SUMMARY:
I. Geography
II. Ethnography and religions
III. Asia in the Bible
IV. Christianity in Asia.I. GEOGRAPHY.
Asia is the largest of the continents (over 44 million sq. km.; almost 1/2 of the emerged lands, more than 4 times the size of Europe), or rather, perhaps, the greater part (52.6%) of the ancient continent, to which it is joined both to Africa (the Isthmus of Suez was cut by a canal only in 1860, and the Red Sea can easily be crossed) and, even more so, to Europe, which is often considered a peninsula of it (hence the term Eurasian continent is sometimes used), as it is connected to Europe by a vast land area from the Barents Sea to the Black Sea.
Every separation here has only a conventional value, even in historical terms, and moreover, that entire area has belonged for a long time to a single political entity. To the southeast, a complex and articulated island bridge connects Asia to the nearby southern continent, while to the northeast, the two landmasses of the Old and New Worlds, separated by the immense expanse of the Pacific Ocean, approach each other first with a broad island chain of uncertain belonging (the Aleutians), then through a narrow stretch of sea (Bering Strait, 92 km.), which, frozen in winter, allows easy passage from Asia to America and vice versa. In this way, Asia enjoys the privilege of being in more or less intimate contact with all parts of the world, occupying a central position among them.
Bounded by Cape Chelyuskin to the north (77° 42' N.), Cape Buru to the south (1° 16' N.), Cape Baba to the west (26° 5' E., Greenwich), and Cape Dezhnev or the Eastern Cape to the east (169° 44' W., Greenwich), the main body of the continent lies entirely within the Northern Hemisphere.
Asia is the part of the world that extends the furthest in terms of longitude: over 164° (nearly half the circumference of the globe). Considering the islands, while the longitudinal extremes shift little, the Australasian archipelago extends the southern boundary of the continent beyond the Equator: 10° 54' S. (Roti Island, southwest of Timor).
Asia has a rather massive shape, with a main body that can roughly be compared to a quadrilateral of about 6,000 km. on each side, and alone (33.5 million sq. km.) it is larger than any other part of the world.
Its vastness and continental nature are well expressed by the fact that the average distance from the sea is more than double that of Europe (770 km. compared to 340 km.), nearly 1/3 of its area is separated from the coasts by over 1,000 km. of intervening land, and there are inland points that are up to 2,400 km. from the sea. Nevertheless, its coastline is relatively irregular. The main body and its appendages are in a ratio of approximately 3 to 1 (in area), with the latter represented mainly by peninsulas. Of these, the three southern peninsulas (Arabia, India, and Indochina) are among the largest in the world (several times larger than Mediterranean ones), while the islands, including some very large ones (Borneo, Sumatra, Hondo, Celebes, Java, Luzon), together with the peninsulas, form on the eastern side of the continent a rich and striking garland of island arcs such as is found nowhere else in the world. Characteristic is the development of the peripheral seas between these island arcs and the continental mass, from the Bering Strait to the Australasian Mediterranean (which, at 7.5 million sq. km., is the largest of the world's mediterraneans): around some of these seas, areas of intense economic activity have formed, among the most densely populated on Earth.
With regard to relief, Asia also stands out from the other two continents that make up the Old World. More than the much greater proportions of its mountain systems, plateaus, basins, valleys, depressions, glaciers, etc., and the much greater absolute height of its highest peaks (central Asia exceeds 8,000 m. in many places and reaches 8,882 m. at Mount Everest, Himalayas), what best conveys an idea of its morphology is the predominance of highlands over lowlands. The former, which include the highest plateaus in the world and all (except one) of the Earth's peaks above 7,000 m., alone cover 2/3 of the continent's surface, whose average elevation (600 m.), nearly triple that of Europe, has no counterpart in other parts of the world, except for Antarctica, which is still imperfectly known. Immediately striking is the contrast between a median orographic zone, which represents the continuation of the Alpine arc, and the lowlands (northern Asia) or platforms (western and southern Asia) that delimit it to the north and south. On one side, a series of long and reinforced mountain barriers continues from the Mediterranean eastward (Pontic Mountains, Taurus, Zagros, Hindu Kush) deep into the heart of Asia, where they seem to converge (Pamirs) before branching out in different directions: eastward toward Tibet (Himalayas, Transhimalayas, Kunlun, Altyn-Tagh) and then, bending southward, toward Indochina and Indonesia; further east toward China (Qinling), northward toward Mongolia and Siberia (Tian Shan, Yablonovy, Stanovoy). On the other side, more or less extensive plateaus are enclosed or bounded by these ramparts (Anatolia, Armenia, Iran, Tibet, Eastern Turkestan, Dzungaria, Mongolia, etc.) on one or more of their sides.
