejia, John of Montecovino was named Bishop of Han Ba Li (Beijing) in 1307, and managed the Diocese of Beijing for over 20 years before his death in 1328. Other missionary leaders, including John of Marignoli (ca.1338) were sent to China in this period, but due to the highly unstable political and social situations, he returned rather quickly to Rome. Yan writes, After the founding of the Ming dynasty [in 1368], the Catholic Church in central China passed from the scene simply because most of the Catholics were Mongols.18 Thus, in a situation very much reminiscent of the vicissitudes of the Nestorian outreach during the turbulent years of social and political unrest that prevailed in Tang China during the 8th and 9th centuries, the missionary efforts that centered in and around the imperial center of the vast Yuan empire met with a temporary, but not fatal setback, due primarily to the dynastic changes that were taking place at that key juncture in Chinese history. From 1368 to 1644, writes Yan, the Catholic Church in China was somewhat moribund. This phenomenon lasted until the end of the Ming 8

Dynasty [1644].19 Furthermore, At the same time, Europe was going through many dramatic social changes: feudalism was dissolved, and new countries were created based on races; the capitalistic system was developing in some European cities and modern technologies were assuming greater importance.20 Further hampering the ability of the Catholic Church to initiate and expand missionary undertakings, several new elements of the social, political and economic equations were coming to dominate various aspects of the life, thought and collective energies of European civilization during the 17th and 18th centuries. This, however, also provided a new impetus for overseas missionary activities, as the increasingly powerful Reformation movement spread throughout Europe.. Facing the rapid social progress and the influence of the religious reformation, posits Yan, the Catholic Church began to undergo internal changes by reorganizing the religious orders both old and new. They sent many missionaries abroad to proselytize in order to counteract the Reformation influence. Borrowing its own saying, the church was trying to gain what they had lost in Europe.21 This period of retrenchment and reorganization was to lead directly to successive and increasingly powerful waves of Jesuits, Franciscans, Augustinians and Dominicans, both in Macao and eventually in the coastal areas of the Chinese mainland itself. These missionary efforts were to culminate in the work of such luminaries as the Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), who is widely considered to be the father of modern Catholic missions in China. Indeed, according to Professor You Xilin of Shaanxi Normal University in Xi'an, The missionary activity of the Jesuits, represented by Matteo Ricci, to supplement Confucianism and replace Buddhism, was put into actual practice in the form of a Christian humanism which was based on science and ethics. This outcome was not a matter of chance, but was historically inevitable; one could even say that it revealed the non-divine plan of the historical movement of 9

modernization.22 This period of Chinas parallel socio-cultural and spiritual histories, however, also witnessed the degeneracy of the traditional ways, and this to such an extent that even the greatest of her Confucian scholars, Wang Yangming (1472-1529), himself a celebrated general and government official, was to write poignantly of the decline of Chinese culture, ethics and morality. Wang came to bemoan the state of affairs that greeted the eyes of the observant Confucian gentleman scholar of his time: Learning is finished and the Way is destroyed.23 Thus, there existed a yawning chasm of unfulfilled moral and spiritual longings, both on the personal level and throughout the greater part of Chinese society as a whole. Into this void stepped the profoundly foreign, yet highly structured teachings of the Jesuit missionaries of the Catholic Church, all of whom were more than happy to replace the traditional and scholastically-oriented ru jiao ("scholars' way") with what they saw as the healing and regenerative power of their lord and savior, Jesus Christ. Wang Yangming speaks pointedly and powerfully of the deep spiritual and moral void that had come to afflict Chinese society in his time, and which was only to grow more acute and paralyzing as the centuries passed. You Xilin cites Wang's lament as proof of the need for moral and spiritual regeneration in the Chinese society of the time: The learning of the Sages grows daily more distant and obscure, and the pursuit of success and profit grows ever more intense. Meanwhile, although people have been hoodwinked by the doctrines of Buddha and Laozi, these are of no avail in overcoming their lust for success and profit; and although they may compromise with the mass of Confucianists, neither are the teachings of the Confucianists of any avail in putting a stop to their fixation on success and profit." 24 Thus, at the highest levels of Chinese society and leadership, including the Confucian bureaucrats and literati, the time was ripe for a wave of new and powerful teachings, and it was precisely this sort of rebirth that was promised by the many emissaries and teachers of Roman Catholic Christianity. 10

