New Shun 1730

However, Jiang Youren knew that he was actually a "heretic" to some extent.

This strange and heretical idea was closely related to his coming to Macau, or to the changes in Dashun over the years.

The first reason that prompted him to have an unknowing heretical idea was the establishment of the Dashun Academy of Sciences.

Because his purpose in coming to China was to use scientific knowledge as the key to reopen the door for the Jesuits to return to Dashun.

Therefore, he was very concerned about the situation of the Dashun Academy of Sciences.

The "legal system" upheld by the Dashun Academy of Sciences was the Leibniz system of the Academy of Sciences, and the Russian Academy of Sciences used foreign academicians to lead their own assistants to conduct research, their own assistants to lead college students to conduct research, and science for application, and for technology and technology to benefit mankind.

Instead of studying pure science like the British group, science for science, and with a comprehensive understanding of nature as the highest goal.

Therefore, Dashun is a very standard Leibniz Academy of Sciences system.

Naturally, some of Leibniz's articles are easy to find and circulate in Dashun.

In order to understand the Dashun Academy of Sciences and then enter the Academy of Sciences, Jiang Youren certainly read a lot of books on this subject.

He naturally read articles such as Leibniz's "Theodicy" and "Monadology".

The word "theodicy" itself can also tell its meaning.

This is of course an old topic, so old that it can't be any older. Since God is omniscient, omnipotent, and all-good, why does evil exist in the world?

In this era, mechanism and atomism are popular, but they can't solve the continuity and unity of the world, nor can they explain the relationship between matter and spirit.

Leibniz proposed monadism to try to reconcile and solve this contradiction. Finally, through very rigorous reasoning, he came to a conclusion:

Why is there still evil in the world when there is an all-good, omniscient, and omnipotent God?

When creating the world, there must be countless templates.

Since it is omniscient, it is possible to design infinite possible universes. However, there can only be one universe, which is the one we live in. Therefore, the omniscient must have compared and felt that this is the best one relatively speaking.

Excluding concepts such as God, it is roughly said that at the beginning of the universe, a set of rules was designed, and then everything that followed evolved according to this rule. Including life, it is just a necessity evolved under this rule.

There may be a universe with a pi of 3, or a pi of 4 or even 5678, but the one that was finally chosen was our pi of 3.14... and this one is the best one after comparison.

As for good and evil, it is roughly said that evil is the understanding of people from a limited perspective, but from an all-seeing infinite perspective, this is actually a kind of good, or in order, and order itself is good from an all-seeing perspective.

This requires a perfect government to ensure that evil people will be punished, and good will be rewarded with good, and evil will be rewarded with evil. Punishing evil people is to give humans an opportunity to imitate the all-good savior to punish evil. From this perspective, aren’t these evils good from a broader perspective?

To some extent, it is like being a "God chess party". God is playing a big chess game. You have to use a higher, big chess perspective to look at the good and evil within the limited perspective of you mortals.

Only in this way can you draw different conclusions.

This is the first shock Jiang Youren received.

The second shock stems from the particularity of Macau.

Since the opening of East-West trade in the middle of the Ming Dynasty, Macau's special status and the trade policies of the previous dynasty have made Macau extremely prosperous for a long time.

This extreme prosperity also gave rise to a problem.

The Jesuits want to preach, and preaching requires money. How to solve the money problem in Macau? Of course, rely on trade.

As the Jesuit company during the Reformation, the Jesuits made three vows and were not allowed to do business.

But the situation was special and as a stopgap measure, the inspectors of the Eastern Diocese came to visit and allowed the Jesuits to do business moderately to raise funds.

However, when it comes to doing business, either the regulations that prohibit business should be maintained, or once the opening is opened, the opening can be stretched infinitely.

From the initial investment in the Japanese silk trade, to the Jesuits' own merchant ships, to the monopoly of the trade volume in Annan... the business grew bigger and bigger.

When Jiang Youren chatted with the local priests in Macau, he could feel the strong smell of money from the priests here.

Before he came to Macau, Europe was also on the edge of a new era, and everything was about money, which was replacing the hierarchical status of the feudal era.

This made him feel a hidden worry about the new era.

Catholicism prohibits idolatry, which is also an important reason for the Chinese ritual dispute. Ancestor worship and Confucius worship are all considered idolatry.

Jiang Youren is reflecting on idolatry. Does the idol have to be a person?

Is capital, money, wealth, and profit, which are abstract and concrete, also a kind of idol?

Isn't it a special kind of idolatry that people in the new era pursue profits and money?

Based on the logical reasoning of the academic Confucian system he accepted, after doubting whether "worshiping money" is also a kind of idolatry, he began to think more.

This further thinking also comes from the changes of the times and Dashun’s trade policies.

He found that the decline of Macau was closely related to the trade policy of Dashun.

