Dis-assembling Traditions

Deconstructing Tasan via Matteo Ricci

Bibliographic Data

ID9272980
AuthorsKevin N Cawley (University College Cork, corresponding author)
Year2014
Volume24
Issue2
Pages297-313
Publication date2014-04-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0035-869X • E-ISSN: 2051-2066
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s1356186313000783
OpenAlexW2016919356
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited11

Chŏng Yagyong 丁若鏞 (1762–1836), commonly known by the penname Tasan 茶山, was infamous for his involvement in the early Catholic Church, which was formed by his close friends and his brothers. This Church was responsible for its self-evangelisation based on the ideas found in Matteo Ricci's Tianzhu shiyi 天主實義 (The True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven). The effects of this very controversial aspect of his life, and the influence of this precarious context—fraught with danger, narrowly escaping execution and exiled for 18 years—has been under-valued. This paper highlights the effects of such a context on Tasan's ideas by engaging with “deconstruction”, drawing on the ideas of Jacques Derrida. I outline how Tasan embroidered Ricci's deconstructive strategies into the deepest fabric of his own deconstruction of “original” Confucianism, or his dis-assembling of traditions. The paper uncovers Christian traces silhouetted in Tasan's theistic commentaries, leading him towards a Post-Confucian conceptualisation of humanity (仁) vis-à-vis a personal, monotheistic, creator God

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Context (archaeology) · Deconstruction (building) · Epistemology · Heaven · Humanity · Meaning (existential) · Sociology · Theism · Theology · Chinese history and philosophy · Engineering · History · Japanese History and Culture · Philosophy · Religious studies

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