Yet, at the very same time, and in the unvarnished words of Professor You, Wang Yangming had already embarked upon a critique of modernity,25 the very sort of modernity that this nascent Chinese Catholicism would bring in its wake over the course of the several centuries to come. Although the Chinese elites were eager to benefit from the new technologies and scientific knowledge brought into the country via Catholic missionaries like Johann Adam Schall von Bell (1591-1666) and Ferdinand Verbiest (1623-1688), as the decades passed, they also grew suspicious of the degree of foreign influence and direct power that eventually came to be exercised by the selfsame missionary outsiders. Thus it is that the role of Catholicism within China has historically been viewed with varying degrees of wariness and caution on the part of the people, as well as by the state authorities. Nevertheless, that Catholicism has been relatively successful in China is beyond reasonable dispute, but the earliest roots of this success, particularly in some of the most remote rural areas of the country, have not been sufficiently explored. It is therefore my aim to present some elements of my recent field research in this domain, particularly in connection with modern Chinese Catholic communities in Shaanxi Province. One area in particular, that of Zhouzhi County, is especially rich in successful and seemingly durable Catholic communities, and their proximity to areas originally evangelized by the Nestorian missionaries of the Tang dynasty served to raise the very real possibility in my mind that this earlier form of Christian belief had continued to quietly subsist in the region, even in the interval between the supposed disappearance of a Nestorian Christian presence during the late Yuan dynasty and the widespread introduction of Catholic Christianity to the region in the 17th and early 18th centuries. Therefore, I set out to interview (via an interpreter) a number of the local Catholic believers, and to try to determine precisely why it was that such beliefs persisted, and indeed apparently flourished here in this rather isolated agrarian backwater. Section Three: Following the Skeins in Rural Shaanxi Province 11

My first visit to this area took place in May, 2008, in the company of a local teacher and scholar, Mr. Fu Xifeng, who kindly acted both as guide and translator during the course of this weekend excursion. Our first stop on the morning of May 17, 2008, was the small village of Dongwei, located in the heart of the rural farming region of Zhouzhi County, Shaanxi Province. Upon our arrival in Dongwei, a relatively small and dusty country town, we were accompanied by several local parishioners to the village Church of the Great Mother, which had originally been founded in 1703, during the reign of the Kangxi Emperor (1654-1722 CE). According to the testimony of the older members of our party, it was subsequently destroyed at some point during the Cultural Revolution of 1967-1976, but was later rebuilt during the early years of the widely-touted "Opening Up and Reform Movement" of the late 70s and early 80s, which was initially spearheaded by Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping. According to an elderly male villager who took part in these efforts, and who acts as de facto sexton of the small church complex, because the government was neither for nor against its reestablishment,26 all the materials, labor and art involved in the reconstruction of the Church of the Great Mother were donated by village parishioners, who undertook to complete its reconstruction in the shortest possible time. In addition, as the original structure had been designed by a nowunknown Italian missionary priest of the Kangxi period, the villagers took care to research the style of churches built in the area during the early 18th century, and to use these designs as their basic inspiration in its reconstruction. During our time in the church itself, I had occasion to enter into conversation with Mr. Zhang Qiwei, one of the stewards of the parish, who informed me that of the approximately 1,200 people who live in Dongwei, at least 1,000 are practicing Catholics. The other 200 are Buddhist, Taoist, or non-believers, described by Mr. Zhang as incomers from other villages and/or regions, 27 as opposed to the natives of the village, who have been staunch Catholics since at least the time of 12

