CONTENTS

Preface and Acknowledgments

I. Introduction

1.1 Aim

1.2 Sources

1.3 Method

1.4 Previous research

1.5 Motivation

1.5.1 Confucians as the main dialogue partner to Christians in China

1.5.2 Contemporary cultural regeneration bringing Confucianism and Christianity to the same agenda

1.6 Structure and notational convention

II. The preconditions for the dialogue

2.1 The legacy of Matteo Ricci for the Confucian-Christian dialogue

2.2 Confucianism

2.3 The Confucians who have mostly commented on the Christian doctrine of salvation

2.3.1 The Neo-Confucians (16th–17th centuries) and the representatives in this study

2.3.2 The Cultural Nationalist Confucians (1920–1980) and the representatives in this study

2.3.3 The Modern Confucians (1980–) and the representatives in this study

2.4 The Christian concept of God in Chinese terms

III. Confucian ideas of the Saviour in Christianity: The assimilation of God to the Chinese concepts of Shangdi and Tian

3.1 The Neo-Confucian ideas of the assimilation

3.1.1 Affirmative responses to the assimilation

3.1.2 Negative responses to the assimilation

3.2 Cultural Nationalist Confucian ideas of the assimilation

3.3 Modern Confucian ideas of the assimilation

IV. Confucian ideas of the object of salvation in Christianity: created humanity and its status

4.1 Human beings as part of creation

4.1.1 Neo-Confucian arguments

4.1.2 Cultural Nationalist Confucian arguments

4.1.3 Modern Confucian arguments

4.2 The status of human beings

4.2.1 Neo-Confucian arguments

4.2.2 Cultural Nationalist- and Modern Confucian arguments

V. Confucian ideas of the means of salvation in Christianity

5.1 The existence of transcendence in Confucianism

5.1.1 Neo-Confucian arguments

5.1.2 Cultural Nationalist Confucian arguments

5.1.3 Modern Boston Confucian arguments

5.1.4 Modern Christian Confucian arguments

5.2 The transcendence of the Christian God and that of the Chinese Heaven

5.2.1 Neo- and Cultural Nationalist Confucian arguments: The Chinese Heaven as internal transcendence

5.2.2 Cultural Nationalist and Modern Confucian arguments: The Christian God as external transcendence

5.3 The superiority of the internal transcendence to the external transcendence

5.3.1 The arguments of Cultural Nationalist Confucians

5.3.2 The arguments of Modern Non-Christian Confucians

5.3.3 The arguments of Modern Christian Confucians

VI. Basic Problems in the Confucian-Christian dialogue

6.1 The hidden differences between Confucian and Christian ways of thinking

6.2 Four obstacles in the Confucian-Christian dialogue

6.2.1 Theological perspective: the monistic unity between Heaven and humanity

6.2.2 Spiritual perspective: Christianity as spiritual opium

6.2.3 The Political perspective: Christianity as an element of political turmoil

6.2.4 The Ethical perspective: the Christian concept of God as confl icting with Confucian ethics

6.3 Affirmative elements in the Confucian-Christian dialogue

Summary

Appendices

I. The Five Classics

II. The Four Books

III. The eleven quotations of Ricci

IV. The degeneration from theism to humanism

V. The nine horizons of Tang Junyi's Confucianism

VI. The Taiji

VII. The Li and Qi

VIII. Two wings of Neo-Confucianism

Bibliography

Primary sources

Literature

Index