CHAPTER 2
Europeans on the Margin: Missionaries and Indigenous Response in East Asia

QUESTION FOR DISCUSSION 1. Describe the approach of the Jesuit missionaries in China and Japan to convert these peoples to Christianity.
When the Portuguese sea-captain, Vasco da Gama, introduced a new route to East Asia rounded the Cape of Good Hope, he marked the entrance of early modern Europeans in the maritime world of Asia. The Europeans were interested in spice trades and other luxury goods such as silk and textiles. The Portuguese, Spaniards and Italian people also brought Christian missionaries through this famous sea route.
The Jesuit missionaries remade their own religion and cultural habits to suit the needs of the Japanese and Chinese. They hoped that this would increase the number of East Asian converts. In China the missionaries approached by emulate Chinese Confucian elite. They were also dressing and wearing their hair in the Confucian style, but there were few converts. The Jesuit missionaries used a similar method to convert the Japanese. They dressed in kimonos and took the Japanese cultural to other factors, which led to several more conventions than China.

2. How were the Jesuit missionaries in making Christian converts in Japan and China?
The Jesuit missionaries were impacted as much of not more than the cultures they entered. They came to identify with the culture and way of the life of their hosts, but were themselves converted to the host culture. Some of the Jesuit also came as men of god. They had abandoned their religious calling in favor of managing the trade between the West and their adopted Asian home.

3. How did the Chinese respond to Jesuit missionaries? To Matteo Ricci?
The Chinese did not have any interest in converting to Christianity, because China thought of itself in cultural and political terms as the “middle kingdom” superior to all others. They also refused western traders permanent residence within China. This changed when the missionaries started working within the Chinese system. They therefore became more trustful and successful making connection between Christianity and Confucianism. If a Jesuit won a favor with a certain leader or Confucian scholar, he could be allowed to visit other great cities in China. This opened a lot of opportunities to spread the Christianity in China.
Matteo Ricci was a missionary from Italy. He had mastered Confucianism, and he was therefore highly respected among the Chinese. Together with other missionaries, he gain converts and became even more desired to become Chinese. Ricci learned to read, speak and write Chinese. He became a bridge between China and the West. 4. What purpose did Jesuit missionaries in Japan serve for the Japanese ruler Hideyoshi? How did this impact Japan?
In 1580, when Hideyoshi became the leader of Japan, the Jesuit also established a training school and a college in Funai. These were designed to the converted Japanese to keep their Christian faith. The institution were also supported by the local lord, who had converted to Christianity. This made Hideyoshi believe that the Jesuit wanted to overthrow the throne, making him rely more on the current religion in Japan, bur over time the Jesuit also became a kind of lobbyist for Hideyoshi. The way this impacted their stay in Japan was that they were firstly welcomed by Hideyoshi, and afterwards they were as mentioned before, accused of wanting to overthrow the throne - and if it hadn't been for Joao Rodriguez they might have been killed in a terrible bloodbath.

5. What basic conflicts of loyalties did the presence of missionaries in Japan engender? Why did this engender their mission to Japan?
Because of the before mentioned suspicion that missionaries were going to overthrow the throne, 26 missionaries were killed as a result of a Spanish shipwreck that washed up on the Japanese shore. Rodrigues also believed that his generation of Jesuits had been solid and virtuous. But the younger generation of Portuguese was narrow-minded and not open to cross-cultural encounters. Referring to the governing of Jesuit communities in Asia - he said that they thought they were in Portugal This endangered their mission as they got expulsed and killed due to Rodridgues' trading skills as the Japanese were intimidated by his economic power.