RHODES, ALEXANDRE DE

Jesuit missionary to Indochina, b. Avignon, March 15, 1593; d. Nov. 5, 1660. Shortly after his ordination in 1618, de Rhodes was granted by Superior General Mutio Vitelleschi the permission to go to the mission in Japan. De Rhodes's dream of being a missionary in Japan was not to be realized. Because of persecutions in Japan, de Rhodes's superiors thought it wise not to send him there. Instead, they dispatched him to Cochinchina.

With regard to the political situation of vietnam in the 17th century, although there was a king of the Lê dynasty, he was in fact nothing more than a puppet, and real power lay in the hands of two clans; the north, known to the West as Tonkin, was under the Trinh clan, and the center, known then as Cochinchina, under the Nguyen clan. Continuous warfare was conducted between the two rival clans for total control of the country with no definitive results. De Rhodes's entire ministry in Vietnam was carried out during this struggle for power between Tonkin and Cochinchina.

De Rhodes's First Mission in Cochinchina (1624–1626). There were three Jesuit residences in Cochinchina when de Rhodes arrived in the country—Hoi An, Thanh Chiem, and Nuoc Man (Qui Nhon). He was assigned to that of Thanh Chiem to study the language under the guidance of Francisco de Pina. Meanwhile Andrea Palmiero, the Jesuit visitor, was planning to send missionaries to Tonkin. In July 1626, de Rhodes and Père Marques were recalled to macau to prepare for their mission in Tonkin.

De Rhodes's Mission in Tonkin (1627–1630). On March 1627, the two missionaries embarked a Portuguese merchant ship for Tonkin and arrived at Cua Bang (today Ba Lang) on March 19, 1627. Shortly afterwards, they met Lord Trinh Trang, who was on his way to wage war against Cochinchina. When Lord Trinh Trang returned in defeat from his military expedition, the missionaries accompanied him to Thang Long (modern Hanoi), the capital, and there began their mission in earnest. The great number of conversions aroused the opposition of eunuchs, Buddhist monks, and the concubines dismissed by their husbands who decided to become Christian. One of the monks accused the missionaries of joining in a plot against Lord Trinh Trang. As a result, on May 28, 1628, Lord Trinh Trang issued a decree forbidding his subjects, under pain of death, to meet with the missionaries and to embrace the religion they preached.

However, the lord tolerated the presence of de Rhodes and Marques in the hope that they would attract Portuguese traders. When the Portuguese ships had not come during the sailing season, the lord expelled the missionaries. In March 1629, they left for the south with the plan to return to Macau. However, in November, when two Jesuits, Gaspar do Amaral and Paul Saito, arrived, de Rhodes and Marques returned to the capital in their company. At first, Lord Trinh Trang tolerated their presence, but after six months, when the Portuguese ship returned to Macau, he ordered them to embark the ship and leave the country.

In May 1630, de Rhodes left Tonkin, never to return. He had worked there for more than three years. By numerical standards alone, his mission had been a huge success: when he left, there were 5,602 Christians. Banished from Tonkin, de Rhodes returned to Macau and stayed there for ten years during which he taught theology at the Madre de Deus College and looked after Chinese Christians. However, in 1639, events in Cochinchina once again made de Rhodes's missionary experience highly desirable. There were then some 15,000 Christians and 20 churches in central Vietnam. In 1639, the lord of Cochinchina, Nguyen Phuoc Lan, who suspected that the missionaries had assisted his brother's rebellion against him, ordered the seven Jesuits to leave the country.

De Rhodes's Second Mission to Cochinchina (1640–1645). Eager to continue the mission in Cochinchina, the new visitor Antonio Rubino canvassed for someone to send there. De Rhodes volunteered and was accepted. De Rhodes's second mission to Cochinchina was divided into four trips and lasted a total of 50 months from 1640 to 1645. As a whole, it was far more difficult and eventful than his mission in Tonkin. Four times he was exiled from the country. During that time, he baptized some 3,400 people, not counting the baptisms administered by his catechists. Compared with his mission in Tonkin which produced 5,602 conversions, de Rhodes's second mission in Cochinchina produced significantly fewer, though it was much longer and much more strenuous (50 versus 38 months). On July 3, 1645, sentenced to perpetual exile from Cochinchina, de Rhodes left Vietnam for Macau.

Return to Rome and the Establishment of the Hierarchy in Vietnam. De Rhodes's superiors in Macao decided that a man of his experience could render a vast service to the missions by going back to Europe to fetch spiritual and temporal help. In December 1645, de Rhodes began his return journey to Rome. Immediately after his arrival on June 27, 1649, he set out to realize his plan of having a hierarchy established in Vietnam. On Sept. 11, 1652, de Rhodes left for Paris where he found three priests of the Société des Bons Amis who were judged worthy candidates for the episcopacy, among whom was François pallu. On learning that Rome was about to send French bishops to Vietnam, Portugal voiced fierce opposition. Meanwhile the Jesuit General, believing that de Rhodes's presence in the project of establishing a hierarchy in Vietnam would prevent it from being realized, decided to make him superior of the Jesuit mission in Persia. On Nov. 16, 1654, de Rhodes left Marseilles for his new mission where he died on Nov. 5,1660.

Achievements. Though not the first to arrive in Vietnam, de Rhodes is often proclaimed the founder of Vietnamese Christianity. No doubt he deserves this accolade. First, he carried out a highly successful mission in both parts of Vietnam, Tonkin and Cochinchina. Secondly, besides two priceless memoirs on the Vietnamese society in the seventeenth century and on the beginnings of Vietnamese Christianity, he published the earliest Vietnamese books in Romanized script (quoc ngu )—the Dictionarium annamiticum, lusitanum, et latinum ope Sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide in lucem editum ab Alexandro de Rhodes è Societate Jesu, ejusdemque Sacrae Congregationis Missionario Apostolico (Rome 1651), and the Cathechismus pro iis, qui volunt suscipere Baptismum, in Octo dies divisus. Phep giang tam ngay cho ke muan chiu phep rua toi, ma beao dao thanh duc Chua Bloi. Ope sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide in lucem editus. Ab Alexandro de Rhodes è Societate Jesu, ejusdemque Sacrae Congregationsi Missionario Apostolico (Rome 1651). Thirdly, he successfully lobbied for the establishment of a hierarchy in Vietnam. Thanks to his persistent efforts, on Sept. 9, 1659, two bishops, Pallu and Pierre Lambert de la motte, were appointed apostolic vicars of Tonkin and Cochinchina respectively.

Bibliography: q. c. do, La mission au Viet-Nam 1624–30 et 1640–45 d'Alexandre de Rhodes, S. J. avignonnais. (Diss., Sorbonne, 1969). p. c. phan, Mission and Catechesis: Alexandre de Rhodes and Inculturation in seventeenth-century Vietnam (Maryknoll 1998).

[p. c. phan]