This orographic continuity does not always correspond to genetic or structural continuity: in contrast to the great belt of Tertiary folds to which, for example, the Caucasus and the Himalayas belong, individuality is given to ranges dating from the Hercynian orogeny, such as, for example, the chains that cross Tibet and border the central part of Asia to the north. Similarly, the origin and appearance of the plateaus can vary. Some of these correspond to tablelands (of the complex that includes Africa and Australia): the Deccan and Arabia, both welded to the continent by extensive alluvial zones (the Indo-Gangetic and Mesopotamian lowlands respectively); the others are mostly the result of ancient folded zones that long erosion has leveled and flattened, as is the case, for example, with the central section (between the Yenisei and Lena) of Siberia, quite different from a true plain. A position apart, in many respects, is occupied by the eastern side of the continent, in the relief and morphology of which volcanism plays a major role, present with numerous active volcanoes from Kamchatka to the Sunda Islands.
Overall, the arrangement of the relief is such that, generally, the peripheral zones correspond to the most accessible sectors, whereas the internal regions are crossed by grand mountain systems that hinder penetration. The axes of these systems, now drawing closer together, now diverging, enclose areas of varying size that are cut off from the beneficial influence of the ocean. Asia is thus the continent with the highest percentage of areas without drainage to the sea. At the same time, a regional compartmentalization is determined, with which may perhaps be connected the persistence of original and equally conservative forms of practical activity (modes of life, tribal and state organization, languages, religions, customs).
The characteristics of the relief are matched by those of the hydrography, which is distinguished above all by the great extent of its internal basins. No less than 15 million sq. km. (roughly one-third of the continent) are covered by areas whose waters do not reach the ocean, and indeed fully 10 million sq. km. (equal to the area of all Europe) entirely lack surface hydrography (areic zones) due to insufficient precipitation. Excluding Arabia and Iran, these regions affect Central Asia, from the Caspian to Manchuria and from Tibet to Turkestan; regions in which, besides a large number of closed salt lakes (Caspian, Aral, Balkhash, Lob Nor; Tibetan lakes), there are also numerous absolute depressions (Turfan, 130 m.; Caspian Sea surface, 26 m.; the deepest, however, is represented by the Dead Sea in Palestine, 394 m.). Excluding the Aralo-Caspian region, the largest internal basin is that of the Tarim (1.1 million sq. km.), whose course (1,300 km.), like those of the Amur, the Syr Darya, and all the rivers of the arid zones, progressively diminishes toward the mouth due to the intense diversion of water for irrigation.
The expansion, in the very heart of the continent, of this immense area without an outlet to the sea, and the arrangement of the relief, explain why Asia, despite its vast size, has the greatest number of large rivers (7 with courses exceeding 4,000 km.; 2 exceeding 3,000 km.; and 6 exceeding 4,000 km.), though not the longest river in the world.
The Siberian rivers, among which there are notable ones (each with a length of 5,200 km.: the Ob and Yenisei), are surpassed only by the Nile, Mississippi, and Amazon. They flow through plains with abundant and steady waters, but navigation—interrupted for many months (7 on the Lena above Vitim) by ice—has a sporadic character (internal communications). Moreover, as the ice forms downstream and thaws upstream, the riparian zones are transformed into swamps for more or less prolonged periods. The mouth of the Amur (4,500 km.; basin of 2.1 million sq. km.) is also blocked by ice for about six months, and the regime of the Huang He (4,100 km.; basin of 1 million sq. km.) is too irregular; its powerful alluvial deposits have caused frequent breaches and changes of course (nine times in historical times, the last in 1852, when the mouth shifted from the Yellow Sea to the Gulf of Pei-chi) and incalculable destruction. By contrast, the largest of the Chinese rivers, the Yangtze (5,200 km.; basin of 1.8 million sq. km.), rich in water and navigable by vessels for more than half its length in every season, represents the most important artery of all Eastern Asia; with its numerous tributaries, it is certainly the most traveled basin in the world.
The Indochinese rivers (Irrawaddy, Menam, Salween, Mekong) also enjoy abundant flow, but with notable irregularity both in regime (floods) and in bed profile (rapids and cascades). A striking contrast exists between the two great Indian rivers, the Indus and the Ganges-Brahmaputra: the former, poor in water, little navigable, and flowing through sparsely populated territories (3,200 km.; basin of 1 million sq. km.), the latter privileged by abundant and regular flow, more navigable and used for irrigation (in one of the most fertile regions of the continent) perhaps more than any other river in the world (3,000 km.; basin of 1.7 million sq. km.). Of lesser but still notable importance are the "twin" rivers Euphrates and Tigris, whose wise utilization made possible, in ancient times, the flourishing of Mesopotamian civilizations.
