Jesuit Persecution

1665 - Jesuit Persecution - Beijing

Adam Schall (1592-1666), dedicated missionary and brilliant scientist.

Johann Adam Schall von Bell, best known simply as Adam Schall, was a Jesuit priest whom in many ways took up the mantle left behind by Matteo Ricci. Arriving in China in 1619 at the age of just 28, Schall laboured in Xi’an, the former capital of China. His skills in geography, map-making, mathematics and astronomy soon caught the attention of the Chinese leaders. In 1630 he relocated to Beijing, where he was to remain for the rest of his life. Schall was a brilliant man, yet he considered his knowledge merely a tool by which God could use him to reach many with the gospel. He was invited to lead the Institute of Astronomy, established after the Chinese conceded the foreigners’ knowledge of the stars was superior to their own.

Trouble for the Jesuits started in 1664 when two missionary-priests, de Magalhães and Buglio, wrote an article entitled, “The Origin and Propagation of the Divine Law.” It contained the following provocative lines, “Christianity is the most ancient and most perfect of all religions. It is to be found inscribed in the hearts of men. It was proclaimed to the first human beings.”[I] The article went on to explain that the first Chinese Emperor was descended from Adam and came to China from the land of the Jews. One historian notes, “As if to complete their work of controversy as tactlessly as possible, they then affirm that: ‘Chinese learning and wisdom is only a pale reflection of Christian doctrine’.”[II] The article achieved nothing except to antagonize every Chinese who read it. One official, Yang Guangxian, responded in the strongest possible way, rebuking the two foreigners and giving the opinion that Jesus Christ was only a revolutionary, rightly executed for his insurgency. Adam Schall was grieved by these developments, as he had often warned missionaries not to degrade Chinese history or culture.

On April 20, 1664, Schall suffered a stroke and was barely able to move or speak. On September 15th of that year, Yang Guangxian presented a petition to the Board of Rites, “charging Schall and his companions with treachery, preaching an abominable religion and teaching false astronomical methods.”[III] Schall was arrested, along with Ferdinand Verbiest, the two antagonists de Magalhães and Buglio, and a number of Chinese Christians associated with the Institute of Astronomy. The men were brought before a court in Beijing. Schall’s condition had become pathetic. A mat was positioned on the floor for him to lie on, bound with chains. After a lengthy trial the prisoners were handed over to the Minister of Justice for sentencing on January 16, 1665. The decision shocked the devout men. It read:

“Unless the supreme court of justice reduces the sentence, Adam Schall, the chief of the traitors, is to be put to death by strangulation; Fathers Verbiest, Buglio and de Magalhães, and Li Tsu-pe [Li Zubai] and other Christian officials of the Institute of Astronomy are to receive one hundred strokes of the cane and then to be exiled.”[IV]

On February 4th three judges ratified the death sentence that had been given to Schall, only they changed the method from strangulation to “the most barbarous of all deaths known to Chinese law, by which the victim was literally but slowly cut to pieces with a sharp sword while each wound was cauterised with a red hot iron to prevent too quick a death through loss of blood.”[V]

For the next two months Schall contemplated the gruesome death he was faced with, when a series of remarkable events occurred in Beijing that spared his life. On April 13th a comet appeared in the sky. Then on April 16th at 11 o’clock in the morning, at the exact time the emperor was to have signed Schall’s death warrant, a large earthquake struck the city. The emperor ran out of his palace in terror. Aftershocks continued for the next two days, while the sun was obscured from the great amount of dust that had been thrown into the atmosphere by the earthquake. As a result,

“The scared authorities at once took certain steps; on April 19, an amnesty was granted which included Ferdinand Verbiest, Buglio, de Magalhães and one of the Chinese Christian officials. Four days later, the death sentence on Adam Schall was commuted; but he remained in chains, until, so it seemed, nature took a hand again. On April 29 fire raged in the imperial palace; some forty rooms were burnt out and there were people who claimed they had seen a fireball descend on the building. All Beijing was now terrified; the God of the Christians is himself upholding the cause of his servants, was the cry, and the voices could not be calmed.”[VI]

Adam Schall was released and allowed to return to his home, but five Chinese Christians from the Institute of Astronomy were beheaded, and thirty missionaries who had taken up residence in Beijing were banished to southern China. Only Verbiest and four other missionaries were permitted to remain outside the capital.

One of the martyrs was Li Zubai—the leading Chinese astronomer of his generation. Baptized in 1622, he worked with Adam Schall at the Institute of Astronomy. In 1663 Li published a book, Tianxue Chuan’gai that told of God’s creation and how a branch of the human race had migrated to China after the Flood.[VII] Li Zubai was executed along with four Chinese Christian coworkers, namely Song Hecheng, Song Fa, Zhu Guangxian, and Liu Youtai. In another incident, the 51-year-old Dominican missionary Domingo Coronado died in prison in Beijing on May 9, 1665.

The Kangxi Emperor, who ruled China for 61 years from 1661 to 1722.

Finally on August 15, 1665, Adam Schall died at the age of 74, having given 47 years of his life to the Lord’s service in China. Some say the broken heart Schall suffered after the murders of his five Chinese friends was the main cause of his death, his broken body being just a contributing factor. Ferdinand Verbiest wrote the following obituary in honour of his beloved mentor Adam Schall:

“After forty years of work in the Lord’s vineyard, this faithful servant—thus did providence permit—was stripped of everything which gives satisfaction to human life and became the victim of intense suffering. This great apostle, who himself could not speak of the passion of our Saviour without tears, was found worthy to be shaped, through the instrumentality of his enemies, into a likeness of our crucified Lord.”[VIII]

Although technically Adam Schall did not die directly from persecution his life was one of a living martyr for Christ. The intended widespread persecution of Jesuits was abandoned due to the supernatural intervention of God, and the number of martyrs was confined to the five Chinese men who had laboured as co-workers with Schall at the Institute of Astronomy in Beijing.

The chief government persecutor, Yang Guangxian, was promoted due to his role in this incident. Five years later, in 1670, Emperor Kangxi acquitted Schall and Li Zhubai (although both men were already dead) and set free the missionaries that had been arrested. Yang Guangxian was dismissed from office for misleading the government, and died while travelling back to his hometown.