This project has drawn on the collaboration, expertise, and support of several individuals and institutions, to whom we are deeply grateful.
First and foremost, we want to thank Professor Jürgen Moltmann for encouraging this book project from its inception through his input and, most importantly, by coming to China on numerous occasions to promote and develop his ongoing dialogue with Chinese theologians, contemporary Chinese scholarship, and Chinese traditional religion and philosophy.
We are equally grateful to the Chinese and Hong Kongese theologians, social scientists, scholars of religion and literature, as well as non-Chinese contributors to this volume who have seen the value of furthering this important dialogue between Moltmann’s theology and contemporary Chinese thought. We also want to thank the participants in various discussions with Moltmann during his visits to China: Gao Quanxi, He Guanghu, Hong Liang, David Jasper, Kwok Wai Luen, Lai Pan-chiu, Li Bingquan, Li Qiuling, Lin Hong-hsin, Peng Xiaoyu, Yang Huaming, Yang Huilin, Daniel Yeung, You Bin, Zhang Baichun, Zhang Xu, and Zhuo Xinping.
Moreover, we are grateful for the support of the Hong Kong Institute of Sino-Christian Studies (ISCS), the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and Renmin University of China for the events they organized, as well as for their advocacy of Chinese theological studies over many years. The ISCS has also facilitated and supported a number of translations of Moltmann’s works into Chinese since the 1990s. Moltmann himself has personally sponsored some of these translations. We also want to acknowledge the efforts and dedication of Thomas Tseng and other early translators of Moltmann’s works who have paved the way for Chinese Moltmann studies. The contribution of Daniel Yeung, the director and founder of ISCS, can hardly be overstated. He has been a “hidden hand” behind many translation projects and academic events related to Moltmann in the Chinese context.
Naomi Thurston would like to thank Yuelu Academy of Hunan University and Zhang Jun in particular for institutional and academic support of her ongoing project on the reception history of Moltmann’s theology in Chinese scholarship. Since July 2022, her research on this topic has been supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong SAR [project number: CUHK2191282].
Jason Lam would like to thank the students and colleagues at Melbourne School of Theology for discussions on Moltmann’s theology, and the Australian College of Theology for their support of the Senior Research Fellow’s project.
We thank the Christian Study Center on Chinese Religion and Culture for granting us permission to reproduce the essays of the 2018 Hong Kong Forum in Part II of this volume, and Helen Ng in particular for handling the original manuscripts. They first appeared in volume 18 of the center’s journal, Ching Feng: A Journal on Christianity and Chinese Religion and Culture. We are also grateful to the Institute for the Study of Christian Culture at Renmin University of China, especially to Prof. Yang Huilin and Dr. Cathy Zhang. They hosted the Beijing Summit jointly with the ISCS and produced the Chinese version of Part III in volume 35 of the Journal for the Study of Christian Culture, which is edited and abridged here.
We would also like to thank Fortress Press for granting permission to reproduce Moltmann’s essay, “Tao – The Chinese Mystery of the World,” herein. The manuscripts of his two other essays in Parts III and IV, respectively, were supplied by the author himself, but earlier versions are available elsewhere. The following is a list of these:
Part I: “Tao – The Chinese Mystery of the World,” originally printed in Science and Wisdom, trans. Margaret Kohl (London: SCM, 2003), 172–193.
Part III: “Thinking Means Transcending,” an amended version appeared in The Living God and the Fullness of Life, trans. Margaret Kohl (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2015), ch. 10, 177–90. A German version, “Hoffen und Denken: „Denken heißt überschreiten,”” is included in Hoffen und Denken: Beiträge zur Zukunft der Theologie (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2016), 135–150.
Part IV: “A Culture of Life in the Dangers of This Time,” was originally published as, “On a Culture of Life in the Dangers of This Time” in Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences 77 (2013): 175–179.
(The editors of this volume have made minor amendments to each text.)
A note on transcriptions: in most cases, unless other renderings are more commonly found in print, we have transcribed Chinese characters using pinyin. We have also opted to use traditional Chinese characters. Where names, titles or Chinese sayings are given in pinyin in the texts below, we have generally added the original Chinese in traditional script in parentheses. Where other transcriptions are given, we have mostly added both pinyin and Chinese
We gratefully dedicate this volume to Prof. Moltmann, who turned 97 in April of 2023, and to the memory of his late wife, feminist theologian Elisabeth Moltmann-Wendell, whom Moltmann’s Chinese students affectionately refer to as 師母 Shimu, their teacher’s wife.
Jason Lam, Melbourne
Naomi Thurston, Hong Kong
5 January 2023
Please note that the opinions expressed in this volume do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors of the Brill series Theology and Mission in World Christianity.