Kangxi, and "perhaps even before."28 In addition, the steward and his fellow parishioners described Zhouzhi as the central element of an East/West Catholic axis, with the important districts laid out thus: Meixian --------- ZHOUZHI --------- Huxian The county seat, also called Zhouzhi, is also something of a Catholic headquarters in the region, and plays a role equal in importance to the much larger Shaanxi cities of Xian, Baoji and Xianyang. Its cathedral, located in the heart of Zhouzhi City, is of relatively recent construction, its earlier manifestation having also been damaged at the height of the Cultural Revolution. In the course of our discussions regarding the re-establishment of the Church of the Great Mother during the "Opening Up and Reform" period, the locals revealed that several individuals from outside the community contributed to the ongoing efforts, including a priest and two deacons from Hong Kong. These three gentlemen established a kindergarten for the church, donating over 250,000 RMB (+/- $ 35,000 USD) to aid in its completion. They also mentioned that while Dongwei was mostly Catholic, and had been so for several centuries, it did have residents who were of other faiths, such as Buddhism, or who were not in any way religious. Nevertheless, there are some other villages in the region, such as Xiwei, which are 100% Catholic, with populations of over 500 to 600 people. The Dongwei parisioners, among them Mr. Zhang, went on to explain that in the vicinity are also to be found several sites associated with regional Catholic Christianity, including the pilgrimage site of East Cross Mountain (Dong Xizi Shan), also located between Meixian and Huxian in the Zhouzhi Catholic corridor. One gentleman again indicated that in the Dongwei village, there are some who are not Catholic, but in nearby Xiwei, the population is entirely Catholic, adding that "it has been for several centuries, since at least the time of the Kangxi Emperor."29 Throughout the course of our conversations, there also seemed to be emphases of belief and reverence centering, not as one would expect of modern Catholics, on the Three "Persons" of the

13

Holy Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit), but instead around the Father, Son and Holy Mother." I advanced the notion that this might be a manifestation of the love historically shown by Chinese Buddhists for the mother-like figure of Guanyin, the Boddhisattva of Compassion, but this idea was rejected directly, with one parishioner claiming that "the teachings of the late Holy Father [i.e., Pope John Paul II]"30 are centered to a great degree on reverence for Mary, adding that this was thus an important aspect of Catholic belief. When queried about their beliefs regarding the nature and role of Mary, a number of the parishioners, both male and female, seemed to concur that she is considered by believers to be the mother of Jesus the man.31 In a subsequent conversation with Mr. Zhang, held about an hour later at his home, he put forward what he characterized as a "generally-held belief" in this area that in the beginning, Jesus was a human being, but that he gradually became God because of his great actions to save others.32 Therefore, through his selfless efforts, he was transformed from a man into a god. When asked if anyone believed that Mary was "the mother of a divine being," Mr. Zhang smiled quizzically and continued. In our families," he said, "we learn that he [Jesus] was a man at the start, eventually became a man-god, and finally was transformed into a god through saving people. After his great contribution to human beings, he became [a] god. I dont believe that anyone can be born divine. We believe that Christ was a mixture of the human and the divine.33 I must have registered a certain visible measure of surprise upon hearing the translation of his remarks in their entirety, for several members of the group gathered at the Zhang residence hurried to offer further explanation in response to Mr. Zhang's comments. Native local guide and translator Mr. Fu Xifeng commented that perhaps Mr. Zhang has been influenced by Communist culture in his belief that no one can be born divine."34 Nevertheless, I remained somewhat startled by this clear rejection of the standard Catholic doctrine regarding the fundamental divinity of Christ, and equally determined to research precisely which (if any) doctrinal pronouncements on the part of the Communist Party of China 14

might have had such a profound impact on a group that claims to practice orthodox Roman Catholic Christianity in this remote country setting. On a second visit to the Dongwei area a few weeks later, we returned to the same church, where this time we were met by a trio of Roman Catholic priests from the Zhouzhi Diocese. Upon engaging the local parish priest, Father Zhao, as a well as two other priests from neighboring villages (Father Ly and Father Cai), regarding standard Catholic doctrine regarding the divine nature of Christ, as well as Mary's role as the theotokos, the three clerics unanimously responded that "the believers hear a lot of things in society, but we all teach them that Mary is the Mother of God, and that Jesus is His Son."35 When I asked again why the locals all seemed to be in agreement that "Jesus became a god," Father Ly responded that "perhaps they don't want to say what they know." Sensing this to be a fairly delicate subject, I decided to defer any further questioning on matters doctrinal to a later time. In the course of the following weeks, I was fortunate enough to arrange a brief meeting with Professor You Xilin, Director of the Christian Cultural Research Center at Sha'anxi Normal University, who has made rural Chinese Catholicism one of his primary fields of study. In response to my comments about the apparent contradictions in the Dongwei villagers' accounts of Catholic doctrine, he explained apologetically (through a student interpreter) that "quite honestly many believers are reluctant to discuss religious matters with foreigners whom they don't know well,"36 somewhat increasing my suspicions about the accuracy of what I had heard on our first few outings to the area. On my fourth visit, which took place a few weeks later, I was therefore determined to dig deeper into the nature and origin of the seemingly inconsistent notions that the Zhouzhi Catholics (both laypeople and clergy) had produced in response to my initial queries. My very first stop was a church known locally as the Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Mountain, situated on an outcropping slope of Dong Shan ("East Mountain"). This shrine, which is difficult to reach even by car, is one of 15

