曾庆豹 台湾中原大学
Zeng, Qingbao, Chung Yuan Christian University
原文Original
汉语景教经典中的“政治神学”问题：一个“汉语基督教思想史”的基本问题
从古至今宗教与政治间的张力从未消除过，基督教在西方的发展，以及其在世界其它地区的扩展，很难回避“政治神学”的问题。基督教传入中国，毫无疑问的，必须获得官方或政府的许可；在中国“以政领教”的长久历史下，无一例外的，汉语景教经典早已透露出其中的政治神学争端，过去有把景教的消亡理解为因为与政治走得太近的说法，问题是：能不和政治保持必要的关系吗？
景教可谓确立了“汉语基督教思想史”基本的问题意识，即一个外来的宗教面对在地的“文化（思想语言）”（cultural-linguistic）与“政治霸权”（political-hegemony）的主权及认同与否，即构成了本文所谓的“政治神学”问题，因此根本地说，基督教在中国面对的是政治问题而非文化问题。在唐代，景教即面对“华夷之辨”（民族）、“朝贡”（外交）、“致拜亲君”（宗教）等这类政治神学问题，事实上，这个问题几乎可以说是贯穿着“汉语基督教思想史”的发展，一部“汉语基督教思想史”即为一部“汉语基督教政治神学史”。
作为景教最重要的文献：《大秦景教流行中国碑》，即充份地透露了一个现实，景教之所以得以立碑应归功于对政治有所贡献，即唐肃宗时入安史之乱之际，当时有一位名叫伊斯的景教僧人，他“为公爪牙，作军耳目”，军功卓著，被朝廷封赏。《景教碑》的书写旨在“正当化”自己在唐代历史上的地位（提及了诸位皇帝的德政），而且藉此叙述了景教自太宗九年至建中二年一百四十多年的历史。
从贞观九年到会昌五年（845年）这二百余年间，虽可谓景教的全盛时期，但也非一帆风顺。其间至少出现过三次危机，最后在会昌五年（845年）武宗灭佛时，祸及景教，寺院被毁，景教徒被迫放弃信仰或退到边疆地区发展，远离了中国政治的中心，外来宣教士被驱逐回国。景教经此一击，此后便一蹶不振，传教士两个多世纪的惨淡经营，为何落得“寺废基空在，人归地自闲”（杨云翼句）的结局？
我们注意到《景教碑》中提及“惟道非圣不弘，圣非道不大”、“法非景不行，主非德不立”、“道无不可，所可可名。圣无不作，所作可述”，不仅说明了景教与朝廷和历代皇帝的良好关系，更是暗示着景教在政治现实中具有不可或缺的地位。这也就是为什么景教在中国的兴衰，根本上即取决于唐王朝的政策，它充分证明了基督教在中国的命运，即在于他们的政治立场或态度。本文将以政治神学的问题意识来理解汉语景教经典的政治神学书写，以此做为清理出从“政治神学”的面向来理解或重写“汉语基督教思想史”的问题意识之可能。
译文Translation
The Jingjiao (Sino-Nestorian Church) and ‘Political Theology’: A Perspective from the Basic Problem of ‘Sino-Christian Theology’
Ever since ancient days, the controversy between religion and politics has never ceased. With regard to the development of Christianity in the West and its expansion to other parts of the world, it is never easy to escape the “political theology” debate. When Christianity first came to China, it was undoubtedly with the tacit permission of the emperor or government. China has a long history of having politics take the lead in religious affairs. It is no surprise therefore that issues of political theology emerged in Nestorian period. In the past, people have tended to believe that Nestorian Christianity died in China as a result of its overly close involvement in politics, but the question is this: could they have been able to avoid the necessary links to politics?
We can say that the Jingjiao of China has already established the basic problem awareness of the “Sino-Christian history of thought”, namely the problem that a religion coming from abroad faces the dominance of a cultural-linguistic and political hegemony and must decide to agree to it or not, and this is the issue of “political theology” of this paper. Thus, if we see it from a deeper perspective, Christianity faces a political problem in China, and not a cultural problem. In the Tang Dynasty the Jingjiao faced the questions of ethnicity (discrimination between Chinese and foreigners, hua yi zhi bian), questions of diplomacy (paying tribute, chao gong), and religious questions (adoration of the gods, respect for parents and the ruler, zhi bai qin jun). In fact these problems have always accompanied the development of “Sino-Christian theology”, and a work entitled “The History of Sino-Christian Thought” would also be a work on “Sino-Christian Political Theology.”
Being the most important document of the Jingjiao, the text of the Nestorian Stele of Xi’an (Da Qin Jingjiao liuxing Zhongguo bei) already clearly manifests this fact: the reason why the Jingjiao was able to erect this stele was that they had made some political contribution, namely during the reign of Emperor Su Zong of the Tang and at the time of the riots of An and Shi (An Shi zhi luan) there was a Nestorian monk called Yi-si who “helped actively to defend the society and became a translator or spy for the military” (wei gong zhao ya, zuo jun er mu). His military achievements were well-known, and so he was rewarded by the government. The intention of erecting the Nestorian stele (Jingjiao bei) was to “justify” the position of the Jingjiao in the history of the Tang Dynasty (the virtuous government of several Emperors is mentioned), and to narrate the 140 years of the history of the Jingjiao from the ninth year of Tai Zong (635 A.D.) to the second year of the Jian Zhong period (781 A.D.).
In the span of more than two centuries from the ninth year of the Zhen Guan period (635 A.D.) until the fifth year of the Hui Chang period (845 A.D.), the Jingjiao on the one hand passed through a prosperous period, but it was not a time without challenges. During this period there were at least three times of crisis, and in the fifth year of Hui Chang (845 A.D.) the emperor Wu Zong finally tried to exterminate Buddhism, but this calamity also affected the Jingjiao. Their buildings and monasteries were destroyed, the Jingjiao Christians were forced to renounce their faith or were exiled to remote areas, they had to keep far away from the political center of China, and the foreign missionaries were expelled from the country and forced to return to their homelands. After these events, the Jingjiao of China was never able to recover from the blow. Why was it that the result of the arduous missionary work of two centuries collapsed like that and resulted in a situation described by Yang Yunyi as “The monastery is collapsed, the empty foundations remain, the people have left, the place is laid waste”?
We have seen that the Nestorian Stele mentions that “the dao will not be propagated without the emperor, and the emperor will not be great without the dao” (wei dao fei sheng bu hong, sheng fei dao bu da), and “the teaching will not spread without the glorious master, and the lord will not establish himself without virtue” (fa fei jing bu xing, zhu fei de bu li), and “the dao can do all things, and it is manifest; the emperor can achieve all things, and it is expressible.” (dao wu bu ke, suo ke ke ming. Sheng wu bu zuo, suo zuo ke shu.) These expressions do not only prove that the Jingjiao had always a very good relationship to the court and to the emperors, they even hint to the fact the Jingjiao had an irreplacable position in the political reality of that time. And exactly this is the reason why the Jingjiao first flourished and then perished in China, it depended basically on the policies of the Tang court, and this clearly manifests the fate of Christianity in China which depends on the political outlook and attitude of the Christians. This paper is going to interpret the political theological writings of the Nestorian canon from a Chinese political ideological perspective. Seen through the lens of “Political Theology”, the author attempts to summarize the issues through an understanding and re-writing of “Chinese History of Christian Thought”.