Q3. James Legge and Robert Morrison –
who are they, what did they do and what is their importance?
Discuss in the light of current ideas of globalisation.
Globalisation appears to be an increasingly important issue for the future development of the world nowadays and it continually gathers great concern over countries. It is actually the breakage of barriers existing between nations so as to enhance unification and similarity. The barriers are induced by the distinction of language, culture and even religious belief in different nations.
While most people consider globalisation as a new phenomenon which has been discovered since the late twentieth century, two pioneers of it, Robert Morrison (1782-1834) and his successor James Legge (1814-1897) spent almost their whole life in removing barriers between the east and west as early as two centuries ago. Despite the concrete and influential contribution in translation, Morrison and Legge also acted as role models of globalisation indeed.
The scope of the essay is thus divided into two parts: to introduce the main contributions of Morrison and Legge and investigate their importance to globalisation. That is, the impact of their work to the core ideas of globalisation. Removal of the three kinds of barriers and the essential role that education is playing in ‘global village’ will therefore be the focal points of this exploration whereas the pros and cons of globalisation will be out of scope.
Robert Morrison was the first Protestant missionary coming to China and one of the early Sinologists. He immersed himself in Chinese language and culture by dressing in Chinese costume and wearing a false pigtail. In order to break the language borders between Chinese and English, he devoted himself to making the first and remarkable Chinese-English dictionary, “Morrison’s Dictionary” and one thesaurus named “Vocabulary of the Canton dialect”. Morrison also published grammar guides: “A grammar of the Chinese language” and “A grammar of the English language” in 1815 and 1823 respectively. As diminishing language obstacle between people from different countries is the first and key step for globalisation, Morrison absolutely presented a real demonstration in the process of minimizing language barrier.
Culture difference acts as another hindrance for globalisation which includes distinct philosophical thoughts and unique traditional style. An eminent early Chinese scholar, James Legge who was the first holder of the chair of Chinese founded at Oxford in 1875, dedicated a brilliant set of “Chinese Classics”. The “Chinese Classics” consists of five volumes capturing the most profound thoughts of giant philosophers in China like the Confucian and Mencius. These five volumes undoubtedly created significant impact on the west on understanding the ideas of Chinese culture. Morrison, however, sketched out the Chinese chronology, geography, government, religion and customs for the west by publishing the book “A view of China, for philological purposes”. He also outlined an Old Testament history in Chinese in 1815 so as to provide foundations of cultural traditions of China for the westerners. It seems unable to deny that Morrison and Legge have brought the core ideas in Chinese culture to the west.
Religious beliefs separate people into different groups and therefore in some way hinder globalisation. Being the pathfinders to promote Christianity in China, Morrison and Legge worked hard to assimilate the religion of China. That is, to make the Chinese believe in the only ‘mighty God’ and become Christians so as to minimize the religious boundaries between the east and west. Morrison not only carried out his missionary work by completing his translation of the Holy Bible, but also presented publications in the religion-related areas. For instance, his first Chinese book which was a summary of the doctrine of divine redemption, the translation of the Gospel of St. Luke and an annotated catechism on the teachings of Jesus in Chinese etc.
While Morrison focused on promoting his religion to Chinese, Legge aimed to explore the religions of Chinese and introduce to the west. This is why Legge published not only the Sacred Books of the East series, but also the translation of ‘Taoism’ which is part of the important religious beliefs in China. He comprehensively compared religions in China including Taoism and Confucianism. In 1880, Legge published an influential paper discussing about the differences between Chinese religions and Christianity. The deep impact that Legge brought to the study of religions in both east and west should not be ignored. Christianity, being the main religion in the west, claims there is only one true God in the universe and bans any worship to the ‘idols’ which refers to other gods. This shows one of the theme thoughts in globalisation: assimilation and unification. This may also explain why globalisation has been so controversial over the world. That is because some people regard it as an invasion of language, culture and religions.
Apart from narrowing the gap between nations by the removal of barriers in language, culture and religious belief, another core idea of globalisation is the importance of education. Globalisation is such a wave of change caused by high advance of technology in recent decades. As advanced technology shortens distance between nations, information and resources can be shared without difficulty at high speed. As a result, to cope with the rapid change everyday, life-long learning will become the main trend in the future knowledge-based world. In particular, only the learning in foreign languages and understanding of other cultures help people to self-access the inter-transferal of global messages and information. Education is therefore the single way for people to adapt to the globalising world.
Two centuries ago, Morrison and Legge got to realize that education is one useful tool to break down borders. Therefore Morrison established the Anglo-Chinese College in Malacca in 1818 and Legge continued even after the death of Morrison. Also, numerous publications and translation work by Morrison and Legge are means to educate westerners the Chinese thoughts and expose the Chinese to the western ideas at the same time. The exchange of ideas between cultures continues decades by decades because of education.
Globalisation cannot be a natural process. Though it is a predictable outcome under the high increase in effectiveness of communication, without the contribution of translators like Morrison and Legge, there will be perhaps no way for globalisation due to the difficulty in communicating from nation to nation. Morrison and Legge are not simply translators between Chinese and English, but also the very early bridge connecting the east and west. There is no doubt that they are admired as the pioneers at crosswords of east and west.
The importance of Morrison and Legge is actually their always-first and unique contribution: the first group of missionaries to China, the first Chinese-English dictionary by Morrison, the first “Chinese Classics” by Legge and the first college established by them in Shanghai. They are the first people who saw the essential connection between one culture and another culture in order to enhance improvements for both cultures. This is the core idea of globalisation: to share with other nations so as to increase the resources of all nations.
History of Translation/ Essay
22 November 2002
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