Medieval Roman Catholic Missions in China
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The second major thrust of Christianity into China occurred during the thirteenth century. The Mongols, under the leadership of Genghis Khan, began reaching outward from Central Asia, invading neighbouring countries and incorporating them into an empire that at its height included all China (the Yuan Dynasty, 1260-1368) and extended westward to Persia, Mesopotamia and parts of Eastern Europe. A political bridge was thereby provided that surmounted the vast wasteland of Asia and eventually brought China into direct contact with Western Christianity.
Because the Mongols were known for their toleration, political hegemony and outright patronage, the Nestorians flourished throughout Central Asia. Those who were living on the frontiers of China were emboldened to return. Their subservience to the Mongols meant that they tended to serve Mongol rather than Chinese interests. They located in the key cities along major trade routes in relative isolation from the Chinese people.
When the Mongol threat to Europe was at its height, reports came to Rome of Asian Christians living freely within what they regarded as “a sea of pagan violence”. Particularly astonishing and exciting was a vague reference by Otto of Freising in his Chronicle to “a certain ‘Presbyter Johannes’ – a king and a priest and a Christian”.[1]
Rabban Sauma, a Mongolian Turk born in Khanbaliq and bearing a Syrian name, came to Rome in 1287. He visited Philip IV of France, Edward I of England and the newly elected Pope, Nicholas IV. Sauma created quite a stir by celebrating the Syrian liturgy in the presence of the pope and the cardinals. He later repeated this at Bordeaux for Edward I. The cardinals in Rome had been more than a little surprised to learn that a Christian priest, a member of the patriarchate’s hierarchy, had come as an envoy from the “King of the Tatars”.
Rabban Sauma pointed out that "many of our fathers in times past entered the lands of the Turks, Mongols and Chinese and have instructed them in the faith. Today many Mongols are Christians" . Rabban Sauma’s proposed of a Mongol alliance with the Christian West against the Muslims. No missionary impulse had moved; he merely acted in self-interest, hoping that by diplomacy the Mongols might be diverted from sacking Europe. Although he did not win many supporters, Edward I did show some interest in that type of Crusade. Communication was begun, and delegates were sent to the great Khan. This eventually brought European Catholicism into contact with Asian Nestorianism. One of the tragedies of church history is that this encounter was never friendly.
In 1271, the Marco Polo brothers brought an invitation from Kublai Khan to the pope imploring him that a hundred teachers of science and religion be sent to reinforce the Nestorian Christianity already present in his vast empire. The great Mongol leader concluded:
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- “So shall I be baptized, and when I am baptized, all my barons and lords will be baptized, and their subjects will receive baptism and so there will be more Christians here than in your own countries” .
This came to nought due to the hostility of influential Nestorians within the largely Mongol court. When in 1253 the Franciscan William of Rubruck arrived at Karakorum, the western Mongol capital, and sought permission to serve its people in the name of Christ, he was forbidden to engage in missionary work or remain in the country, and he had to return home .
Fortunately, the Eastern Court under the more immediate rule of Kublai Khan was eager to secure Western assistance in its rule over the Chinese. In 1289, Pope Nicholas IV sent the Franciscan John of Monte Corvino to China by way of India, thereby passing Karakorum. Although the great khan had already died by the time John arrived (1294), the court at Khanbaliq received him graciously and encouraged him to settle there. John was China’s first Roman Catholic missionary, and he was significantly successful. He laboured largely in the Mongol tongue, translated the New testament and Psalms, built a central church, and within a few years (by 1305) could report six thousand baptized converts. He also established a lay training school of 150students. But the work was not easy. Although often opposed by the Nestorians who had over the years increasingly filtered back into China’s cities, the Franciscan mission continued to grow. Other priests joined him and centers were established in the coastal provinces of Kiangsu (Yangchow), Chekiang (Hangchow) and Fukien (Zaitun).
One of John’s most vigorous younger missionaries was Odorico da Pordenone (1265-1331), who arrived in Khanbaliq by the way of India in 1326 and whose subsequent sixteen years of unremitting journeys throughout China, preaching the gospel in the vernacular, resulted in over twenty thousand converts . (Some scholars reported that by 1381 the total number of communicants exceeded a hundred thousand ). Odoric later returned to Europe by an overland route through Inner Asia about seven or eight years later. The Alars from the Black Sea, converted by John of Montecorvino, dispatched an embassy to Rome in 1338 to ask for a bishop. Rome’s reply was to send John of Marignolli, who accompanied by fifty fellow Franciscans, left Avignon that same year and reached Khanbaliq in 1342. He brought a gift of a Western warhorse to the emperor as recorded in the Yuan Dynasty annals. John of Marignolli left China in 1347 and reached Avignon in 1353.
But the Mission was of relatively short duration. Two massive political catastrophes also hastened the extinction of this second wave of missionaries to China. Firstly, the Black Death during the latter half of the fourteenth century in Europe so depleted Franciscan houses that they were unable to sustain the mission to China. Secondly, the Yuan Dynasty began to decline. In 1362 the last Catholic bishop of Quanzhou, Giacomo da Firenze, was killed by the Chinese who seized control of the city. The Chinese rose up and drove out the Mongols, thereby launching the Ming Dynasty (1368). By 1369 all Christians, whether Roman Catholic or Syro-Oriental, were expelled by the Ming Dynasty founded by the Chinese. But it must be pointed out that the Franciscan success was principally with the Turko-Mongols and foreigners, not with the Chinese. The Syro-Oriental Church that had translated a significant body of literature into Chinese was considered too close to the ruling regime.
Regarding mission practice it seems that no translation of the full Bible was ever made, into Turkic languages, Chinese or other vernacular languages. The eventual collapse of the Mongol empire into warring factions, and loss of the flourishing exchanges which the empire had made possible across the region, isolated and weakened countless churches. Widespread warefare, the destruction of water and food supplies and forced migration then frequently ended or crippled the life of local churches . Then a new Turkic-Mongol uprising erupted erupted in the broad reaches of Central Asia under Tamerlane (1387) and menaced both East and West. Tamerlane was a Muslim convert, and he turned with fury on Roman christians and Nestorians alike. Few survived.
It appears that from the very beginning of their mission to China, the Franciscan friars were suspicious of the Nestorians and critical of everything they said and did. They refused to cooperate and would not give ground on such peripheral matters as their use of Latin in worship and their particular method of catechetical training. Furthermore, the Franciscans publicly denounced the Nestorians as heretics. Therefore Christianity made no lasting contribution in the life and institutions of the Chinese people in this period. Infact, with the collapse of the Mongol Dynasty the Chinese were quick to expel them. This brought about the early collapse of their churches, since the Franciscans had trained no Chinese clergy. All traces of Franciscan Christianity were suppressed by force. In Chinese eyes, the “religion of barbarians” was unworthy of a civilized people.
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- ^ La leggenda del Prete Gianni e l'Oriente favoloso - "Johannes quidam, qui ultra Persidem et Armeniam in extremo oriente habitans, rex et sacerdos, cum gente sua Christianus est, sed Nestorianus."
