Why was the missionary work by Jesuits working in Asia considered a mixed success?

What will be an ideal response?


The first missionary work in Asia was an effort by Francis Xavier, who worked from a Portuguese base in Goa and tried to find converts in India and Japan. He stayed two years in Japan, where some local rulers, who were crucial for the missionary's success, supported the Jesuits' efforts in order to strengthen commercial ties with the Portuguese. This approach was initially successful, with a Catholic Japanese community of approximately 250,000 by 1600 . However, this community fell into conflict with the arrival of Spanish missionaries from the Philippines, and internal quarrels caused this community to collapse. Subsequently, the Japanese government repressed Christianity quite brutally, killing up to 40,000 converts and closed the door to the West. In China, with the efforts of the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci, efforts were not as dramatic in terms of gaining converts, but did expose both China and Europe to their respective cultures. Ricci maintained an effort to learn Mandarin, dress in the Chinese fashion, and appeal to the Chinese elite by pointing out similarities between Catholicism and Confucianism. However, this can be construed as a mixed success because, while the conversion efforts did not recruit as many as in other areas of Asia and the Americas, Ricci's firsthand accounts of the Chinese spread widely throughout Europe and raised the point that the Chinese were unquestionably "civilized," unlike the debates about indigenous populations of the Americas, which raised uncomfortable issues about the benefits of Christianity.

History

You might also like to view...

What happened to women as New England grew and prospered?

A) They were legally barred from working outside of the home. B) They gained the right to make contracts. C) They found it difficult to obtain credit or receive a business license. D) They moved into a number of male-dominated professions.

History

Thomas Jefferson and his political supporters opposed John Adams's last-minute appointment of new federal judges mainly because

a. the judges appointed were viewed by Jefferson and his political supporters as incompetent. b. they believed that the appointments were unconstitutional. c. they did not want a showdown with the Supreme Court. d. it was an attempt by the Federalists, who had been defeated in the congressional and presidential elections of 1800, to maintain political influence in the federal government. e. these judges were superfluous in a federal judiciary with relatively few civil and criminal cases being filed and tried each year.

History

The Second Socialist International was split on various types of nationalism affecting a unified socialist platform

a. True b. False Indicate whether the statement is true or false

History

Describe the main provisions of the Social Security Act.

What will be an ideal response?

History