One of the questions about natural phenomena asked in the Hydromethods of the Great West(Taixi shuifa泰西水法;1612)(hereafter TXSF),composed by the Italian Jesuit Sabatino de Ursis with the support of the Chinese offi...One of the questions about natural phenomena asked in the Hydromethods of the Great West(Taixi shuifa泰西水法;1612)(hereafter TXSF),composed by the Italian Jesuit Sabatino de Ursis with the support of the Chinese official Xu Guangqi徐光啟,concerns the causes of sea tides.The idiosyncratic answer given in the TXSF serves as an example for the Jesuit missionaries,strategically motivated approach to the transfer of knowledge through the translation of Western scientific thought into Chinese.From a chronological overview of the attempts made both in the East and in the West to theoretically conceptualize the causes of the cyclical occurrence of ebb and flow,the comparison reveals that despite being based on totally different cosmologies,the related insights were virtually on a par.The aim to nevertheless convince the audience of the TXSF of the superiority of Western sciences resulted in a particular rhetoric and a division of tasks in the composition of the tides paragraph.In order to verify the success of this joint effort of de Ursis and Xu Guangqi,a change of perspective from the transmitter to the receiver side is necessary.Thus,the paper also explores the work's reception in later Chinese works dealing with this topic.展开更多
基金the German Research Foundation for the years 2018 to 2021 and is carried out at the Department of Chinese Studies at Eberhard Karls University of Tubingen under the direction of Prof.Dr.Hans Ulrich Vogel.I thank Prof.Vogel as my supervisor for his dedicated support,and my project colleague Dr.Cao Jin曹晋for her persistent encouragement and great cooperation。
文摘One of the questions about natural phenomena asked in the Hydromethods of the Great West(Taixi shuifa泰西水法;1612)(hereafter TXSF),composed by the Italian Jesuit Sabatino de Ursis with the support of the Chinese official Xu Guangqi徐光啟,concerns the causes of sea tides.The idiosyncratic answer given in the TXSF serves as an example for the Jesuit missionaries,strategically motivated approach to the transfer of knowledge through the translation of Western scientific thought into Chinese.From a chronological overview of the attempts made both in the East and in the West to theoretically conceptualize the causes of the cyclical occurrence of ebb and flow,the comparison reveals that despite being based on totally different cosmologies,the related insights were virtually on a par.The aim to nevertheless convince the audience of the TXSF of the superiority of Western sciences resulted in a particular rhetoric and a division of tasks in the composition of the tides paragraph.In order to verify the success of this joint effort of de Ursis and Xu Guangqi,a change of perspective from the transmitter to the receiver side is necessary.Thus,the paper also explores the work's reception in later Chinese works dealing with this topic.