Of the many lakes with which Asia is rich, most belong to internal basins, not excluding the Caspian, which, due to its proportions (440,000 sq. km.) and characteristics (remnant of a much larger sea), forms a category of its own. The Aral (64,500 sq. km.) and Baikal (33,000 sq. km.) are among the most notable; the latter, which is also the deepest on Earth (1,521 m.), is at the same time the greatest known cryptodepression, its bed descending to 1,045 m. below sea level.
The climatic characteristics of Asia and their great variety are essentially determined by: the considerable latitudinal extent of the continent (from the pole to the equator); the pronounced continentality of its mass; the arrangement and energy of the relief; and finally the action of the monsoons. These are periodic winds determined by the regular seasonal contrast (mawsim, in Arabic, meaning "season") between the differing heating and cooling of the compact continental mass and the adjacent Indian Ocean, blowing during the boreal winter as cool, dry winds from land to sea (NE monsoon), and during the summer semester in the opposite direction (SW monsoon), bringing in this case, laden with moisture, the benefit of rain to an extremely vast area (from the coasts of Arabia to Japan). In monsoonal Southern and Southeast Asia, where temperatures are generally rather high with modest thermal ranges, the year is divided into two seasons, the dry and the rainy, separated by two brief periods of inversion (usually in April and October), during which frequent and terrible storms (typhoons of the China Seas) occur. On the southern slopes of the Himalayas, up to 12 m. of annual rainfall have been recorded (the maximum recorded on Earth). Rainfall is also abundant and occurs in every season in Indonesia, where temperatures remain constantly high throughout the year (equatorial oceanic climate). Toward the west, from India and the Caspian to the Aegean, the Mediterranean climate prevails, with mild winters, hot and dry summers, and scarce winter rains, which become even scarcer on the internal plateaus cut off from maritime influence (Anatolia, Arabia, Iran). Toward the northwest from these arid zones, one gradually passes into the climates of Central Asia, which extend over a good third of the continent: more than the thermal contrasts between long, harsh winters and brief, hot summers, their character is defined by general aridity, even at higher altitudes (Tibet). Northern Asia, from the Urals to the Amur, has even longer and harsher winters (at Oimekon, in the Indigirka basin, there is a winter average of −48°; this is the so-called "cold pole"), and brief summers with equally scarce precipitation, but in southern Siberia climatic conditions moderate and rainfall increases sufficiently to make cultivation possible.
The roughly north-to-south zonal distribution of climates corresponds to that of natural vegetation. The periarctic boreal region, with persistently frozen soil, falls within the domain of the tundra, bleak in winter, vividly blooming and green with mosses and lichens during the sunny summer. South of the Arctic Circle stretches the vast coniferous forest (taiga), covering almost all of Siberia over a width ranging from 1,000 to 2,300 km. (and thus the largest in the world): a refuge for inexhaustible wildlife (fur-bearing animals, wolves, brown bears). At the expense of the forest, Russian colonization has developed, in the more suitable southern regions, livestock farming and the European crops of the cold zone. With gradual transition, the taiga gives way, toward the south, first to the steppe and then to the desert, forming an almost continuous zone stretching from the Red Sea to the
of Asia, including Arabia, Anatolia, Persia, Turan, and Central Asia as far as the vast arid Gobi Desert, whose natural vocation is nomadic pastoralism (sheep and camels; Central Asia seems to be the original home of the camel, while the anterior Asia is the home of the dromedary). However, part of this region (through irrigation and oases) has been made suitable for cultivation (cereals, cotton: Tarim, Russian Turkestan). The remaining Asia covers barely one-third of the continent’s area but contains about one-tenth of its population. It includes, alongside the savannas of monsoon lands and the evergreen maquis of subtropical regions—which, both in the west (Anterior Asia) and in the east (southern China, southwestern Japan)—have now been transformed by agriculture—quite extensive tracts of equatorial forest that still cover the interior parts of the Malay Archipelago and various regions of the same continent (Malacca, Indochina). In these regions, the fauna is as exuberant as the flora (large felines, elephants, rhinoceroses, monkeys, reptiles, etc.; great abundance and variety of birds in the subtropical regions of Asia), though it gradually diminishes as one moves from the equatorial and monsoon zones toward the peripheral subtropical regions.
Altogether, of Asia’s area, a little more than one-fifth is occupied by steppes, pastures, and meadows; less than one-fourth by maquis and forests; roughly one-fifth or slightly more by arable land; the remainder is unproductive (20%).
Asia contains more than half of the entire world population—between 1,250 and 1,300 million people—which would give an average density of barely 28 inhabitants per square kilometer (a little more than half of Europe’s). It must be borne in mind, however, that these are largely estimates, since several Asian countries lack regular censuses (consider, for example, populous China), and the distribution of this mass is in fact highly uneven. India, China, and Japan alone account for three-fourths to four-fifths of the total, with densities in certain areas, even those not particularly restricted, exceeding 500 and even 1,000 inhabitants per square kilometer. Yet alongside these enormous human anthills, there are much vaster areas that are sparsely populated or even uninhabited: densities of less than one inhabitant per square kilometer, and sometimes fewer than one per 10 square kilometers, characterize the tundra and taiga of Siberia, the steppes and deserts of the west and center, as well as the highest parts of the great mountain systems. By contrast, the average density for monsoon Asia is about 100 inhabitants per square kilometer, while for the rest of Asia—no less than three-fourths of the continent—the figure is twenty times smaller (5–6 per square kilometer).
