Angelology in Late Ming: On Gao Yizhi (Alphonse Vagnoni，1566-1640) and Shengui zhengji (True Recordings on Gods and Ghosts)

XIAO Qinghe

Ph.D., Chinese University of Hong Kong and Peking University,

Vice Editor in Chief, International Journal of Sino-Western Studies (www.SinoWesternStudies.com)

Associate Professor, Department of History, Shanghai University, Shangda Road 99, Baoshan District, Shanghai City, 200444, P. R. China. Email: qinghexiao@gmail.com

Abstract: Before Catholic missionaries entered in the late Ming dynasty, China already had a rich local system of thought of Gods and Ghosts. The main problems needed to be solved by the Missionaries were two: first was that Neo-Confucianism explained Gods and Ghosts as the functions of Qi (Air), second was that the thoughts of Gods and Ghosts of Buddhism, Taoism and folk religions. By using the tradition of Catholic Angelology, missionaries argued that it was wrong to explain the Gods and Ghosts as air; and the local Chinese thinking of the Gods and Ghosts was not either perfect. This article firstly analyzes the life and editorial group of Gao Yizhi (Alphonse Vagnoni,1566-1640), then analyzes the thought of Angelology in the book of Shengui zhengji (True Recordings on Gods and Ghosts) composed by Gao Yizhi. It finally discusses the influence of the Catholic angelology on the thought world in late Ming dynasty.

Key Words: Gao Yizhi (Alphonse Vagnoni,1566-1640), Shengui zhengji (True Recordings on Gods and Ghosts), Angelology