Das Collegium Sinicum zu Neapel und seine Umwandlung in ein Orientalisches Institut: Ein Beitrag zu seiner Geschichte (review)

After learning that his legate, Charles Thomas Maillard de Tournon (1668–1710), had two audiences with the Kangxi emperor (1662–1722) in Beijing in December, 1705, and June, 1706, Pope Clement XI (1700–1721) promoted him to the cardinalate and assembled six clerics in Rome to present the red hat to him in Macao. One of the clerics was Matteo Ripa (1682–1745), a diocesan priest of the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, who for thirteen years (1710–1723) was designated as a painter and engraver in the imperial court. As the Chinese Rites Controversy between the papacy and the Beijing court became more complex during those years, Ripa was also engaged in a related question—the development of an indigenous clergy for China. His view was to bring young Chinese students to Naples, where he would establish a college to train them so that they could return to China as diocesan priests. After his return to Italy and several years of negotiations with the papal court, Ripa received a positive response from Pope Clement XII (1730–1740) on April 7, 1732, that approved the founding of the Congregation of the Holy Family of Jesus Christ composed of diocesan priests and a college for the Chinese in Naples. This study by Karl Josef Rivinius outlines the transformation of the College into the Istituto Universitario Orientale of today.

The first chapter covers the history of Christianity in China beginning with the arrival of the Nestorians during the Tang dynasty (618–907). Several centuries later, Dominicans and Franciscans were active missionaries in the capital and in several provinces under the control of the Mongols (1279–1368). Neither could leave a continuing impact in China until the Jesuits under Michele Ruggieri (1543–1607) and Matteo Ricci (1552–1610) began a policy of inculturation during the late Ming dynasty (1368–1644). Dominicans, Franciscans, and others challenged several aspects of this policy in the Chinese Rites Controversy.

In the second chapter Rivinius explains the problems Ripa faced with the Austrian Emperor Charles VI, who insisted that the College become a lay and civil institution so that the Ostend Company of Austria, which was to handle trade with China, would have a number of translators of Chinese and also Indian languages. With papal support Ripa opposed this move, although years later the vicissitudes in Europe after the French Revolution and then the changes in Italy itself had repercussions on the status of the College.

In a separate section entitled "An Excursus" Rivinius portrays the connection between the embassy of George Earl of Macartney (1737–1806) in 1793–1794 to the Qianlong emperor (1711–1799, r. 1735–1795) and the College. Since there was no one in Great Britain nor even in France who could act as a translator for the embassy, Macartney and his aides turned to Naples and agreed to assist three Chinese priests at the College in their return to China. One of the priests, James Li, sent a memorial to the emperor, asking that the ban against Christianity be lifted, but the reply was that the religion that the Chinese followed was not to be changed and that the petition was not reasonable.

The final two chapters focus on the nineteenth century as Ferdinand I and the Holy See in a concordat of 1816 agreed about the immunities and privileges by which the College was to be considered a monastic institute. This lasted until 1860, when Italian unification challenged the role of the Church and its properties in the new Italian state. The controversy ended in 1869 in a royal decree stating that the College was to be called the "Royal Asiatic College of Naples" under the Ministry of Education with the goal of continuing to train young Chinese as well as Europeans in the living languages of East Asia. Several of...