Asia is considered the cradle of humanity; from it, in historical times, various waves of peoples migrated: the Ugro-Finns, Tartars, Turks, Huns, etc., toward Europe; the Arabs toward Africa; and the Jews in all directions. All three of the major racial groups now generally recognized (White, Yellow, Black) are represented in Asia, but roughly two-thirds of its population belongs to the Yellow or Mongoloid race (so much so that this continent is often called, by antonomasia, the Yellow Continent). Among these, the numerically dominant branches are the two eastern ones—the Sino-Tibetans and the Koreans and Japanese—while the western branch (Turks, Turkomans, Tartars, Kirghiz) and the central (Mongols in the strict sense and Manchus) and northern branches (the Paleoasiatics: Samoyeds, Tungus, Yakuts, Kamchadals), which are more widely dispersed but thinner on the ground, mostly live a nomadic life and sometimes in primitive conditions.
The Europid group penetrates Asia from the west in two long intrusions: an ancient one in the south, from the Mediterranean to the Bay of Bengal, composed of Armenians, Iranians, and Hindus; and a more recent one in the north, stretching like a slender strip from the Urals to the Pacific (Slavs). These branches are, in a sense, spatially connected by the original, confused nucleus of the Caucasians. It may be estimated that the Whites in Asia number about 320–350 million. As for the Malays, who populate most of the Australasian islands and are sometimes considered a mixed race (a cross between Mongoloids and Negrids), they probably number no less than 70 million. Another area of ethnic mixing is represented by the southern part of the vast region where Asia and Europe meet; a third, even more evident, is India, where, alongside remnants of primitive populations (the Vedda of Ceylon), there is a fairly substantial branch (200 million) of Negrids or Indomelanesians (eastern regions) whose position is still uncertain. Races that are difficult to classify are found, moreover, scattered throughout Asia: in northern Japan (the Ainu), in the Philippines (Negritos), in the Andamans (Mincopies), etc.
Asia was the cradle of all the most widespread religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam originated on the edge of the Arabian Desert; Brahmanism and Buddhism in India; Confucianism and Taoism in China; Shintoism in Japan. It is therefore not surprising that Asia presents, in this regard, a picture no less varied than it is complex. Confucians (370 million), Hindus (280 million), and Buddhists (270 million) alone account for four-fifths of the continent’s population, with the first group prevailing in southeastern Asia from Annam to Korea and in proper China, the second in India, and the third from Burma to Indochina. Islam dominates southwestern Asia, with significant nuclei in India and Indonesia; its adherents, according to the most reliable sources, number between 200 and 250 million. No less than 50 million probably adhere to the primitive religions still preserved among the peoples of the far north and in the interior of India, Indochina, and the major islands. A separate and considerable group, even in numbers (18–20 million), is formed by the Shintoists of Japan; relatively small (perhaps one million) and rather scattered are the Jews, though most of them are settled in Anterior Asia.
As for Christians, they probably represent no more than one twenty-fifth of Asia’s population (50 million souls); barely one sixtieth are Catholics (20 million), mainly in the Philippines and Anterior Asia. Most of the Christians on the continent (25 million) are Orthodox (Minor Asia, Siberia); Protestants are scattered throughout, and, like Catholics, have founded numerous missions in southern and southeastern Asia. It need hardly be said that all these statistical data must be received with great caution, given the varying and often questionable reliability of the sources from which they derive.
In the context of the world economy, Asia occupies a position that is, on the whole, disproportionate to its size, potential, and population.
With regard to mineral production, Asia dominates the international market only in tin (over 90% of the world total, from British Malaya, China, and Indochina), and its share in petroleum is significant (though less than one-fourth of the world total, mainly from the Caucasus, Arabia, and Iraq). As for coal, even taking into account Soviet production (which still comes largely from European regions), the amount extracted in Asia probably does not reach one-fourth of the world total. Asia’s share in all other products most sought after in international trade is modest or even negligible (we note only about 40% for tungsten; lead at one-tenth, antimony at one-fourth or one-fifth).
