The Conflict between Christianity and Chinese traditional culture
Chinese culture is all-inclusive, nourished by many foreign cultures. However,
Christianity has never seeped into Chinese mainstream culture since Tang Dynasty
when it was introduced into China for the first time. As a foreign religion, Christianity
varies distinctly from Chinese traditional culture, and undoubtedly conflicts with
Chinese essential beliefs which consist of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism.
From the Cost of Being a Disciple, it’s obvious to discover their differences.
Firstly, there is a big difference between ethics lurking in Christianity culture
and that in Chinese culture. Just as LinYutang wrote in My Country and My People,
Chinese traditional culture is humanist ethics, that is, men-centered, while Christianity
is God-centered ethnics.
Since the ancient times, Chinese society has been organized by the family system.
It is so well-defined and organized that family ethics has been deeply penetrated into
Chinese people’s spirit and soul. Every Chinese people were taught to be filial to his
parents, care about his brothers or sisters, and be respectful and friendly to his
relatives at his young age. Every Chinese child has memorized these sentences like
“the body, the hair and the skin are received from parents and don’t hurt them without
authorization.” Even, Chinese devote to his family instead of their state. They are
willing to die for families, not for the state.
A conversation between MengZi, a Chinese saint, and his students occurred to
me. MengZi’s students asked him that if Shun, an emperor, found his father
committed a crime, what he should do. MenZi answered that Shun should abandon
the throne and carry his father to the seaside to escape from punishment. Law is not as
important as family. Similarity, Christianity is not comparable with the family.
So, it’s impossible for a man to forget where his lineage belonged and leave his
family. To Chinese people, it’s hardly imagined that God asks disciples to love God
more than his father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters and his own life. It’s
equally amazing that these people can follow Jesus and proclaim the kingdom of God,
one of whom abandoning his father in the field, another never saying good-bye to his
relatives and one even without burying his dead father. These people are unfilial, and
should be punished by morality.
Another reason making Chinese people can’t accept Christianity is ancestor
worship, which derived from family ethnics and system. Thousands of Chinese visit
ancestors’ cemeteries and burn fake money and paper clothes every year to
commemorate the ancestors on the Tomb-sweeping Day and July 15th, known as
Chinese Halloween. However, Christians are only allowed to believe in God and
forbidden to all sacrificial practices. In ten commandments, it read “ Thou shalt have
no other gods before me; Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any
likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or
that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven
image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth
beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to
them,nor serve them.” Such a long-time and complete family system and ingrained
ancestor worship has been an enormous obstruction when Christianity tried to roll into
Chinese culture.
Thirdly, nothing, including the afterlife and immortality, is striking Chinese
people than living an earthly life. They prefer a cozy life to carry the cross. LinYutang
once compared Chinese people as a pig, and Westerners as a dog. What the pig wants
is that dog leaves him alone. Chinese people do not have as much ambitious and
energy as Westerners do. They are not willing to endure misery, humiliation and
torment for a region, for society or for immortality. They know well that they have
only one life and one chance to do all things they want to. If that belief in Christ
means a matter of life and death, it must be a stumbling block for Chinese people to
worship the Christianity. Just like when I saw the film the Da Vinci Code, I was
frightened by Silas, a villain, who chases the hero in order to keep the indigo secret of
Catholicism and he lashes himself in front of God to redemption every time when he
perpetrates, I can’t believe there exists such a bloody, horrible, and afflictive religion
in the world.
Fourthly, that people are born sin and Jesus was crucified to absolve people from
sins totally contradict Chinese mainstream concept of people are innate good. As an
old Chinese saying goes, people are inherently good. Everyone can become a saint in
Chinese culture. Whether a man is noble or whether he should be rewarded is decided
by his characters and behaviors. Virtue is always rewarded and evil is published. On
the contrary, in Westerners’ eyes, Adam and Eve ate the apple, deceived by the serpent,
and had sins. Since then, generation after generation, people, from cradle to grave,
can’t get rid of sins. Believing in God is the only way to reduce the sins and be
immortal. In the Luke, it read “he said unto them, Verily I say unto you, There is no
man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom
of God's sake, who shall not receive manifold more in this present time, and in the
world to come life ever-lasting”.
Last but not least, Chinese people and Westerners achieve various purposes from
belief. Westerners are to obtain inner freedom from serving God with undivided
loyalty. Jesus has already contributed himself in return. A disciple can’t beg God for
money, status or fame. Jesus emphasized the purity of Christians instead of the
number. He said that a Christian without the pure belief is like salt without saltiness. It
should be thrown out. Just as someone builds a tower, or a king goes to war against
another king, the first thing they should do is estimating the cost. Before one joins in
Christianity, he must understand the gains and the cost of being a disciple and
measure them. A disciple should completely believe in God, leave all they had to
follow the God and go to church every week.
Nevertheless, Chinese people are more like utilitarian and realists. On seeing a
temp, they burn incense. They don’t care which religion they have faith in. They only
count input and output and choose which region benefit them most. Chinese regard
religion as a trade with God. They are always transforming their beliefs according to
their needs. When a family is eager for a child, they will pray for SongZi Guanyin, a
God in Buddhism. When a student is going to attend the college entrance examination,
his parents will pray for Buddha or Confucius. These days, a great number of people
put forward a view that Chinese people should have faith. The reason, I think, largely,
is that Western countries are more prosperous. Chinese people believe that in the help
of religion, China will be as democratic, powerful, freed and peaceful as Westerner
countries. I don’t think how pious Chinese people will be to the God. From these two
typical attitudes, we can see the contrast between Christianity and Chinese cultures.
These days, Christianity has seemingly been more and more queried by European
countries. In order to complete my paper, I wrote to my French pen pal and asked my
oral English teacher about their opinions on the Cost of Being a Disciple. But to my
surprise, they don’t believe in Jesus. In fact, since science urged people break off the
chains of the region, people increasingly lose the faith. Nietzsche once announced the
death of God.
In modern times, the new God is interest. People have no time for anything other
than work. Cities become more and more congested; human beings feel drained,
hollow and negative about the future. People appeal to religious belief regression.
Chinese people are no exception. Westerners can turn to Christianity. But,
Chinese people, as far as I am concerned, still don’t require Christianity. Although
Confucianism and Taoism are not religions, they indeed play the role. LinYutang said
that Chinese are Confucianists when successful and Taoists when they are failures.
Confucianism teaches Chinese how to behave in the society and to deal with others;
Taoism relieves Chinese pain when they are frustrated in reality. Nature to Chinese is
what church to Christian. Chinese Poem and painters discover inspiration and insight
from the nature. Ordinary people are baptized by nature and find the true meaning of
lives.
So, how to keep peace with the soul for Chinese people in this bustle of society?
Maybe, the answer is to be close to the nature; reread the Chinese classics; retrieve the
lost Chinese tradition. May Chinese people find a place to repose their souls soon.