Matteo Ricci's Influence On Western Culture

Matteo Ricci created a link between the Western world and China by attempting to introduce Christianity to the Chinese people. Matteo Ricci is a pioneer because he took Western lifestyle to China. Chinese scholars were very intrigued by the knowledge introduced to them from Renaissance Europe and so they explored this new information. By showing the extravagance of western civilization and religion Matteo Ricci and the Jesuits became cultural mediators, and they created a foothold for Western ideals and commerce to expand in China. Matteo Ricci was a part of the Jesuits who were known as, "The most prominent of the of the missionaries...who worked to strengthen Roman Catholic Christianity in Europe and also to spread their faith abroad"(Traditions and Encounters, Bentley and Ziegler). By being a part of such a prominent group Ricci was able to spread his faith and ideas more easily. Ricci and his comrades were very ambitious because they wished to convert all of China to Christianity. The Jesuits were very well educated and Matteo …show more content…
"Ricci 's mastery of Chinese language and literature opened doors for the Jesuits, who then dazzled their hosts with European science, technology, and mechanical gadgetry"(Traditions and Encounters, Bentley and Ziegler). The Chinese did not think that the Europeans could be so technologically advanced and so they were awestruck by these Jesuit missionaries who knew so much, and who knew about things that interested them or that they had not discovered yet. The Jesuit scholars became valuable to the Chinese because they were able to correct the Chinese lunar calendar so that the dates of eclipses would be correct and they supervised the casting of Chinese cannons. This made the Jesuit missionaries respected and allowed for them to have access to China so that they could