Cattle raising is substantial in India (which has more than any other country in the world) and in China; with over 200 million head, Asia accounts for about 30% of the world’s livestock. Goats (50% of the world total) and sheep (12%) are widely distributed, especially in India, China, and the Near East; pigs (the continent, including the U.S.S.R., possesses nearly two-thirds of the world total) are found chiefly in China (which holds the absolute lead with more than one-third of the global total). Among draft and pack animals, aside from the extreme northern regions (reindeer and dogs), cattle and buffaloes (with 62 million head, the latter represent 98% of the world’s stock) prevail in monsoon Asia, where elephants are also employed for the same purpose; horses (30 million head; one-third of the world total: U.S.S.R., China, and India), donkeys (16 million head; over one-third: China, India, U.S.S.R.), and mules (26%; chiefly in China and Manchuria) in the central territories north of the desert belt and in eastern Asia; camels (one-quarter of the world total: China, U.S.S.R., India) in the arid regions of the center, except Tibet, where the yak is used (but only for transport).
Among animal products, silk must be noted, whose cultivation is highly developed throughout eastern Asia; the continent produces certainly more than four-fifths of the world’s raw silk. While Asia’s contribution to meat, wool, and milk is modest, the output of sea fishing is rich (perhaps two-thirds of the world total), long a favored occupation of the populations of Japan (in this respect leading all states), China, and Malaya.
While handicrafts have ancient traditions in Asia (China, Japan, India) and still supply objects of artistic merit and wide renown, the development of modern large-scale industry has been late and recent everywhere. Only Japan, China, and central Siberia can be counted among industrial countries, though, with the exception of the first, these are partial transformations and productions intended at least partly to meet domestic consumption. In international trade, therefore, Asia’s participation remains modest: from one-seventh to one-sixth of the total value before the recent world war. This trade has essentially rested and still rests on the exchange of raw materials for manufactured goods, of which the only major continental suppliers are Japan and the U.S.S.R.
The extensive political fragmentation of Asia, its physical structure, and its economic development explain why, while trade has largely retained traditional systems, international commerce is concentrated in southern and eastern Asia. The busiest sea routes connect these regions to Europe via the Red Sea (Suez Canal); the importance of the Pacific is nonetheless growing as a consequence of the Second World War. The most active ports (excluding the U.S.S.R.) are all south of the 40th parallel (Izmir, Beirut, Aden, Bombay, Madras, Colombo, Calcutta, Rangoon, Singapore, Batavia, Manila, Hong Kong, Canton, Shanghai, Nagasaki, Kobe, and Yokohama). As for internal communications, railways were introduced to Asia relatively late, and their development has been slow. With about 170,000 km of track, Asia ranks last among the continents in terms of railway density relative to population (1.4 km of railway per 10,000 inhabitants), and the four sectors containing most of the lines (Indian, Japanese, Russian, Chinese) neither connect nor complement one another. It is now possible, however, to travel by train from Europe to the Persian Gulf, Turkestan (Turksib), Korea, and China (Trans-Siberian) with regular services; for almost all other parts of the continent, equally rapid and convenient motor services are available, and even faster air links now connect all the main Asian centers with those of the Old and New Worlds. Though distances are thus everywhere overcome or shortened, much of the continent (central and northern Asia) remains isolated from modern traffic, and its development will certainly engage the efforts of many generations.
Asia, whose peoples have constituted since the remotest antiquity great and well-ordered political organisms and have at various times included parts of Europe itself, had, on the eve of the First World War, more than half of its territory subject to European states. These maintained long-standing flourishing colonies of exploitation, in which a narrow aristocracy of rulers dominated vast masses of indigenous populations, whose traditional and often original ways of life Western civilization has not always been able to permeate or alter. The past century, however, with its economic evolution and its great political and social conflicts, has everywhere first fostered closer collaboration between the local element and the rulers, and then a broader and more effective autonomy and independence for the ruled.
Taking into account recent changes in the political status of territories under British authority or influence (India, Burma, Ceylon, Transjordan), nearly one-tenth of the area and over one-tenth of Asia’s population are de jure independent, excluding from the reckoning Russian Asia, which alone absorbs nearly two-fifths of the continent’s surface but barely one-thirtieth, or slightly more, of its population (and, moreover, the recognized national autonomy finds a reflection, albeit external, in the federal structure of the Soviet state). If we then include among the independent states Palestine, the Dutch East Indies, and the Indochinese Federation—none of which can any longer be described as colonial—the proportions reduce European rule in Asia to a mere 2.4% of the territory and 1.4% of the population, that is, in essence, to residual enclaves, the most important of which are British (Ceylon and the Malayan Union above all).