the most prominent local spots of pilgrimage, the original structure having been established by an unnamed Western Catholic missionary father of the early 20th century. Upon arriving at this high mountain location, we were met by Father Cai (whom we had first encountered during our earlier visit to Dongwei) as well as by Mr. Li, the volunteer caretaker of the site, who showed us around its precincts. Mr. Li had been a volunteer there for over three years, and we were told that he spends a great part of each year thus engaged in maintenance and repair projects at the shrine. Upon observing a mural portrait of Joseph, earthly father of Jesus, within the nave of the sanctuary, I politely questioned Mr. Li as to what he believed about Joseph's role in the life of Christ. His description of the role of Joseph was as that of foster father, but he stated quite clearly (via our interpreter, Mr. Fu Xifeng) that Gods role was as Jesus true Father.37 He affirmed that he believes that Jesus was originally with God, and that he came down to Earth to save mankind. He also believes that Jesus was born divine.38 What I noted at the time, however, was that Mr. Li appeared to be somewhat circumspect in the presence of Father Cai, who seemed to be monitoring his responses to my questions about the nature of certain elements of Catholic doctrine and belief. It was therefore with a certain amount of relief that we managed to direct Mr. Li's attention to another part of the nave, while Father Cai took a call on his cell phone. It was at this juncture that I asked Mr. Li about his beliefs regarding Jesus' role on earth. He responded that "according to the Eden story," mankind was "cut off from the Father as a result of eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.39 However, in the course of our brief exchange, he also acknowledged that Jesus got his body from Mary, and that he came to save people from the effects of their sins. Furthermore, according to Mr. Li, it was only after Jesus death and resurrection that he became fully divine.40 It was at this point that Father Cai returned to the group, and we all headed off to another area outside the church. In conversation with Father Cai shortly thereafter, I put forward the thoughts of some of the parishioners whom I had met during my first few visits to Zhouzhi, particularly those with regard to 16

the initially human nature of Jesus. In reply, he stated in a rather matter-of-fact fashion that only priests really know the true facts and teachings thoroughly. Furthermore," he continued, "most parishioners have a very limited view of the faith and its many elements.41 Perhaps in an effort to bolster his bona fides somewhat, he went on to explain that he was a graduate of both a Chinese university and of the Xi'an Catholic Seminary, and that he had been resident in Zhouzhi for four years (since 2004). This exchange seemed to indicate to me that our interaction had caused him a certain amount of discomfiture, so I quickly shifted our discussion to elements of the local scenery and church history in the region. The visit ended in a fairly typical fashion shortly afterwards, with a group photo and the ritual exchange of e-mail addresses. Section Four: Untangling the Skeins? In the time since my initial visits to Zhouzhi, I have been exploring various ways in which to explain the fundamental divergence of many local Catholic believers' views of the nature and extent of the divinity of Christ from the standard and widely-accepted Roman Catholic doctrines, essential tenets of the Christian faith throughout the world, that present him as fully divine. Could it simply be that the Communist Party's control of the people has led these Catholics to reject the notion of Christ's inborn state of divinity? Thus, my first avenue of inquiry "post-Zhouzhi" was to attempt to discover any Communist pronouncements or propaganda that might serve to somewhat demystify the origins of this significant divergence from Catholic orthodoxy. As my access to Chineselanguage sources is sharply limited by my lack of Chinese language skills, I have been forced to fall back on translated and/or secondary sources that deal with this issue. Writing in a New York Times editorial of August 18, 2005, journalist Ramn Pedrosa avers that "Mao created the schismatic Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, which, under the supervision of the Religious Affairs Bureau, has essentially subordinated Catholic beliefs to Communist Ideology."42 However, scholars such as Anthony Lam, who write from within contemporary Asian 17

