Was Joaquim Angélico de Jesus Guerra S.J. (1908–1993) a 20th-Century Figurist?

Abstract

Fr. Joaquim Angélico de Jesus Guerra S.J. (Chinese name: Ge Zhendong), a Portuguese missionary in China, was the most prolific Sinologist in the Lusophone world. Over a period of nine years (1979–1988), he published his translations and commentaries on the Wujing (Five Classics) and the Sishu (Four Books), plus the Xiaojing (Classic of Filial Piety) and the Daodejing. Much more astonishing than his monumental Sinological work is the peculiar silence academia devoted to his achievements. One of Guerra’s remarkable features, which is a possible reason for such silence, is his alleged “figurist” attitude towards the Chinese Classics. This article discusses Guerra’s figurism and his theological background, briefly compares it with the original Figurism and theology of Joachim Bouvet and Joseph de Prémare, and finally expounds on sections of the Shijing (Book of Songs), the Shangshu (Book of Historical Documents), and the Daodejing that were interpreted typologically by the French Figurists in their commentaries on the Chinese Classics. The aim is to analyze Guerra’s interpretation of these texts and determine if typological readings of figurist type can be found in his Portuguese translations and commentaries on the Chinese Classics.

耶穌會神父戈振東（Joaquim Angélico de Jesus Guerra, 1908–1993），葡萄牙來華傳教士，是葡語世界中最多產的漢學家之一。九年中（1979–1988），他出版了儒家經典「四書五經」、《孝經》和《道德經》的譯本及評注。但比起他那不朽的漢學作品，更令人驚訝的是學術界對其成就的異常沉默。戈振東神父作品的顯著特徵之一是他對待中國經典所謂的「索隱」態度，這可能是導致學術界如此沉默的一個原因。本文論述了戈振東神父的索隱主義及其神學背景，並將其與白晉、馬若瑟的原始的索隱主義和神學做了簡要的對比，最後闡述了《詩經》、《尚書》和《道德經》部分內容中的預表，這些預表是由法國索隱派在其對中國經典的評注中解釋的。本文旨在分析戈振東對這些文本的注解，並確定在他對中國經典的葡語翻譯和評注作品中是否能找索隱派預表式的解讀。

Keywords:

• Joaquim Guerra
• Figurism
• Portuguese Sinology
• Jesuits in China

關鍵字:

• 戈振東
• 索隱派
• 葡萄牙漢學
• 來華耶穌會傳教士

*This article is based on the author’s doctoral dissertation in progress “God’s Left Hand: Sinology and Theology in Fr. Joaquim Guerra, S.J.” which has passed the thesis proposal assessment. The materials presented in the fourth and fifth chapters of the dissertation were especially useful for this article.

Notes

1 Christened Joaquim Angélico Guerra, he later added “de Jesus” (of Jesus) to his name as a sign of gratitude for what he considered a miraculous deliverance after having been sentenced to death in 1951.

2 Fr. Luiz Gonzaga Garcia S.J., 1895–1946 (Santos 2008, p. 38).

3 Fr. Peter Hui, whose family name was Xu 許, was later ordained a priest in Shanghai and was a missionary in Zhaoqing. He spent twenty years in prisons in communist China. Fr. Hui died in Macau in the year 1982. See https://www.macaumemory.mo/entries_b6156ed667c947b5830f48a46d19d476 (accessed 30 Jan. 2024).

4 Guerra 1981a, p. 88; Guerra 1986, p. 62.

5 We are not aware that Guerra’s Alphabetic Chinese was ever used, except for Guerra himself, and except for a brief paper by Duarte-Ramos (2009), it has not been an object of research in academia. This etymological form of transliteration could be read, according to Guerra, by any Chinese in his or her own dialect after the proper rules are learned.

6 Lúcia de Jesus Rosa dos Santos, born on 30 March 1907. Sister Lucy claims to have seen an apparition of the Blessed Virgin in 1917. Guerra hoped that he could be instrumental in encouraging Catholics to observe the “First Saturdays Devotion,” as Sister Lucy said that the apparition requested. Guerra was called an inveterate fatimista by his nephew, Fr. Abel Paulo Guerra S.J. (Menezes 2013, p. 212).

7 Guerra 1963, pp. 9, 16, 146, 150, 166–170, 281, 284.

8 Boletim Oficial de Macau 1961 (Macau: Imprensa Nacional de Macau, 1961), p. 374. We could not identify the reasons for this decision. Guerra was unhappy about it (Santos 2008, p. 74).

9 Condenado à Morte. This title is “not from his own manuscript” (Guerra 1986, p. 88). It seems that it was arbitrarily changed by a superior (Menezes 2013, p. 37). The original title was “O Comunismo é Assim,” “This is how Communism is,” a phrase constantly used in the book.

