136 The Han Kitab Authors
Learning of Islam), and the Xizhen zhengda 希真正答 dated 1658.
He also composed another short text, Shengyu 剩語 (Addendum), a
collection of forty-six dialogues with a Buddhist monk.^48
At a later stage of his life, Wang left Nanjing and moved to Bei-
jing, where he was supported by a rich Chinese Muslim. Before his
death he worked there for several years as a teacher in a Chinese
Muslim school in Sanlihe 三里河 (in modern Beijing), where he
was buried.^49
Wang’s texts are short and explanatory. Two are constructed
dialogically, as sets of questions and answers. In all his works he
includes short quotations from hadith and the Qur’an, with exe-
getical commentary. This literary style is a direct reflection of his
experiences as a teacher in the classroom. Many of the questions
posed in his works are likely the actual questions of students. As
his own teacher described him, Wang was very good at explaining
concepts to students and at translating from the Arabic and Persian
to Chinese. Evidently, his books were based directly on his experi-
ences as teacher and probably intended to be used in the classroom
by other teachers. Wang was not attempting systematically to
hammer out a basic curriculum for Chinese Muslim schools in
general, nor was he trying to develop a systematic explication of
Muslim thought and philosophy. In the introduction to his first
book, Wang wrote that his primary interest lay in helping his col-
leagues better understand Islam, to “save them from [the] mistakes”
he used to hear in the classroom.^50 Nevertheless, many of the con-
cepts that Wang’s works explicate were later used and developed
by subsequent authors.
Wang’s work is the best example we have of original authorship
in the Chinese Muslim educational system taking place, as it were,
“on the ground.” That is, Wang’s work was not necessarily in-
tended to have a wide-ranging impact, and its initial purpose was
simply to foster the development of Wang’s own students and of
—————
48. The Shengyu never appeared as a separate text, hence its title. It is included
in ZQX, pp. 305 – 21. See also Leslie, Islamic Literature in Chinese, p. 24.
49. Tazaka, Chūgoku ni okeru Kaikyō, p. 1367. See also Wang’s biography in
HRZ (Qingdai), p. 38.
50. Wang Daiyu, “Zixu,” in ZQX, p. 17.