China, Christianity, and the Question of Culture

1. Language and Missionary Universities in China

3 CHAPTER ONE language and Missionary universities in China It is generally acknowledged that “the missionary universities were the forerunner of higher education in China.”1 It is also true that such institutions were primarily meant as “Christian missions.”2 What was not expected, however, was that the differences in the understanding of the relations between the original and target culture led to two diametrically opposed teaching strategies adopted by the early missionary universities. Of those universities the Cheeloo University in Shandong and St. John’s University in Shanghai were outstanding examples. What separated those two universities was their adoption of their language for instruction: one made Chinese the working language, the other chose English. The issues that divided their adoption also showed their conflicting views about how to achieve the cultural and missionary aims. As “[t]he primary phenomenon in the realm of understanding is not understanding of language, but understanding through language,” what happened in the past around this language issue remains a relevant topic today.3 In the early days of Cheeloo, when it was known as Shantong Christian University, the Chinese language in both of its archaic and modern forms was made the working language for instruction by the American Presbyterian and the English Baptist missionaries who ran the university.4 4 China, Christianity, and the Question of Culture This decision was announced in the declaration, “The Basis of Union in Educational Work,” that set the promotion of Christ’s cause in China as the primary objective of the university, to be achieved through Chineselanguage instruction.5 Shantong Christian University was not the only missionary school in the province that gave Chinese culture such prominence. Confucian classics accounted for approximately one-third of the courses in the missionary schools in Shandong. At Tengchow College, one of the predecessors of Cheeloo University, the students at the precollege level were required to learn by heart the texts of the four volumes of The Book of Songs (诗经). At the college level, they were expected to be able to recite what was taught in two volumes of The Book of History (史记), four volumes of The Book of Rites (礼记), six volumes of Zuo’s Commentary (左传), and the entire Book of Changes (易经). In addition they were expected to master the materials in a review course that covered The Analects of Confucius (论语), The Words of Mencius (孟子), The Great Learning (大学), The Doctrine of the Mean (中庸), and the annotations of related classics.6 To win a place for Christianity in traditional Chinese education, the early missionaries produced a textbook called The Three-Word Holy Book that imitated in form of San zi jing (三字经), an elementary textbook for children written in verse with each line consisting of three characters. It teaches that God is the creator of the universe, a being of omniscience, omnipresence, and omnipotence and the true king of the world.7 However, as this book is intended for acceptance by Chinese people, it plays down Western Christian concepts such as the fall of Adam and the original sin and gives prominence to Chinese ideas, set in verse of three-word lines, about ethics, the natural world, human feelings , blessings, social hierarchy, and admonitions, all Chinese concepts except the part on blessings, which has its origins in the Bible, and the part on admonitions, which reads like the Ten Commandments.8 Cheeloo’s choice of Chinese as its instruction language was meant not just for religious assimilation. Such effort showed the vigilance of the missionaries in their attempts to advance contemporary Western ideologies. As Calvin W. Mateer put it, the usual enthusiasm displayed by young people in learning English showed that they believed English was a gold mine.9 Furthermore, according to Mateer, the ever-increasing number of English publications available in China constituted a threat by sowing the seeds of agnosticism, skepticism, and rationalism. In Language and Missionary Universities in China 5 conclusion, Mateer said that with English as one of the basic courses, the missionary schools would soon become secular institutions, running counter to the very purpose of their existence.10 It goes without saying that the missionary schools were meant to promote Christ’s cause in China, but such an effort, in the view of Mateer, did not mean bringing Western culture to China wholesale; discrimination was advocated and exercised. So Mateer borrowed heavily from Chinese culture and tradition by way of adapting whatever would be effective with regard...