It must nonetheless be noted that the de facto situation often differs from the legal one, not only in the territories recently granted independence but also in those long considered such (Afghanistan, Arabia, China, Iran, Iraq, Mongolia, Nepal, Thailand), whose domestic policies are closely tied to the fortunes of the ongoing or latent conflict among the principal extra-Asian powers (including above all the U.S.S.R.). Only with this reservation can the following statistical overview of the continent be given.
| Territory | Area (sq km) | Population |
|-------------------|--------------|------------|
| Afghanistan | 650,000 | 12,000,000 |
| Arabia | 2,800,000 | 9,000,000 |
| Burma | 604,721 | 16,824,000 |
| China | 9,240,000 | 463,200,000|
| Korea | 220,788 | 27,200,000 |
| Philippines | 296,285 | 19,511,000 |
| Japan | 382,253 | 78,025,000 |
| Iran | 1,643,558 | 15,000,000 |
| Iraq | 452,500 | 4,611,000 |
| Outer Mongolia | 1,612,000 | 900,000 |
| Nepal | 140,000 | 7,000,000 |
| Lebanon | 10,170 | 1,146,793 |
| Syria | 171,104 | 2,901,316 |
| Thailand | 513,447 | 17,359,000 |
| Transjordan | 89,975 | 340,000 |
| Asian Turkey | 743,500 | 17,600,000 |
| Independent Asia | 19,570,301 | 692,618,109|
| Asian U.S.S.R. | 17,030,000 | 43,200,000 |
### Inhabitants
| Region | Area (sq km) | Population |
|-----------------------|--------------|------------|
| Indostan | 4,095,686 | 400,000,000 |
| Pakistan | | |
| Cyprus | 9,282 | 462,000 |
| Bhutan | 46,600 | 250,000 |
| Aden, Perim and Dependencies | 15,200 | 150,000 |
| Ceylon | 65,905 | 6,880,000 |
| Singapore | 730 | 950,000 |
| Federated Malay States| 131,193 | 4,780,000 |
| British Borneo | 190,567 | 860,000 |
| Hong Kong and Kowloon | 980 | 1,750,000 |
| Palestine | 26,158 | 1,912,000 |
| British India | 4,582,401 | 417,994,000 |
| Portuguese India | 513 | 346,150 |
| French Indochina | 740,400 | 23,850,000 |
| French Asia | 740,913 | 24,196,150 |
| Goa, Daman and Diu | 3,983 | 625,000 |
| Macao | 16 | 375,000 |
| Timor and Cambing | 18,990 | 500,000 |
| Portuguese Asia | 22,989 | 1,500,000 |
| Dutch Asia | 1,488,000 | 71,534,000 |
| Greek Islands in Asia | 7,050 | 460,000 |
| Sinai (Egypt) | 61,000 | 30,000 |
| Inland Seas | 505,746 | |
| Total | 44,008,423 | 1,251,532,259 |
Asia. — Carved wooden gilded crucifix. Zikpuri, China. Rome, Pontifical Missionary Ethnological Museum of the Lateran.
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II. Ethnography and Religions
1. From an anthropological perspective, the following racial groups may be identified in the Asian continent:
a) the Pygmies, of very small stature, confined to the extreme southern limits (Malacca, Andaman Islands, Philippines);
b) the Pygmoids, of small stature, differentiated by various evident admixtures; represented in the north by the Eskimos, Lapps, Ainu, etc., and in the south by the Vedda, Dravidians, etc.;
c) the Indo-Afghanics, of large build;
d) the Turkic-Tatarics, of medium stature, occupying the western part of Central Asia;
e) the Mongols, characterized by prominent cheekbones.
2. Linguistically, the following groups are noteworthy:
a) the Old Pygmy group (Negritos, Andamanese);
b) the Paleo-Asiatic group (Ainu, Yukaghir);
c) the Dravidian group;
d) the Tibeto-Chinese group;
e) the Austro-Asiatic group;
f) the Indo-European group;
g) the Ural-Altaic group;
h) the Semitic-Hamitic group.
3. Ethnologically, a growing specialization can be observed:
a) the primordial culture of hunting and gathering is represented by the Pygmies;
b) the Arctic culture may be considered a particular phase of the preceding;
c) the pastoral culture is richly present in the great northern steppes;
d) the totemistic-patriarchal culture is found among the western tribes;
e) finally, there remain the great mixed cultures: Indian, Chinese, Japanese.
All these cultures have, for a very long time, been more or less firmly crystallized; only recently, following the encounter with modern European civilization, have the great mixed cultures embarked on a new ascending path.
For the major non-Christian religions of Asia, see the entries: BRAHMINISM; BUDDHISM; CONFUCIANISM; JAINISM; HINDUISM; ISLAMISM; LAMAISM; PARSI-ISM; SHINTOISM; TAOISM; VEDISM.
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III. Asia in the Bible
The term never designates the entire continent. In the Books of the Maccabees, it refers to the Seleucid kingdom: the first to be given the title of "King of Asia" was Antiochus III (223–187 BC: 1 Macc. 8:6), and his successors also received it (ibid. 11:13; 12:31; 13:32; 2 Macc. 3:3), though under Antiochus III the Seleucid kingdom retained only Syria and Cilicia from the Asian provinces of Alexander the Great.
