Borrowed Gods and Foreign Bodies: Christian Missionaries Imagine Chinese Religion [Hardcover]

In "Borrowed Gods and Foreign Bodies Eric Reinders," a professor of Religion at Emory University, explores 19th century British Protestant missionary misrepresentation and subsequent dismissal of Chinese religion and culture as mindless, uncivilized, and empty. By analyzing literature published by British Protestant missionaries, Reinders highlights how the Chinese were characterized as mentally deficient, childlike, drugged, feminine, and lazy. Reinders explains that all of these metaphors directed at the Chinese "share the common thread of weakness or lack of consciousness and a `higher reason' " (41). There was a general consensus on the part of British Protestant missionaries that Chinese culture was flawed, as evidenced in its backward language, disregard of literature, and meatless diets. Reinders analyzes how missionaries perpetuated the idea that the Chinese "had concocted a language so excessively complex that it stumped not only foreigners but the Chinese themselves" (Reinders, 73). Since the Chinese language was a barrier for many missionaries, this led to the accusation by many missionaries that the Chinese did not even know their own language. Just as the missionaries portrayed the mind and culture as meaningless and uncivilized, the Chinese religion was charged with emptiness. While Catholics at times saw Chinese religion as proto-Christian, Protestants did not even consider it a religion. Reinders notes how most missionaries "expressed a view of popular [Chinese] religion as...materialistic or self-interested". Reinders quotes John MacGowan who portrayed the Chinese as having a religion that has "absolutely no religion in it" (Reinders, 136). What counted as religion, as far as the anti-Catholic British Protestant missionaries were concerned, was not ritual but words and text. The belief held by missionaries that obeisance is idolatry and not an act of worship, as well as the absence of a Sabbath in the Chinese religion, led to the conclusion that Chinese religion was fundamentally wrong. Further, Reinders argues that much of the Protestant polemic regarding Chinese religions was reliant upon anti-Catholicism because the missionaries saw similarities in what they called empty rituals of Catholicism and Chinese religion. Therefore, just as there was the assumption that Christianity should replace Chinese religion, there was the belief that Protestantism should replace Catholicism.

Although Reinders indirectly offers a thorough exploration of British Protestant orientalism and its impact on religions missions in the 19th century, he excludes potentially relevant research such as writings of female missionaries and includes seemingly irrelevant information such as the Chinese response to the smell of missionaries. Reinders should have formally stated that he would be primarily looking at the male British Protestant missionaries and their interpretation of the Chinese. The exclusion of female missionary writings is a limitation and could have potentially challenged his argument if the female British Protestant missionary representations do not coincide with male missionary writings or supported his arguments if they did coincide. Although Reinders did support and prove his argument, his examination of how Chinese viewed the missionaries (including smell) was not a central aspect of his argument. This weakness could have been strengthened had Reinders thoroughly explored the depictions of the British Protestant missionaries in addition to how the British Protestant missionaries portrayed the Chinese. While there is possibly a lack of information available considering how the Chinese viewed Protestant missionaries, the inclusion of this view only weakened Reinders' argument and therefore seems extraneous. However, I did find Reinders redefinition of who is "foreign" in the context of British missionaries in China intriguing. Reinders comments on how the Chinese were obsessed with the bodies of the missionaries "and this focus on the body presented an obstacle to mission work" (Reinders, 181). Thus, it is not the Chinese who are foreign; it is the British missionaries in China.

Like Philip Jenkins' Dream Catchers, Reinders addresses the complexities surrounding the definition of religion and impact of orientalism on the study of religion. Similar to the Foucaultian idea that power constructs as knowledge, both scholars address how power also constructs what constitutes religion. For Jenkins', mainstream America is the power that constructs what counts as religion (Native American Spirituality was often denied as a religion) and for Reinders the British missionaries are the power who decide that Chinese religion is inferior to that of Christianity although many denied the Chinese as even having a religion. As seen through Reinders' and Jenkins' analyses, it is the colonial power that decides what constitutes religion. In addition, Reinders' and Jenkins' accounts both address a theme of essentialization, meaning that Native Americans are all like that and the Chinese are all like that, which strengthen how orientalism negatively impacts religious studies.