Qi Han 韩琦, Tongtian zhi xue: Yesu huishi he tianwenxue zai zhongguo de chuanbo 通天之学:耶稣会士和天文学在中国的传播 [The Study of Communicating with Heaven: Jesuits and the Dissemination of Astronomy in China]

Abstract

This book is written by Professor Qi Han of the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Professor Qi Han is renowned for his research in the history of Chinese printing and astronomy, as well as in the interaction between Chinese and European sciences, especigally during the Ming and Qing periods. This particular work gives the reader a general overview, based on his three decades of research, into the complexities of the transmission and interaction between Chinese and European calendrical astronomy from the late-sixteenth to the early-nineteenth century. The bulk of the work consists of a Prologue and nine chapters on different topics, which are arranged in an essentially chronological order. The Prologue describes the background: how European science began to spread in Ming and Qing China. The Jesuit Matteo Ricci, who was in Ming China in the late-sixteenth and earlyseventeenth century, realized that the Ming court had a strong need for calendrical reform. Later, a wave of Jesuit missionaries who were well-versed in astronomy and mathematics reached China and were recruited into the Ming court. The Chinese court needed a better calendar to form part of the foundation for the ruling of the empire, while the Jesuits wanted to spread tianxue 天學, “heaven learning,” a consistent study of natural sciences and the Catholic religion. Calendrical reform, along with cultural and political struggles among different groups of interests, continued in various forms from the late-Ming period to the mid-Qing period in the eighteenth century. The stage is set, and the story starts. The first chapter gives a quick review of the transmission of European astrology in Ming and early-Qing China. Though related to calendrical astronomy, the astrological works written or translated by Jesuit missionaries found little favor among