society, have observed that "[t]he government seems to have put aside its ideological debate and redefined its relationship to ... religions by laws and regulations."43 Thus it is that there seems to be no clear consensus on the exact nature and extent of the Chinese government's current involvement in the realm of religion within the country's extensive borders, particularly in the wake of the "Regulations on Religious Affairs" (Decree No. 420) that were promulgated in 2005, and which purport to "regularize" the relationship between believers and the Communist state. Prominent Catholic commentator and teacher, Jean-Paul Wiest, writing in a 2005 article entitled, "Understanding the Roman Catholic Church in China," believes that "[t]h[e] submission of the Churches to government control [has] not [been] done without putting the integrity of the faith at some risk and, as a consequence, of jeopardizing authentic Christian living."44 However, while there are clearly dangers involved as a result of government supervision/control of the various Christian churches in China, I have found no conclusive evidence of government manipulation of Christian doctrine to follow Party dictates/initiatives. Could it be then that these modern Chinese Catholics of Zhouzhi were actually maintaining and passing on beliefs regarding Christ that originate in the era of the first Nestorian mission to China in 635 CE? I have pondered this question long and hard since first coming into contact with this rural agrarian population in 2008, but would also be the first to admit its "long-shot" qualities as a reasonable hypothesis for the source of the notion that Christ was born human, and essentially "became divine." In the end, however, it was a chance remark regarding the ascension of Jesus, made during the course of a general discussion in one of my other Harvard courses, that recently served to steer me toward what I believe to be at least a more probable solution to this deeply puzzling, yet eminently fascinating local doctrinal "wrinkle." It is now my belief that, far from having any origin whatsoever in the teachings of the Nestorian missionaries who first came to China under Aluoben, this rather heterodox conception of Jesus as "becoming divine," as held by a number of the Catholic faithful in Zhouzhi, is on the contrary the

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result of some residual and deep-seated Chinese folk belief regarding the effective "deification" of certain exemplary individuals after their death. According to scholar Chiu Hei-yuan, in Chinese folk practices, "[F]rom those gods who were transformed from great heroes and sages... believers... ask [for] protection and spiritual efficacy."45 Most notable among those to have been transformed according to popular belief into figures of worship after their deaths are the great moral teacher Confucius (ca. 551-479 BCE), and the Taoist sage Laozi (ca. 6th century BCE), the site of whose legendary "departure for the West" itself lies at Lou Guan Tai, located at the very heart of the Zhouzhi countryside. If Confucius and Laozi could be "deified" in this fashion, why not the figure of Jesus of Nazareth? Indeed, writes scholar Geoff E. Foy, "Popular, or folk religious practice in China today has elements as old as the ancestral rites of the Shang [ca. 1600- 1046 BCE] and Zhou [ca. 1045256 BCE] dynasties and, dating from the Song dynasty (960-1279 CE), is marked by a propensity for syncretism."46 Could it be that vestiges of a millennial and essentially syncretic mindset persist among these rural Catholic believers, despite centuries of missionary efforts aimed at "purifying" the local population of non-Christian beliefs? Coupled with this folk belief may also exist fundamental misapprehensions of the "progressive" nature of several well-known episodes from the New Testament accounts of the life of Jesus, including his transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-9, Mark 9:2-8 and Luke 9:28-36), his resurrection (Mark 16:1-8), and his post-resurrection appearances (Matthew 28:8-20, Mark 16:9-20, Luke 24:1349, and John 20:11-21), culminating with his eventual ascension (Mark 16:14-19 and Luke 24:5051). Perhaps it is thus be that a fundamental "misreading" of the nature of these New Testament episodes, in conjunction with age-old Chinese folk beliefs regarding the fairly regular practice of deifying exceptional human beings, has led some modern Catholics in Zhouzhi to believe that "Jesus was born human and became divine." Are these New Testament episodes viewed by some rural Chinese Catholics as a "path to divinity"? Short of returning to these villages to conduct