10 Paul VI 1970 (accessed 11 January 2024).

11 In an unusual arrangement, Guerra published his version of the Sishu with the Xiaojing in the place of the Mengzi, which was published separately.

12 Guerra 1979, p. 65; Legge 1960, p. 97.

13 Guerra 1979, pp. 63–75, 101–135.

14 As Roderick Ptak suggested (Ptak 1985, pp. 757–758). An example of this can be found in the second stanza of the Gao Yang 羔羊 poem. Here the Old Chinese phonology exhibits a rhyme scheme of A/A/B/A, as noted by Baxter (1992, p. 589). The following quotation presents Chinese characters, along with Hanyu Pinyin and Guerra’s Alphabetic Chinese (Guerra 1979, p. 172): 羔羊之革、/ Gao yang zhi ge / Kaovyão the kak / 素絲五緎。/ Su si wu yu / Sow se nhx weg / 委蛇委蛇、/ Wei yi wei yi / Vejdao-vejdao / 自公退食。/ Zi gong tui shi / Dsez koq thoey zheg. As one can see, Guerra’s Chinese Alphabet preserved the stop codas in verses 1, 2, and 4 (kak, weg, zheg), unlike Hanyu Pinyin (ge, yu, shi).

15 Guerra 1980, pp. 176–185.

16 Guerra made this claim in virtually all his commentaries on the Chinese Classics. Here he seems to have followed a particular tradition of Jesuit Sinology. Guerra’s criticism against Zhu Xi will become more elaborated in his introduction to the Daxue 大學 (Great Learning), published in 1984, where Guerra relied much on Fr. Stanislas Le Gall’s scholarship (1898). For a discussion on Guerra’s critique of Zhu Xi, see Pfister 2020, pp. 715–717.

17 “DEUS é o Meio contínuo, universal e transcendente, por onde se estendem o Espaço e o Tempo, o grande Cosmos e a História; e também o Fundo em que se apoia toda a Actividade e Mudança.” Guerra 1983a, pp. 67–68. Unless otherwise stated, all translations in this article are mine.

18 “Uma visão profunda das coisas, que descobre a relação e interacção de todas as criaturas entre si, e a presença e acção do Criador em todos os seres e acontecimentos.” Guerra 1983a, pp. 66–67.

19 Guerra 1983a, pp. 22, 67–68.

20 Guerra 1987a, p. 28.

21 See Tian Jing 2011 and Bueno 2020. One might speculate that at least four factors contributed to a certain lack of interest in Guerra’s achievements: first, the “Christianization” of the Chinese texts (which would include his “Figurism”). Second, the fact that Guerra wrote in Portuguese, which is not a major language and less popular than Legge’s English or Couvreur’s French. Third, his unusual theories regarding the origin of languages. Fourth, Guerra's decision to use his “Alphabetic Chinese” system for transliterating the Chinese text, rather than Hanyu Pinyin.

22 Rowbotham 1956, p. 478.

23 In Contra Faustum, St. Augustine gives us an example of two typological readings of the Old Testament: “The whole narrative of Genesis, in the most minute details, is a prophecy of Christ and of the Church with reference either to the good Christians or to the bad. There is a significance in the words of the apostle when he calls Adam ‘the figure of Him that was to come’; and when he says, ‘A man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.’ This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and the Church.” (Schaff 2007, p. 239). St. Augustine quoted from St. Paul (Rom. 5:14, Eph. 5:31–32) respectively.

24 Lundbæk 1991, pp. 13, 109; Wei 2019a, p. 9; Mungello 2019, p. 49.

25 Lundbæk 1991, p. 16; Collani 2007, p. 239. [On Bouvet see also Collani 2023. – Ed.]

26 Prémare dissociated himself from Bouvet for disagreements regarding their Figurist theories (Lundbæk 1991, pp. 114–115).

27 Wei 2019b, p. 9.

28 Lundbæk 1991, p. 64.

29 Schmidt-Biggemann 2004, p. 445.

30 Collani 2007, pp. 239–240; Wei 2019a, p. 74. Both Bouvet and Prémare examined the Chinese characters and affirmed that in their structure there were encrypted messages, for instance, about the Flood, Jesus, and the Trinity. Chuan 船 would be analysed according to its elements ba 八 (eight), kou 口, meaning “person,” and zhou 舟 for “boat” as a description of Noah’s ark. According to Genesis, Noah, his three sons, and their four wives were the only humans that survived the cataclysm: eight persons in a boat. The character lai 來 (to come), comprised of mu 木 (tree, wood) as the image of the Great Man (da 大) on the cross, and renren 人人 would be the sinners in general or the two thieves that were crucified to the right and to the left of Jesus (Prémare 1878, p. 360; Lundbæk 1991, pp. 128–130). Prémare believed that the Chinese characters had a divine origin and affirmed direct divine revelation in the case of the “Yellow River map” (Hetu 河圖) in the appendices to the Yijing (Pan Feng-Chuan 2017b, p. 110).