If Dashun opened up trade, Macau would decline; if Dashun closed trade and left only Macau, Macau would prosper.

During the heyday of Macau, missionaries interpreted the prosperous Macau as "our civilization is more superior, so Macau is so prosperous."

However, with the shift of the trade center of Dashun to the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, and with the establishment of trading houses by Britain, France, the Netherlands and Switzerland on the shore of Dashun, Macau declined instantly.

Not only was the decline visible to the naked eye, but it also fell to making a living by trafficking in people and smuggling opium.

Jiang Youren was not an economist, he was a missionary.

Therefore, his perspective was still the extension of the worship of money.

That is, after the concept of "our civilization is more superior" is concrete, is it considered an unconscious idolatry? The object of worship is our Western civilization itself?

If it is not idolatry, but just a fact, then Macau will not prosper or decline because of Dashun's trade policy.

This is not a fact, but an irrational belief generated by self-cognition, so this is obviously idolatry.

Who says that the idol of idolatry must be a person?

And isn't the basis of this worship money? Because he made money before, he dared to say that he was superior, so isn't this still a kind of idolatry of money and wealth?

The second shock and thinking in his heart originated from the new era that had begun in Europe, and finally sprouted and grew in Macau, a special place driven by the trade policy of Dashun.

The third shock he received in Macau can be traced back to the ideological chaos in the late Ming Dynasty, and the reflection on the problems of the previous dynasty after Dashun defeated the Qing Dynasty and ended the chaos in the name of protecting the world.

In short, the previous dynasty almost lost the world, so something had to take the blame.

Who will take the blame?

Naturally, it is Neo-Confucianism. Of course, there are also criticisms that it is the heart school derived from Neo-Confucianism. It is impossible to let Confucianism as a whole take the blame, right?

This also led to the situation on the Dashun side, where Neo-Confucianism was broken and the new school was not established. Although there is an official ideology, the ones that are officially promoted lack a semi-saint to organize them into a system.

For a time, many Confucian scholars believed that "breaking a point of Cheng Zhu and approaching a point of Confucius and Mencius" opened the trend of directly reading the pre-Qin classics, and believed that the later annotations were obviously mixed with private goods. We should read the original text directly and read the ancient books of the pre-Qin period, and not read the annotations of Song Confucian scholars.

The root of this trend is the reflection on the near destruction of the world.

And this trend also led to the widespread dissemination of ancient books of the pre-Qin period. However, the books of the pre-Qin period are not only Confucian, but also the various schools of thought, especially in the pre-Qin period, most of the articles of the various schools of thought were sprayed against each other.

In addition to Confucianism, Jiang Youren tried to read the articles of other schools of thought in the pre-Qin period, and then he saw Han Feizi's book.

Han Feizi said: In their time, witches often wished others longevity and longevity. But there was no fulfillment of making people live one more day, and they never pointed out how to live forever.

So people looked down on witches and gradually stopped believing in ghosts and gods.

It is also said that the Confucian learning is the same. It never says what to do, but only says "if you listen to my ideas, you can do this and that"; but it does not talk about how to govern the country well and what to do specifically.

Instead of talking about how to govern the country well now, it talks about some achievements made in governing the country in the past; it does not examine matters such as government laws, but praises the beautiful stories passed down in ancient times and the achievements of the former kings.

Han Feizi sprayed, saying that what is the difference between the behavior of Confucianism and those witches who wish people longevity? Isn't this the witch in reality?

It is not fulfilled at all and is not operational.

It just talks about things that no one has seen in ancient times.

Of course, Han Feizi's article was originally intended to spray Mohism and Confucianism, and finally concluded that the people were ignorant, and the taxes on money and grain were collected in order to use them to relieve famine and support the army to defend the country, but the people thought it was greedy by the court. Therefore, the people's understanding is unreliable. It is not okay to follow the will of the people when governing the country...

However, this article is written for the monarch.

From the perspective of the missionaries, it is naturally another perspective.

Jiang Youren feels that Han Feizi's comments on Confucianism are very similar to those on Catholicism.

And because Catholicism believes that the Chinese side is idolatrous, worshipping gods and greedy for money, and is very realistic, Jiang Youren took a radical approach and came to a conclusion that is not too strange:

If Catholicism is really spread in Dashun, it must get rid of the problem of Han Feizi's comments on Confucianism.

The kingdom of heaven is invisible, just like the rule of the Three Dynasties.

This very realistic nation, for example, the previous preferential treatment of missionaries was due to the fact that missionaries could bring knowledge of mathematics and astronomy, rather than true inner belief.

The emperor is so realistic, so aren't the people even more so?

This probably requires a human entity to really let them see that Catholicism is feasible, so that it is possible to believe in Catholicism in large numbers.

And now, the emperor route and the upper route are both unworkable, there is no chance.

So, how to create such a human entity first?