Autograph document signed. Co-signed by the bishop of Beijing, Polycarpo da Souza.

8vo. 1 p. In Latin. An oath renouncing the practice of the Chinese rites, taken by the prominent Chinese Jesuit as required by the Papal Bull "Ex Quo Singulari" (1742). The oath was sworn on the Bible, and a form signed in one's own hand ("manu propria") had to be produced as evidence. Most of these documents are co-signed by church officials or senior friars as witnesses to an oath sworn in their presence ("in manibus meis"), in this case the Bishop of Beijing, Polycarpo da Souza (1743-57). - Although little biographical information on Jean Simonelli survives, he was one of the most prominent Jesuit missionaries in China during the difficult second half of the 18th century. Born Ai Jiu-han in Jiang-xi, Simonelli was raised and trained by Portuguese Jesuits in Macau. After studying classical Chinese literature, he entered the novitiate in 1743. On his very first assignment as a missionary in mainland China, in 1746, he was imprisoned and tortured. From 1754, Simonelli was active as a Jesuit priest in various Chinese provinces. Highly esteemed by the Bishop of Macau, Simonelli was elected procurator for the Portuguese Jesuit mission in mainland China in 1770, in which office he remained until the 1773 dissolution of the Society of Jesus. Even after the dissolution, Simonelli continued his missionary work until 1784, when he was arrested in his native Jiang-xi during an unprecedented wave of persecution. Brought to Beijing in chains, Simonelli died in prison and was buried at the Zhalan Cemetery. - During the early years of their mission to East Asia, the Jesuits led by Matteo Ricci accommodated Catholicism to Chinese customs and Confucian practice in important ways, both for political reasons and in hopes of attracting more converts. Criticism of this syncretism is as old as the Chinese rites themselves, and Ricci's immediate successor Niccolò Longobardo attempted to change course, which led to his replacement as provincial. When Dominican and Franciscan missionaries entered China, they reported critically to Rome on the Jesuit practices. A first condemnation was decreed by Pope Clement XI in 1704 and confirmed in the 1715 Bull "Ex Illa Die". In reaction to the condemnation, the Kiangxi Emperor, who had initially tolerated the Christian missionaries and enjoyed especially good relations with the Jesuits, officially forbade Christian missions in China. In 1721, Carlo Ambrosio Mezzabarba, the Latin Patriarch of Alexandria, was sent to Macau and Beijing as Papal legate. Despite the concession of "eight permissions" regarding the practice of the Chinese rites, officiated in a pastoral letter to the missionaries from 4 November 1721, the Emperor did not revoke the ban. Finally, in "Ex Quo Singulari", Pope Benedict XIV re-affirmed the 1715 Bull and required all missionaries in the region to take the oath renouncing the practice of Chinese rites. - A transcription and translation of the document are available on request. - Louis Pfister, Notices biographiques et bibliographiques sur les jésuites de l'ancienne mission de Chine, 1552-1773, Chang-hai, 1932-1934 (Nendeln: Kraus Reprint, 1971), no. 374, p. 810.