Macau Ricci Institute Public Forum: Bridging East and West: François Noël S.J. (1651–1729)’s Synthesis of Aristotelian and Confucian Virtue Ethics in Philosophia Sinica

This presentation examines François Noël SJ’s Philosophia Sinica (1711) as an early and highly self-conscious attempt to articulate a transcultural virtue ethics between the Aristotelian and Confucian worlds. Rather than treating Noël merely as a missionary translator or as a flawed European observer of China, the paper argues that he should be read as an intermediary thinker whose encounter with the Chinese classics generated a constructive ethical synthesis. The central claim is that Noël does not simply “translate” or “report” Confucian moral thought to a European audience; he reorganizes it through conceptual instruments drawn from Aristotelian and Thomistic moral philosophy, especially the notions of habit, finality, and the four causes.

The paper first situates this inquiry within current debates on whether Confucianism is better understood as role ethics or as virtue ethics. It then shows why Noël’s work remains philosophically significant: he stands at the intersection of Jesuit hermeneutics, early modern comparative philosophy, and the later European reception of Confucian moral teaching. Special attention is given to Noël’s use of the Yijing commentarial tradition and the Mencius in order to develop a vocabulary capable of linking Chinese accounts of li, qi, goodness, and self-cultivation with Aristotelian accounts of causality, finality, and habituation.

Methodologically, the paper adopts a transformation-oriented model of cross-cultural exchange. On this reading, Noël’s text is not a neutral description of “Chinese philosophy,” nor should it be accepted uncritically from a contemporary perspective. Its Eurocentric limits are real. Yet precisely in and through these limits, Noël’s work reveals how the reading of foreign classics can transform an interpreter’s practical and conceptual horizon. The Philosophia Sinica thus emerges as a historically important witness to the possibility—and the risks—of constructing a shared ethical discourse across traditions.

以耶穌會士衛方濟（François Noël S.J.）1711 年所著《中國哲學》為研究物件，探討這部著作作為早期極具自覺意識的嘗試，如何在亞里斯多德思想體系與儒家思想之間構建一種跨文化德性倫理學。

本文主張把耶穌會士衛方濟（François Noël S.J.）視為一位思想仲介者：他在研讀中國經典的過程中，形成了具有建設性的倫理學融合體系。本文核心觀點為：衛方濟並非只是向歐洲讀者 “翻譯” 或 “轉述” 儒家道德思想，而是借助亞里斯多德與多瑪斯道德哲學中的概念工具，對儒家思想進行重構，其中尤以習性、目的論與四因說為核心。

本文首先將這一研究置於當下學界的爭論語境之中，即儒家思想更適宜被理解為角色倫理學，還是德性倫理學。繼而闡釋衛方濟著作在哲學層面的重要意義：他身處耶穌會解經學、近代早期比較哲學，以及後世歐洲對儒家道德學說接受研究的交匯點。本文將重點分析衛方濟如何借助《易經》注疏傳統與《孟子》思想，構建一套學術話語，將中國思想中關於禮、氣、善與修身的論述，同亞里斯多德的因果論、目的論與習性養成理論相聯結。

在研究方法上，本文採用以轉化為導向的跨文化交流研究範式。依此視角，衛方濟的著作並非對 “中國哲學” 的中立記述，也不應以當代視角不加批判地全盤接受。其著作中確實存在歐洲中心主義的局限，然而恰恰是通過這些局限，衛方濟的研究展現出：對異域經典的研讀，如何能夠重塑闡釋者的實踐認知與思想視野。由此可見，《中國哲學》作為重要的歷史文獻，見證了跨越思想傳統構建共同倫理話語的可能性，也揭示了其中潛藏的風險。