31 Mungello 1977, p. 47. Marsilio Ficini (1433–1499), also in the philosophia perennis tradition, listed as great theologians: Zoroaster, Mercurius Trismegistos, Orpheus, Aglaophamus, and Plato, who, in this order, transmitted Moses’ esoteric wisdom. The tradition of prisca theologia/philosophia perennis is eminently syncretic (Schmidt-Biggemann 2004, pp. 33, 280).

32 Lundbæk 1991, p. 16; Rowbotham 1956, pp. 474, 476.

33 Collani 2007, p. 242; Prémare 1878, p. 426.

34 Bouvet 1701, p. 16.

35 Prémare 1878, p. 27; Lundbæk 1991, p. 136; Collani 2015, p. 47. To the Enochic tradition, the patriarch had visions concerning fallen angels, the Last Judgment, and the coming of a Son of God, themes that Bouvet thought to have found in the Yijing, a text which some of the Figurists regarded as “a fragment of the Apocalypse of Enoch” (Wei 2019a, p. 10). In the Book of Jubilees, Enoch, as Fuxi, is told to be the first man “who learnt writing and knowledge and wisdom and who wrote down the signs of heaven according to the order of their months in a book.” In: http://wesley.nnu.edu/sermons-essays-books/noncanonical-literature/noncanonical-literature-ot-pseudepigrapha/the-book-of-jubilees/ (accessed 12 Jan. 2024). Bouvet did read fragments of the Enochic texts through Kircher, and, in Bouvet’s days, Pierre-Vincent du Tartre, an adversary of the French priest, saw the connection when he called the Figurist method the “Cabala of the Enochists” (Collani 2007, pp. 242, 258). The Deluge, which Bouvet thought to be recorded in the Chinese texts, can be associated with the Enochic tradition (Cabral 2014, p. 12).

36 Bouvet 1701, p. 24.

37 Wei 2019a, p. 7.

38 In the book of Revelation, chapter 12.

39 Prémare 1878, pp. 344, 346. The lin 麟, a “Chinese Unicorn,” was also understood by Bouvet as a figure of Jesus Christ (Wei 2019a, p. 57; HCC 1, p. 674). Prémare thought that the Lamb (yang 羊), the Dragon (long 龍), the lin, the Phoenix (feng 鳳), and the Tortoise (gui 龜) are all symbols of Christ (Prémare 1878, pp. 312, 342, 351, 360, 367).

40 Mungello 2013, p. 26; Li Tiangang 2007, p. 311.

41 Mori 2020, p. 188.

42 The French figurists were relatively more open to Daoist sources than the first missionaries, for instance (Perkins 2004, pp. 9–13; Mori 2020, p. 195; Rowbotham 1956, p. 479).

43 Perkins 2004, p. 10.

44 Lundbæk 1991, pp. 15, 29; Collani 2007, p. 245.

45 Wei 2019a, p. 80.

46 Lundbæk 1991, pp. 124–126; Collani 2007, p. 247. Prémare defended himself by stating the use the Fathers of the Church made of pagan literature, of Pythagoras and Plato, for instance. But even both philosophers cannot be compared to the “Chinese monuments,” i.e., the Chinese Classics. Here one must see that Jesus is the hope of all peoples, not only the Jews (Prémare 1878, pp. 51–53).

47 Regarding the Sage Kings, Prémare thought that Yao 堯 was a figure of God, Shun 舜 a figure of Christ as Son of God, and Yu 禹 a figure of Christ as Son of Man. Tang 湯, Wen 文, and Wu 武 also represented Jesus (Prémare 1878, pp. 170, 458, 477).

48 The Kangxi emperor was at first a protector of the Catholic Mission and issued an edict of tolerance in 1692. He was later tired of the endless debates among the religious orders in the Church and finally decided to suspend proselytism. In 1724 the Yongzheng emperor banned Christianity from the Chinese empire (Mungello 2019, p. 62; Li Tiangang 2019, p. 62).

49 Prémare 1878; Lundbæk 1991, p. 186.

50 Guerra 1984, p. 769.

51 Guerra 1986, p. 98.

52 Guerra suggestively uses the term “modernist” when criticizing the Neo-Confucian Zhu Xi, who was responsible for the “great modernist heresy” of Neo-Confucianism, which Guerra thought to be a “spiritual suicide” (Guerra 1984, pp. 673–674).

