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The Mandate of Heaven
Strategy, Revolution, and the First European Translation of Sunzi’s Art of War (1772)
Series: - Jesuit Studies, Volume: 26
Author:
The Mandate of Heaven examines the first European version of
Sunzi’s Art of War, which was translated from Chinese by Joseph Amiot, a French missionary in Beijing, and published in Paris in 1772. His work is presented in English for the first time. Amiot undertook this project following the suppression of the Society of Jesus in France with the aim of demonstrating the value of the China mission to the French government. He addressed his work to Henri Bertin, minister of state, beginning a thirty-year correspondence between the two men. Amiot framed his translation in order to promote a radical agenda using the Chinese doctrine of the “mandate of heaven.” This was picked up within the sinophile and radical circle of the physiocrats, who promoted China as a model for revolution in Europe. The work also arrived just as the concept of strategy was emerging in France. Thus Amiot’s Sunzi can be placed among seminal developments in European political and strategic thought on the eve of the revolutionary era.
Adam Parr is a professor at the University of Western Australia. He read English at the University of Cambridge and received his PhD at University College London. His doctoral thesis was on the translation of classical military theory following the Seven Years’ War (1756–63).
“
The Mandate of Heaven is a welcome addition to studies on French Jesuits and their impact on the Enlightenment. Parr and the other contributors to the volume are to be applauded for their contributions to understanding eighteenth-century Jesuit missionary culture and the global connections that facilitated and inspired the Enlightenment.” - Daniel J. Watkins,
Baylor University, in:
Journal of Jesuit Studies, Vol. 7, No. 4 (2020), pp. 687-689
Acknowledgments
Contributors
Introduction
1The Context of the Translation
1.1The Military Enlightenment
1.2War and Peace
1.3The Suppression of the Jesuits
1.4The China mission
1.5The Standing of China at the Outbreak of the Seven Years’ War
1.6The Physiocrats
1.7The Correspondance littéraire
1Translating the
Sunzi
1The Texts
2Sources
3Approaching Translation
4Language Barrier s
2Joseph Amiot’s
Sunzi
1Notes on the English Translation
2Preface by the Publisher, Joseph de Guignes
3Translator’s Preface
4The Emperor’s Preface to the Ten Precepts Addressed to Men at Arms
3The Thirteen Chapters on Military Art, a Work Composed in Chinese by Sunzi
Preface
1The Fundamentals of Military Art
2On the Beginning of the Campaign
3On What One Needs to have Thought of Before a Battle
4On the Positioning of Troops
5On Skill in the Leading of Troops
6On Fullness and Emptiness
7On the Advantages to Be Secured
8On the Nine Changes
9On the Conduct of Troops
10On Knowledge of the Landscape
11On the Nine Types of Terrain
12Guide to How to Fight with Fire
13On How to Make Use of Dissension and Sow Discord
4Interpreting Amiot’s
Sunzi
1Utility
2Science, Art, and Perspective
3Grande science and Grand Art
4La Doctrine: The Way
5Benevolence
6A Second Reading
5Postscript: Strategy and Revolution
1Responses to the Art Militaire
2Henri Bertin’s Correspondance Militaire
3Strategy
Appendix 1: Joseph Amiot’s Letter to Henri Bertin, Beijing, September 23, 1766
Appendix 2: Amiot’s Life
Family Background
Education
A Jesuit in the Kingdom of France
Journey to and Arrival in Beijing
The French Mission
Early Years (1751–64)
The Appeal of Chinese Music
Amiot’s Scientific Research
Amiot’s Contact with European Academies
Amiot’s Major Period of Writing
The Abolition of the Society of Jesus
Writer, Translator, and Correspondent
Further Research into Chinese Music
Later Years
Final Works: Chinese Dances and Scientific Research
A Major Shock: The Impact of the Revolutionary Upheaval in France
Amiot the Missionary
His Network of Contacts
Other Works
Ethno-linguistics
History
Science
Art
Portraits of Amiot
Bibliography
Index
Contributors
Introduction
1The Context of the Translation
1.1The Military Enlightenment
1.2War and Peace
1.3The Suppression of the Jesuits
1.4The China mission
1.5The Standing of China at the Outbreak of the Seven Years’ War
1.6The Physiocrats
1.7The Correspondance littéraire
1Translating the
1The Texts
2Sources
3Approaching Translation
4Language Barrier s
2Joseph Amiot’s
1Notes on the English Translation
2Preface by the Publisher, Joseph de Guignes
3Translator’s Preface
4The Emperor’s Preface to the Ten Precepts Addressed to Men at Arms
3The Thirteen Chapters on Military Art, a Work Composed in Chinese by Sunzi
Preface
1The Fundamentals of Military Art
2On the Beginning of the Campaign
3On What One Needs to have Thought of Before a Battle
4On the Positioning of Troops
5On Skill in the Leading of Troops
6On Fullness and Emptiness
7On the Advantages to Be Secured
8On the Nine Changes
9On the Conduct of Troops
10On Knowledge of the Landscape
11On the Nine Types of Terrain
12Guide to How to Fight with Fire
13On How to Make Use of Dissension and Sow Discord
4Interpreting Amiot’s
1Utility
2Science, Art, and Perspective
3Grande science and Grand Art
4La Doctrine: The Way
5Benevolence
6A Second Reading
5Postscript: Strategy and Revolution
1Responses to the Art Militaire
2Henri Bertin’s Correspondance Militaire
3Strategy
Appendix 1: Joseph Amiot’s Letter to Henri Bertin, Beijing, September 23, 1766
Appendix 2: Amiot’s Life
Family Background
Education
A Jesuit in the Kingdom of France
Journey to and Arrival in Beijing
The French Mission
Early Years (1751–64)
The Appeal of Chinese Music
Amiot’s Scientific Research
Amiot’s Contact with European Academies
Amiot’s Major Period of Writing
The Abolition of the Society of Jesus
Writer, Translator, and Correspondent
Further Research into Chinese Music
Later Years
Final Works: Chinese Dances and Scientific Research
A Major Shock: The Impact of the Revolutionary Upheaval in France
Amiot the Missionary
His Network of Contacts
Other Works
Ethno-linguistics
History
Science
Art
Portraits of Amiot
Bibliography
Index
All interested in the history of the Jesuits, China and Europe, the Enlightenment and French Revolution, the history of strategy and military theory, Sunzi, and translation studies.