154 The Han Kitab Authors
Another example, from an earlier period, is Ma Xiong 馬雄,
also a military jinshi and a commander in Guangxi province during
the 1660 s and the early 1670 s.^99 Shortly after his appointment to the
position, Ma Xiong established a Muslim school and mosque in the
city of Yangzhou (near modern Guilin). He proceeded to invite all
of China’s best-known Muslim scholars and teachers to come and
work together at his school. Such figures as Chang Yunhua, Li
Yanling, Ma Junshi, Ma Zhiqi, Ma Minglong, and She Yunshan
passed through this school at different points and possibly all met
there together. At least two major Chinese Muslim books—one of
Ma Minglong’s translations and Chang Yunhua’s text on Persian
grammar—were first published with the help of Ma Xiong’s school.
It is possible that financial support for Ma Zhu’s Guide to Islam
came from Ma Xiong, although the text was not composed in
Yangzhou. Ma Xiong’s son, Ma Chengyin, contributed a long
preface ( 1681 ) to the Guide, in which he mentioned many of the
scholars associated with his father’s school.
What Ma Xiong in effect created was a scholarly institute for
Chinese Muslim thinkers, where they were provided the space,
time, and financial support necessary to create their work. Most
important, Ma Xiong’s school provided the occasion for the direct
interaction between a number of teachers, students, and authors.
The texts written by these individuals reflect the community of
knowledge of which they were a part and which Ma Xiong’s ef-
forts supported. The fact that Ma Xiong was a Confucian official
in no way negated his sense of himself as a Muslim. His support of
Chinese Muslim education was an expression of his ongoing con-
nection to the Muslim community, one that in its focus on literati
activity was entirely in keeping both with his understanding of his
role as Muslim and with his role as Confucian official.^100
Finally, as way of concluding this discussion of the rise of au-
thorship and book-based culture as key phenomena among the
—————
99. Ma Xiong was a jinshi of 1651. In 1661 he became the commandant of
Guangxi and around then started patronizing Islamic scholars and teachers; see his
biography in HRZ (Qingdai), pp. 74 – 80.
100. On Ma Xiong’s activities as a patron, see Bai Shouyi’s study “Liuzhou Yi-
silan yu Ma Xiong” 柳州伊斯蘭與馬雄 (Islam in Liuzhou and Ma Xiong), in
HRZ (Qingdai), pp. 396 – 412.