53 Pius XII 1950, paragraph 38.

54 Pfister 2015, pp. 30–31.

55 Guerra 1984, pp. 50–51.

56 The original: “Essa interpretação teísta se fundamenta no conceito teológico da revelação primitiva e procura articular a cronologia chinesa antiga com a cronologia bíblica vetero-testamentária, resultando em algumas leituras figuristas” (Menezes 2013, p. 14).

57 “Primitive revelation,” the assumption that God spoke to the ancestors of humanity in the beginning. Such primitive revelation, some would argue, is more or less present in different cultures, always corrupted over time (Sproviero 1998, p. 69). I use this particular expression here, as Menezes did before, and emphasize the distinction between Guerra’s theology and Bouvet’s. In short, the “primitive revelation” I talk about is not associated with all the theological apparatus of prisca theologia, or philosophia perennis (Kabbalah, Hermeticism, Enochic texts, Neoplatonism). The first Jesuits in China found traces of such revelation in the Wujing (Collani 2015, p. 39).

58 Guerra 1979, p. 74. This sentence would be an indirect quotation from St. Augustine, through a speech by Paul VI. Although the quotation does come from Augustine’s Contra Faustum, it was not the saint’s words, but his opponent’s, the Manichean Faustus (Schaff 2007, p. 239; Paul VI 1964). The source of Faustus’ words is St. Paul (Titus 1:12).

59 Guerra 1980, p. 71; 1984, p. 89; 1988a, p. 278.

60 Guerra 1983d, p. 11; 1981b, p. 31.

61 The original: “Cristo é o Único Mestre, como Ele próprio disse. É Ele que alumia todo homem que vem ao mundo (Jo. 1,19). E todos os bons mestres são inspirados por Ele. Mas pelo facto de Deus ter feito de Israel o Seu Povo Escolhido, nem por isso abandonou os mais povos. Todos os povos estão destinados finalmente ao Reino de Deus, e a Providência nunca deixa de os encaminhar a ele, enviado-lhes oportunamente homens que lhes governem e ensinem. É esta uma constante da história, que o próprio Cancioneiro sublina. ‘Também os pagãos têm os seus profetas,’ dirá mais tarde Sto. Agostinho, citado por Paulo VI. Note-se, a propósito, quer até Cristo disse, em presença da fé do centurião: Não encontrei tanta fé em Israel (Mt. 8,10). E no caso da Cananeia: Ó mulher, que grande é a tua fé!” (Guerra 1979, p. 74).

62 As Bruxo (2004) and Pfister (2015) emphasized, Guerra’s Sinology was influenced by the new attitude the Church adopted regarding non-Christian cultures after the Second Vatican Council.

63 Guerra 1983a, p. 93.

64 Guerra 1983a, pp. 145, 339, 835.

65 Guerra 1983a, p. 59.

66 The title of the present poem is translated by Guerra as “A Origem do Povo,” or “The Origin of the People” (Guerra 1979, p. 781).

67 Guerra, in his Book of Songs, gave an alternative translation in English for the fourth to the seventh verse of this stanza: “With a right intention [en] she made the offerings [dzes] / Not to be without a child / By the efficient power [mhu] power [min] of God she was rewarded [qhem] / Being blessed [caey] with her desire [tji]” (Guerra 1986, p. 437).

68 The “people” in the first verse should be understood as the Zhou people, who were the founders of the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BC).

69 Jiang Yuan 姜嫄, according to this tradition, gave birth to Hou Ji 后稷, a patriarch of the Zhou people. Jiang Yuan is, therefore, a matriarch honored in the “Sheng min,” as well as in the poem “Bi gong” 閟宮, in Guerra’s translation, “The Palace of Solitude” (Guerra 1979, p. 963). Legge’s rendering (Legge 1871b, pp. 620–621): “Highly distinguished was Jiang Yuan, / Of virtue undeflected. / God regarded her with favour; / And without injury or hurt, / Immediately, when her months were fulfilled, / She gave birth to Hou-ji.”

70 It is not clear why Guerra would choose to use the word “Heaven” (tian 天, “Theen,” according to Guerra’s romanization system) to “translate” the character di 帝 (“Tey,” in Alphabetic Chinese), which means “God” or “monarch.”

71 Lundbæk 1991, p. 134.

72 For Hannah’s account, 1 Sam. 1. The matriarchs of the Hebrew people were frequently barren (Gen. 18; 25:21; 30).

73 In the present poem, the eighth stanza, fourth verse: 其香始升、上帝居歆. Legge: “God, well pleased, smells the sweet savour” (Legge 1871b, p. 472). Guerra: “Que o Senhor do Céu aceita” (accepted by the Lord of Heaven) (Guerra 1979, p. 787). The parallel text in the Bible is Gen. 8:21–22.

