Relaying the Epistemic Foundations of a Transcultural Natural Theology: Proving the Existence of God in Valignano’s Catechismus christianae fidei and Ruggieri’s Tianzhu shilu

When European missionaries first entered Asia and the New World, they largely transposed to their new contexts catechisms that assumed intellectual passivity of catechumen. The Jesuits, however, soon realized such textual models would not be appropriate in East which boasted its own sophisticated philosophical traditions. This article explores how Michele Ruggieri (1543–1607) deploys adapts his pioneering Chinese catechism, Tianzhu shilu 天主實錄 (The true record Lord Heaven, 1584), innovations catechism genre Jesuit had originally developed for Japan. By comparing Ruggieri’s arguments existence God with those found Catechismus christianae fidei (Catechism Christian faith, 1586) composed by Alessandro Valignano (1539–1606) Japan mission, this shows lays groundwork a transcultural natural theology de-emphasizes metaphysics favour derived from shared ethical understanding political analogies.