In the New Testament, Asia (Acts 2:9; 4:9; 16:6; 19:10, 22, 26; 20:4, 16, 18; 21:27; 24:19; 27:2; Rom. 16:5; 1 Cor. 16:9; 2 Cor. 1:8; 2 Tim. 1:15; 1 Pet. 1:1; Rev. 1–3) refers to the Roman province of Asia (established in 129 BC), which occupied part of Asia Minor. In the 1st century, it included Mysia, Lydia, Caria, and western Phrygia (Cibyra, Apamea, and Synnada), and from 27 BC onward was governed by the Senate through a proconsul residing in Ephesus. In Rev. 1:4, 11, John addresses the "seven churches that are in Asia," listing them as Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea; however, he omits Colossae, Hierapolis, Magnesia, Tralles, Miletus, and others. In the New Testament, the term sometimes assumes a narrower sense; for example, in the Acts of the Apostles it often refers solely to the region around Ephesus.
The term *Asiarch* (Acts 19:31; cf. elsewhere *Bithynarch*, *Galatarca*) derives from Asia (the proconsular province). This magistrate, in the presence of the proconsul, presided over the annual provincial assembly of delegates from all the cities (the *Koinon* or *Commune Asiae*), where the cult of Rome and the emperor was celebrated, and provincial matters were deliberated. The office was distinct from that of the *Archiereus*, the high priest, though occasionally the two roles were united in the same individual.
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IV. Christianity in Asia
### Ancient Period
For the spread of Christianity in the Asian continent during antiquity, see the entries: ARABIA; ARMENIA; ASIA MINOR; CHINA; INDIA; PERSIA.
### Medieval and Modern Periods
#### I. From the 13th to the 15th Century
In the 13th century, after the conquest of the Germanic tribes of the North, it seemed that the Church was doomed to remain confined within the borders of Europe, with no possibility of expanding into the vast pagan world. To the south of Europe, Islamic states had erected an unbreakable barrier between the Mediterranean countries and Africa, while Eastern Christianity, severing its ties with Rome, had closed every path of the Church to the populations of the Asian interior. Only a new event, or a complex of events, could alter this deadlocked situation.
The new development was the impetuous invasion of the Mongols,
who, while seeming likely to threaten the very destruction of Christendom,
in fact broke down that dividing wall, rendering possible the passage of
Christian Occident to the distant East. The Church could thus resume
its expansive programme for the benefit of these new peoples, all the
more fervently in that, through the Mongol incursions, these peoples
had revealed themselves as numerous, powerful, and—so it was rumoured—
also receptive to evangelical preaching. Events would demonstrate that
this last supposition was not accurate (v. MISSIONS, history), but the
notable phenomenon remains of the Church’s coming into contact with
the Eastern world, all the more interesting at a time when Christendom
was in the grip of terror before the advance of those savage hordes, an
advance which, though twice avoided, could not for that reason be
considered permanently averted. A contact between two worlds, which,
effected through the initiative of the papacy—not least meritorious were
the popes of the Avignon period—did not bring about the hoped-for
Christian conquest of those peoples, nor their alliance against the nearer
Muslim peril, and failed at that time to bring those nations permanently
into the general and living movement of Christendom; it did, however,
succeed in establishing stable relations between Europe and Asia, which
learned to know one another, with incalculable benefits for geographical
and ethnographic science.
It cannot, however, be denied that the religious advantages of this
apostolate were entirely lacking. Christianity was not established in the
East, but missions were established, and all the routes of Asia were
marked by small Christian beacons, destined in time to mature into
firmly rooted Christian communities, if not yet dominant, in that vast
then-unexplored world.
The principal agents of this Christian advance into Asia were the two
new mendicant Orders of the Franciscans and the Dominicans. The
century from the mid-1300s to the mid-1400s—from the journey of
Giovanni da Pian de’ CARAITI (v.) MARIGNOLLI, GIOVANNI (v.)—marks the
most significant stages and the creation of bishoprics.
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The situation was definitively closed, and on the other hand the land
routes through Persia, the Kipchak and Turkestan had become almost
impossible: the sowing of missionary outposts suffered a halt. Even here,
to resume the journey, some grand providential event was needed, which
was not long in coming through the enterprise of a young and bold
European power, Portugal.