74 According to Nicolas Standaert, one could divide the commentaries into three traditions of interpretation of the “Sheng min” and Hou Ji’s conception and birth: the first, a purely miraculous birth, as in Zheng Xuan 鄭玄 and Zhu Xi; the second, both miraculous (sterility healed by God) and with human intervention through sexual intercourse (Gao Xin and Jiang Yuan), as in Kong Yingda 孔穎達; third, a purely human event, without any miracle, as in Ouyang Xiu 歐陽修 (Standaert 2016, p. 186).

75 此诗事异文奇，未免骇人听闻 (Fang Yurun 1986, p. 504).

76 In the first line of the third stanza: “He was placed in a narrow lane” (Legge 1871b, p. 468). Guerra’s rendering: “Exposto na quelha estreita” (exposed in the narrow lane) (Guerra 1979, p. 783).

77 炎帝之后有女名嫄当尧之时为高辛氏之世妃 … 姜嫄之生后稷，如何乎？乃禋祀上帝於郊禖，以祓除其无子之疾，而得其福也 (Li Xueqin 1999, p. 1055).

78 Legge 2011, p. 467.

79 Wang Xiumei 2015, p. 623.

80 Wen Yiduo 2005, p. 65; Zhou Zhenfu 2013, p. 424.

81 Feng Zheng 2006, p. 77.

82 Cheng – Jiang 2017, pp. 605–607.

83 Guerra 1986, p. 438.

84 Standaert 2016, pp. 187, 202.

85 又况诗中溯源，但题其母，不及其父，则是无父而生也明矣。姜嫄为高辛氏世妃或曰元妃，都无定解，然皆后日事，若此时，则尚未有夫也，故足怪 (Fang Yurun 1986, p. 505).

86 Hou Ji 后稷 (Lord Millet) is his official title as minister of agriculture in the days of Yao and Shun. The hero’s name is Qi 棄 (Abandoned), his family name is Ji 姬, the name of the imperial family of the Zhou dynasty (Cheng – Jiang 2017, p. 607).

87 是知后稷之生必因无名而见弃 (Fang Yurun 1986, p. 505).

88 Guerra 1986, p. 438.

89 Prémare 1878, pp. 437–438; Lundbæk 1991, p. 135.

90 See footnote 86.

91 Prémare quotes the Psalms (20:7): “All they that see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head” (King James Bible), Prémare 1878, p. 437.

92 In his book (Prémare 1878, p. 438), Prémare gave his translation of six of the lines of the “Sheng min”: “A ce commencement où le peuple est né, Kiang-yuen a été la mère commune. Comment cela a-t’il eu lieu? Elle offrait de tout son cœur ses vœux et ses sacrifices, très triste, parce qu’aucun fils ne lui naissait. Elle pensait profondément en elle à la paix qu’apporterait le Seigneur, quand elle fut subitement exaucée.” Prémare, just like Guerra, thought absurd the traditional interpretation of the sixth verse of the “Sheng min” according to which Jiang Yuan stepped on God’s footprint (Prémare 1878 p. 439). Instead, Jiang Yuan meditated profoundly on the peace that God brings and had her wish fulfilled. Also, Prémare, in a suggestive translation of the “Bi gong” poem in the Shijing (see footnote 69), called Jiang Yuan immaculée (Prémare 1878, p. 439).

93 HCC 1, p. 674; 2016, pp. 232, 235. Still in the Shijing, Bouvet and Prémare thought that the “Xuan niao” 玄鳥, also a song about a miraculous birth according to some commentaries, had figurist implications (Standaert 2016, pp. 239, 262). Regarding the “Xuan niao,” Guerra made no associations with Christian doctrine or its sacred texts (Guerra 1979, p. 1245).

94 In Guerra’s translation, O Autêntico! (The Authentic) (Guerra 1979, p. 217).

95 Cheng – Jiang 2017, p. 79.

96 Guerra 1979, pp. 106–107, 1020.

97 Legge 1871a, p. 62; Cheng – Jiang 2017, p. 81.

98 Guerra 1986, p. 175.

99 Prémare 1878, pp. 190–191. Prémare offered a figurist interpretation for other poems in the Shijing, for instance, “Tian zuo” 天作, “Shiyue zhi jiao” 十月之交, “Zhan yang” 瞻卬, “Wo xing qi ye” 我行其野, “Tu yuan” 兔爰, and “Zheng yue” 正月 (Prémare 1878, pp. 158–163; Lackner 1991, pp. 29, 33). Guerra’s translation and commentaries (1979, pp. 563, 580, 589, 887, 902, 1108, 1112, 1113, 1210, 1219) for the mentioned poems are much like Legge’s. We see no figurism in them.

