Rethinking Syncretism: The Unity of the Three Teachings and their Joint Worship in Late-Imperial China

Abstract

S yncretism is the process by which elements of distinct religions are merged into a unitary world view. Although syncretism is a component of the contemporary Western discourse on the history of religions, the syncretic process has found little favor within Western Christianity or Islam, which have cleaved historically to the notion of religion as revelation and have resisted reconciliation with other traditions. By contrast, China's plural religious environment has encouraged adherents of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism to horrow eclectically from each other's rraditions and to look benignly on pluralism, combination, and mutual influence. By the close of the sixteenth century, that borrowing had evolved into something like syncretism as expressed in the famous phrase sanjiao heyi, "the unity of the Three Teachings" of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism. The Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci was aware of this trend when he noted that "the most commonly accepted opinion of those who are at all edu, cated among the Chinese is that these three laws or cults coalesce into one creed and that all of them can and should be believed.'" Ricci does not use the term syncretism, but the idea of Chinese religions as syncretic may he traced to this observation.