2. From the 15th to the 18th Century
The event was the discovery of the sea route to the Indies (1497–98) with the doubling of the Cape of Good Hope. By that route the Portuguese navigators and missionaries launched forth, and for a century and a half they would hold undisputed monopoly over colonial and missionary activity in Asia. Whatever judgement may be passed upon this from the methodological-missionary standpoint—an evaluation that would be out of place here (v. MISSIONS, history)—this is undoubtedly the first great apostolic period on a broad horizon and of vast scope in the history of the apostolate: a period that realises the Christian take-up of Asia and sees the emergence of the most eminent missionary personalities: St Francis Xavier (v.), who was the initiator of the new missionary era, Ricci (v.), de Nobili (v.). All the great Asian countries that still today constitute that historic continent—India, China, Japan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Tibet—saw their land and sea routes, their coastal and inland cities traversed by the Catholic missionary, who studied their languages, their customs, adopted their usages, and sought to infuse, or at least attempted to infuse, into those civilisations so remote from our own the universal religion of Christ. Thus arose—fruit and hope alike of this activity—on Asian soil at the most strategic points the first cells of Christian life that branched out and multiplied. The 16th century is the century of the creation of the great Asian dioceses, of which the very first—Funchal (1514) and Goa (1534)—comprised, besides all of Asia, also Africa, with which the apostolate had come into contact. In 1558 Goa was divided to create Cochin and Malacca (which extended as far as Japan), in 1579 the dioceses of Macao and Manila were created, and in 1587 that of Funai, by which we have the official take-up of the five major Asian regions: India, Indochina, China, the Philippines and Japan. From these four original centres, or even independently of them, the apostolic vicariates of Propaganda, not bound to Portuguese patronage, developed from the 17th century and in the following centuries the other minor, less extensive but more fruitful centres, which marked the other stages of the journey, in extension and in depth, of the apostolate in the Eastern world.Depth, however, was relative, with diverse, alternating and always hard-
won vicissitudes. The 17th and 18th centuries were indeed the centuries
of the hardest experiences for the Church regarding the ease or difficulty
of the true conquest of those Eastern civilisations long won over to
Hinduism and Buddhism. And so came the rupture: the three greatest
Far Eastern countries isolated themselves from the West, banning the
messengers of Christianity. To render the enterprise ever more arduous,
there supervened in the 18th century—in addition to the disorientating
question of the Chinese Rites (v. CHINESE RITES), which had opened in
the 17th century—further complications of a religious-political nature:
the suppression of the Society of Jesus, with the consequent personal
depletion of the missions; the controversy over the jurisdiction of the
apostolic vicars, opposed by the supporters of Portuguese missionary
policy; the struggle of the Protestant Powers against Catholic missions;
and lastly the French Revolution, which broke the bridges between the
two worlds.
From the 18th to the 20th Century. — With the 19th-century Restoration, the Church, despite the continued state of persecution in at least three of those countries, turned once more to Indochina and the Far East, toward which its zeal instinctively drew II. The new task of Christianity in Asia, however, was extremely difficult, not only because of the prevailing prejudices in those lands following the events just mentioned, but also because the question of penetrating those territories, hermetically closed to foreigners, arose anew. Moreover, it was no longer a matter of mere geographical impenetrability, but of political impenetrability, which was far more difficult to overcome. Indeed, the obstacle—which concerned not only the Church but the civilized States of Europe—was forcibly removed, but precisely this provoked in the missions, as such, the antipathy and hatred naturally aroused by every imposition. Thus, the resumption of missionary activity took place in an atmosphere of distrust, which increasingly colored their religious, evangelizing, and charitable efforts with political overtones.
Yet not all the balance sheet was negative in this period. The missions, equipped and sustained with personnel and resources as never before, and officially tolerated if not recognized, greatly extended their sphere of influence within Asia. While they did not achieve success among the religiously dominant environments of Islam and Buddhism, they gathered a modest harvest among the smaller peoples and, in any case, attracted the attention—often even the admiration—of the upper classes and indigenous governments. The widespread movement of renewal that the great organized religions of Asia have initiated since the end of the last century and continue in this one, both from a doctrinal standpoint and, above all, from an ethical one—seeking to minimize the aspects that conflict with Christianity, sometimes adopting its terminology, and often copying its charitable activities—is an indication of the undoubted, albeit indirect, influence that the missions have exerted and continue to exert on Asian thought.
It is true that the formidable problem of deeply penetrating the strongholds of those religions, which count millions upon millions of adherents, remains. In other words, the ancient problem of the moral conquest of Asia, whose aridity, evident in the preceding period, had provoked the noted controversies, still persists. Today, however, the question presents itself under new and more promising conditions, inasmuch as there is no longer any fear of the resurgence of old disputes or their dismissal with hasty measures. The question of studying methods or adaptation has imposed itself upon the missionary world, from top to bottom, as the times and experiences have matured II. Truly grand strides have been made along the path of that long-sought conquest, such as the creation of indigenous hierarchies (v. INDIGENO, CLERO, questione del) in China, Indochina, India, Japan, and Korea, and the abolition of the oath for the Malabaric and Chinese rites, as well as the permission of civil ceremonies in China and Japan (v. GIAPPONE). It seems that other notable innovations are under consideration, while the most recent events will impose and, to a certain extent, facilitate their adoption. For this reason, it may be said that the foundations for the Christian conquest of Asia have been securely laid. — See Plates XI–XIV.
GIOVANNI B. TRAGELLA