100 “Harmonization of the Penalties” (Harmonização das Penas), according to Guerra’s translation (Guerra 1980, p. 593). Legge’s version: “The Prince of Leu upon Punishments” (italics in the original). There is no firm evidence, said Guerra, in favor of the identification of the character lü 呂 as a Marquis. Guerra argues that lü, which can also mean “musical notes” (in his dictionary, p. 432), can be understood in the context as the “harmonization,” the “tuning,” or the “softening” of the punishments (Guerra 1980, p. 901).

101 Legge 1865b, pp. 592–593; Guerra 1980, pp. 593–594.

102 The original: “A rebeldia do povo foi-se generalizando progressivamente. Eram per­turbações e desordens sem fim. Não havia quem fosse fiel à palavra, a julgar pelo modo como eles se viravam contra os pactos jurados. As vítimas da prepotência, em risco de perder a vida, expuseram então a sua inocência ao Céu. Deus viu que aquela gente não tinha virtude nenhuma nem o seu comportamento Lhe era agradável. O cheiro que esse comportamento exalava, era nauseabundo. O Augusto Senhor apiedou-Se dos inocentes em perigo de perecer, e castigou os opressores com severidade, pondo cobro a esse povo indócil, de forma que não tivessem mais descendência no mundo” (Guerra 1980, pp. 593–594).

103 Chi You is the chief of the Miao 苗 tribe (Wang – Wang 2012, p. 319), a figure Legge considered to be mythological, who would be the “first to produce disorder.” Legge understood that the text suggests the belief in a primordial “period of innocence” that Chi You came to upset. Many figures were proposed as the emperor in question. According to Legge, the monarch must be Shun (Legge 1865b, p. 593). Guerra disagreed with “Chi You” being an ancient figure. Instead, the expression should be understood as the “general concupiscence of men.” The character 蚩 (chi, in Guerra’s transliteration “Tjhe”), would also mean “sexual immorality” (Guerra 1980, p. 903). According to Guerra’s dictionary, the character means “obscene” (Guerra 1981a, p. 656).

104 Guerra 1980, p. 904.

105 Wang – Wang 2012, p. 320.

106 Guerra 1980 p. 905. Both definitions for the character miao 苗 can be found in Guerra`s dictionary (Guerra 1981, p. 455). Prémare sees here a clear reference to the corruption of the human heart (Prémare 1878, p. 164).

107 Legge 1865b, p. 593. Italics in the original.

108 The original: “Depois mandou recomeçar a multiplicação dos homens. A terra excomungada voltou às graças do Céu; e já não houve cataclismos. Os chefes do povo, ao tratarem os súbditos, abertamente se acomodavam às boas normas. As viúvas e órfãos não ficavam encobertos” (Guerra 1980, p. 595).

109 According to a certain tradition of interpretation of the “Lü xing,” the people started to invoke improperly the spirits who would descend from heaven and bring confusion and disasters. Later Zhong and Li “ended the intercourse between Heaven and Earth” (絕地天通). The Guoyu 國語 affirmed such interpretation (Legge 1865b, p. 594). Wang Shishun and Wang Cuiye understand that humans and gods were mixed, which would damage the deities’ dignity (Wang – Wang 2012, p. 320). Guerra, against the tradition, translates 絕地天通 as “the Earth unfrocked came back to Heaven’s grace.”

110 The characters 命 (mãy), 重 (dyoq), and 黎 (lej) can be found in Guerra’s dictionary, Guerra 1981a, pp. 444, 255, and 408, respectively.

111 The original: “Mais uma vez, este documento parece a versão chinesa, assaz fiel, dos acontecimentos narrados na Bíblia. E não era de esperar que um povo tão antigo como o Chinês, guardasse reminiscências dessa corrupção dos homens primitivos, que acarretou o castigo do Dilúvio?” (Guerra 1980, p. 905).

112 Guerra 1980, p. 101. The “Lü xing” makes no mention of a “flood” of any kind. Guerra, one might wonder, possibly had also the “Yi ji” 益稷 in mind when claiming that the Chinese registered reminiscences of the specific Biblical event of the Deluge. But in his commentaries to the “Yi ji,” Guerra makes no reference to Genesis. The “Yi ji” text, according to Legge’s rendering: “'The inundating waters seemed to assail the heavens, and in their vast extent embraced the hills and overtopped the great mounds, so that the people were bewildered and overwhelmed” (Legge 1865a, p. 77).

