Xiao Qinghe, Dialogues on the Issues of Theodicy in Late Ming Fujian (2024)

2024年8月10日11:45:54ChineseCS

Citation: Xiao, Qinghe. 2024. Dialogues on the Issues of Theodicy in Late Ming Fujian. Religions 15: 851. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15070851

Abstract: This paper aims to illustrate the dialogues on the issues of theodicy in late Ming Fujian. The Catholicism that entered China in the late Ming dynasty had a competitive relationship with indigenous religions in terms of their meaning systems. Catholicism emphasized the omniscience, omnibenevolence, and omnipotence of God, which created tensions and contradictions with the re‑ ality of phenomena such as the suﬀering of good people and the existence of evil. In the late Ming period, scholars, believers, and missionaries in the Fujian region engaged in deep exchanges and dialogues on theodicy, reﬂecting the signiﬁcant aention and consideration given to the problem of evil. This paper ﬁrst analyzes the dialogues on theodicy between the Fujian scholar Ye Xiang‑ gao (1559–1627) and the missionary Giulio Aleni (1582–1649). Next, it explores the discussions on the problem of evil between ordinary believers in the Fujian region and Giulio Aleni in their daily lives. Finally, it examines how anti‑Catholics used the problem of evil to criticize Catholicism, and it also identiﬁes the characteristics and impacts of Catholic theodicy in the late Ming and early Qing periods. Keywords: Catholicism; theodicy; the problem of evil; Fujian; late Ming and early Qing.