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# PART ONE: Out from the darkness of forgotten history
4
Growing interest in James Legge's missionary-scholar career reflects a more general trend initiated in the 1970s towards re-examining the impact and contribution of various kinds of missionaries in modern history. Yet it remains one of the ironies of the specialized study of missionary history that it has largely forgotten the converted while emphasizing the converter. Certainly the early 19th century missionary chronicles in Europe and North America dealing with Chinese missions mentioned occasionally the names of indigenous believers, especially those who later became prominent in church leadership. Still, most converts remained hidden under unpronounceable and misspelled transliterations, vague references spiced with evangelical rhetoric, abbreviated names, and, later on, a growing trend to employ comparative statistics with a modicum of personal details.
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As Legge's own pivotal role in exploring Chinese contributions to comparative philosophy and comparative religious studies becomes clearer, it is all the more necessary to re-examine his relationships with those Chinese students, scholars, officials, and collaborators who responded to and enriched his life and work. These include a sizeable number of students from the Anglo-Chinese College (Yinghua shuyuan), the workers at its associated press under the leadership of Wong Shing (Huang Sheng, 1825-1902), and the Chinese scholars he met and worked with during his missionary-scholar career (1840-1873) – especially the Cantonese official from the district of Huilái, Luó Zhòngfán (d. circa 1850), and Legge's academic companion for the last ten years of work on the Chinese Classics (1862-1872), Wáng Tāo (1822-1897). Wáng was also a member of the small group Chinese Christians with whom Legge identified as pastor and scholar. Among these Hong Kong Christians over the years were students, Bible colporteurs, some of the first Chinese Christian families, apprentice evangelists, full-time evangelists, and one ordained Chinese minister. These included the venerable evangelist who trained under Robert Morrison (1782-1834), Liáng Gōngfa (commonly known as Liang Afa, 1789-1855),
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190
PART ONE: Out from the darkness of forgotten history
4
Growing interest in James Legge's missionary-scholar career reflects a more general trend initiated in the 1970s towards re-examining the impact and contribution of various kinds of missionaries in modern history. Yet it remains one of the ironies of the specialized study of missionary history that it has largely forgotten the converted while emphasizing the converter. Certainly the early 19th century missionary chronicles in Europe and North America dealing with Chinese missions mentioned occasionally the names of indigenous believers, especially those who later became prominent in church leadership. Still, most converts remained hidden under unpronounceable and misspelled transliterations, vague references spiced with evangelical rhetoric, abbreviated names, and, later on, a growing trend to employ comparative statistics with a modicum of personal details.
5
As Legge's own pivotal role in exploring Chinese contributions to comparative philosophy and comparative religious studies becomes clearer, it is all the more necessary to re-examine his relationships with those Chinese students, scholars, officials, and collaborators who responded to and enriched his life and work. These include a sizeable number of students from the Anglo-Chinese College (Yinghua shữyuàn)," the workers at its associated press under the leadership of Wong Shing (M. Huang Shèng, 1825-1902), and the Chinese scholars he met and worked with during his missionary-scholar career (1840-1873) – especially the Cantonese official from the district of Huìlái, Luó Zhòngfán (d. circa 1850), and Legge's academic companion for the last ten years of work on the Chinese Classics (1862-1872), Wáng Tão (1822-1897). Wáng was also a member of the small group Chinese Christians with whom Legge identified as pastor and scholar. Among these Hong Kong Christians over the years were students, Bible colporteurs, some of the first Chinese Christian families, apprentice evangelists, full time evangelists, and one ordained Chinese minister. These included the venerable evangelist who trained under Robert Morrison (1782-1834), Liáng Gōngfa (commonly known as Liang Afa, 1789-1855),
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