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further interviews, there currently exists no other practical means of verifying the accuracy of this element of my broader hypothesis. Thus, although there is at present no way for me to fully account for this unusual departure from mainstream Catholic belief, I now feel that my hypothesis may perhaps serve explain why these believers, otherwise fully dedicated to what they see as the "true faith," hold such unusual notions in this one particular, yet pivotal regard. Furthermore, far from being unduly dismissive and/or critical of his own parishioners' ability to understand Catholic doctrine, in hindsight, perhaps Father Cai of the Sanctuary of Our Lady was trying to let me know that the level of their comprehension of some of the theological and doctrinal concepts involved was, in fact, conditioned by long-held beliefs stemming from age-old notions present in traditional Chinese religious culture. Thus, I hope in the months and years to come to be able to revisit the Catholic villages of Sha'anxi Province, and to conduct further research on the origin and nature of the exceptional beliefs regarding Jesus which are present there. At present, however, what I can state in this connection is that although I once suspected that there was at least a certain degree of residual influence from the beliefs of the earlier Nestorian missionaries among modern Catholics in Zhouzhi, I no longer feel this to be at all the case. Far more likely, both from a socio-religious and from a historico-cultural perspective, is the possibility that traditional Chinese notions regarding the deification of exceptional mortals, which date back several thousands of years, and which are deeply woven into the very fabric of Chinese life, as well as possible misinterpretation of the true significance of certain key episodes in the life of Jesus, have all contributed to this seemingly startling doctrinal aberration. Nevertheless, it is clear that a considerable amount of research, both textual and ethnographical, still remains to be done on this fascinating aspect of rural Catholicism in modern China.

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1 Victor Cunrui Xiong, Sui-Tang Chang'an: A Study in the Urban History of Medieval China (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan, 2000), pg. 1 2 Martin Palmer, The Jesus Sutras: Rediscovering the Lost Scrolls of Taoist Christianity (New York: Ballantine Wellspring, 2001), pg. 39 3 Susan Whitfield, Aurel Stein on the Silk Road (Chicago: Serindia, 2004), pg. 21 4 Xiong, pg. 235 5 John M. L. Young, By Foot to China: The Mission of the Church of the East (St. Louis: Assyrian International News Agency), pg. 11 6 Ray Riegert and Thomas Moore, The Lost Sutras of Jesus: Unlocking the Ancient Wisdom of the Xi'an Monks (London: Souvenir, 2003), pg. 13 7 ibid., pg. 14 8 Palmer, pg. 40 9 ibid., pg. 50 10 ibid., pg. 42 11 ibid. 12 Li Tang, A Study of the History of Nestorian Christianity in China and Its Literature in Chinese (Frankfurt-amMain: Peter Lang, 2002), pg. 82 13 Xiong, pg. 242 14 Chen Huaiyu, "The Connection Between Jingjiao and Buddhist Texts in Late Tang China," in Jingjiao: The Church of the East in China and Central Asia, ed. R. Malek (Institut Monumenta Sacra: Sankt Augutin, 2007), pgs. 94-95 15 Mark Dickens, "Nestorian Christianity in Central Asia," at Oxuscom (www.oxuscom.com: 2001), pg. 16 16 Yan Kejia, Catholic Church in China (Beijing: China Intercontinental Press, 2004), pg. 1 17 ibid., pg. 2 18 ibid., pg. 3 19 ibid., pg. 4 20 ibid. 21 ibid. 22 You Xilin, "Modernity and Secularity: The Dual Signification of Christianity for China's Modernization" in China Study Journal, Vol. 18, Nos. 1/2, pg. 8 23 ibid., pg. 9 24 ibid. 25 ibid., pg. 10 24 Author's field research notes: May 17, 2008 27 ibid. 28 ibid. 29 ibid. 30 ibid. 31 ibid. 32 ibid. 33 ibid. 34 ibid. 35 Author's field research notes: May 31, 2008 36 Author's notes of meeting with Prof. You Xilin: June 12, 2008 37 Author's field research notes: June 19, 2008 38 ibid. 39 ibid. 40 ibid. 41 ibid. 42 Ramon Pedrosa, "Beijing and the Vatican Edge Closer," in the New York Times (August 18, 2005) 43 Anthony Lam, "The Catholic Church in China," in China Study Journal, Vol. 15, Nos. 2/3 (Aug-Dec, 2000), pg. 19 44 Jean-Paul Wiest, "Understanding the Catholic Church in China," lecture presentation at the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China (Hong Kong), June 20, 2002 45 Chiu Heiyuan, "On Good Deeds in Chinese Folk Religion," in ACUCA Exchange, Vol. 1, pg. 46 46 Geoff E. Foy, "Chinese Belief Systems: From Past to Present and Present to Past" in Visible Traces (New York: Asia Society, 2000), pg. 50