113 Guerra 1988b, p. 30.

114 There is still another association that can be made between Genesis and the “Lü xing”: in both cases (the Deluge and the punishment of the Miao people), the Deity intervened to punish the people for their immorality. In the King James Version, “And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart” (Gen. 6:5–6). Italics in the original.

115 Prémare 1878, p. 146.

116 Menezes 2013, pp. 217–222; Guerra 1987a, p. 16. Mario Bruno Sproviero, who would publish his Portuguese translation of the Daodejing in 1996, does not agree with Guerra’s statement that the Trinity is referred to in Chapter 42 and does not mention Guerra’s Daodejing in his work.

117 Guerra 1987a, p. 28.

118 Collani 2021, p. 209; Guerra 1987a, p. 78.

119 Guerra 1987a, p. 34.

120 Legge 1891, p. 85.

121 The original: “De Daow {a Luz} nasceu o seu Igual. Com este ficaram dois. Os dois deram origem ao Terceiro. E os TRÊS criaram todas as coisas” (Guerra 1987a, p. 247).

122 The original: “Tao deu à luz um filho igual a Si. Ficaram assim Dois iguais: Pai e Filho. Os DOIS, relacionados entre si, deram origem ao TERCEIRO {a quem chamamos o AMOR e o ESPÍRITO SANTO}, o qual foi o Criador de todas as coisas” (Guerra 1987a, p. 247).

123 Pan Feng-Chuan 2017a, pp. 257, 268. Noël saw the Trinity in Chapters 1, 14, 4, and 42 of the Daodejing, and the Incarnation in Chapters 10, 28, 27, 15, 20, 21, and 25 (Collani 2015, p. 72). As for tradition Chinese interpretations, the Heshang gong 河上公 commentary interprets the “two” as yin and yang (一生陰與陽也). Zhuangzi 莊子 (369–286 BC) and Wang Bi 王弼 (226–249) see the “one” or “unity” coming from wu 無 (emptiness, nonbeing, immanifest, etc.), which is the Dao. The “two” for Wang Bi would be “emptiness and existence” (Sinedino 2016, pp. xlv, 327–328; Laozi Daodejing zhu 老子道德经注, p. 120).

124 Guerra 1986, pp. 248–249.

125 Lackner 1991, pp. 42–43; Pan Feng-Chuan 2017a, p. 258. Prémare’s Vestigia, pp. 41 and 42, has: “Divinae processiones a primâ persona decens initium. 1a persona se ipsum insums generat 2a. 1a et 2a amantes se mutuo spirant tertiam. Tres persona omnia ex nihilo producerum.” (Pan Feng-Chuan 2017a, p. 259).

126 Wei 2019a, pp. 38–39.

127 HCC 1, p. 673.

128 Prémare 1878, pp. 87–98.

129 Pan Feng-Chuan 2017a, p. 267; Wei 2019a, p. 42. Li Rong wrote (Sophie Ling-chia Wei’s translation): “One is not One alone; it is One because of Three. Three is not Three alone; Three comes from One. From One to Three, so Three is One Three. From Three to One, so One is Three One. When One is Three One, One is no longer One; when Three is One Three, Three is no longer Three. When Three is not Three, then there is no Three; when One is not One, then there is no One. When there are no One or Three, words may be forsaken. If one sticks to One or Three, (it) will topple this profound and coherent religion (Daoism).” Wei 2019a, p. 41.

130 Guerra 1987a, pp. 28–35. About the Jews in China, Guerra mentions the following texts: Whence and Whither, by Denis S. Leventhal of the Sino-Judaic Studies of Hong Kong, 1985; Jews in Old China: Some Western Views, by Hyman Kublin, 1971; Essai sur les Juifs de la Chine et sur l’influence qu’ils ont eue sur la littérature de ce vaste Empire, avant l’ère chrétienne, by Antoine Matthieu Sionnet, 1837; China’s First Missionaries: Ancient Israelites, by Thomas Torrance, 1937; Israel à Shanghai: les communautés juives, by Joseph Dehergne, 1948 (Dehergne was Guerra’s friend and historian of the Jesuits in China).

131 “O assombroso é que tenha um chinês daqueles recuados tempos, ensinado e escrito coisas tão evangélicas! Claro que Deus é Pai de todos os povos, e distribui os Seus dons como Lhe apraz: onde, quando e a quem Ele bem quer” (Guerra 1987a, p. 19). Compare this with the formulation by St. Irenaeus. The Son, “being present with His own handiwork from the beginning, reveals the Father to all; to whom He wills, and when He wills, and as the Father wills” (Roberts – Donaldson – Coxe 1885, p. 469). This text from St. Irenaeus was quoted in the Ad Gentes decree, specifically in the second footnote of the first chapter. Guerra acknowledged being inspired by the decree (Guerra 1988c, p. 93).

132 Bouvet, for instance, related the Daodejing to the Kabbalistic notion of Ein Sof. The Dao, just like the taiji, would be Deus absconditus (Collani 2021, p. 208).

133 Guerra 1979, p. 19; 1980, p. 39; 1987a, p. 15.

134 Prémare 1878, p. 35; Xiao Qinghe 2016, p. 160.

135 Guerra 1984, pp. 678–679; Xiao Qinghe 2016, p. 164. One might list other interesting similarities between Guerra and Prémare, even if less relevant to the present work: the criticism against Zhu Xi for his affirmation of the identity between Heaven (tian 天) and the principle (li 理) (Guerra 1983a, pp. 64–65; Xiao Qinghe 2016, p. 160); both favored Wang Yangming against Zhu Xi regarding the Daxue (Guerra 1988b, p. 485; Lundbæk 1991, p. 34); both had problems in pairing Heaven and Earth (tiandi 天地), as Heaven was understood by them to be God transcendent, and they also defended the difference in gradation of the different religious ceremonies performed by the Chinese (Guerra 1988a, pp. 271–272; Xiao Qinghe 2016, p. 166).

136 Guerra affirmed the authenticity and the authority of the Wujing and Sishu as the orthodox Confucian texts, truly ancient, and if not authored, then at least edited by Confucius (Guerra, 1979, p. 68), and he added to his translations sections that are considered by some as forgeries (Pfister 2015, p. 38).

137 Lundbæk 1991, p. 128; Lackner 1991, pp. 34–35. Nevertheless, he suggested that the Chinese characters reveal the original Adamic language (Guerra 1986, p. 96). And the character kan 衎 is explained in Guerra’s dictionary as a “quinta de regalo,” a kind of “garden of pleasures.” Guerra describes the character as a fence made of wood that blocks an entrance. It might be a reference to the Garden of Eden (Guerra 1980, pp. 31, 350). I could not find a similar explanation for the character kan in the works by the two French Jesuits, but, naturally, the topic of an original state of innocence and a garden is present (Prémare 1878, pp. 127, 134).

138 Guerra 1970a, p. 16. “Kvao Tjyntoq” (Ge Zhendong 戈振東) is Guerra’s Chinese name according to his Alphabetic Chinese.

139 See footnote 5 and the introduction to this article.

140 Guerra 1980, p. 1117; 1983a, p. 32.

141 However, Guerra speculated that Shao Hao 少昊, also known as Jin Tian 金天 (“Kemtheen,” in Guerra’s Alphabetic Chinese), could be equivalent to Enoch (1980, p. 90). A denial of the inspiration of “Enochic texts” can be deduced from Guerra’s introduction to the Daodejing (Guerra 1987a, p. 29). No divinely inspired Scripture existed in the days of the patriarchs.

142 For problems associated with prisca theologia, considering a contemporary perspective, see Perkins 2004, pp. 7–8. I could add the developments made in the fields of textual criticism and Bible studies since the days of Bouvet, which undermine some of the assumptions regarding the time of composition and the identity of the Biblical authors.

143 Guerra’s belief in primitive revelation can be seen in his theories regarding the origin of languages, which have not been, as far as I know, the object of academic research to this day.

144 Guerra, by the end of his life, said in letters to Paulo Franchetti that he was “quite convinced” that the author of the Daodejing was a man named Mah-Yonq, from the first century AD, who had converted to Christianity (Franchetti 2021, p. 1). I could not identify this remarkable belief in Guerra’s commentaries. One must conclude that Guerra was not aware of the silk manuscript of the Daodejing which dates from before the Christian era and was unearthed in Mawangdui in the 1970s.

145 Guerra 1984, p. 18; Bruxo 2004, p. 132; Pfister 2020, p. 715.

146 Guerra 1983a, p. 24; 1983b, pp. 23–25; 1983c, p. 27.

147 Lundbæk 1991, p. 187.

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Pedro Regis Cabral

Pedro Regis Cabral (Gao Peide 高培德) is a Ph.D. candidate at the Philosophy and Religious Studies Department of the University of Macau, China. His recent publications are: “Rito e Reforma: breve comparação entre as tradições bíblicas e o pensamento confuciano,” Zi yue 子曰 1 (2020), pp. 42–54; “Crítica ao secularismo e resgate da religião chinesa original em Jiang Qing (蒋庆),” Estudos da Ásia (2019), pp. 173–191.