This paper treated the problem of ancestral rite which was memorized as the most unsavory incident in East Asian Catholic Church history from the perspective of conceptual history. Since the decree of ＜Ex Qui Singulari> Catholic authorities prohibited Confucian ancestral rite among the East Asian Catholics. Nevertheless Korean Catholics would not abandon their endeavor to discharge the religious responsibilities through the practice of commemorating and celebrating their defunct ancestors. They continued the ancestral rite by inventing a new styled catholic litany for the dead, so to speak, `Yeon Do`(Prayers for the Soul in the purgatory). If it would be successful, it needed to establishing and elaborating the concept of purgatory. As Jacques Le Goff, french historian, shows it in the 12th centuries European context, the doctrine of purgatory was invented for considering the dead in the otherworld which could be estimated as a transitional state or location between Heaven and Hell.
When the imagination of purgatory encountered the East Asian religious tradition, what happened? This question evoked me some exciting ideas. Who translated the concept of purgatory? What kind of chinese terminology was chosen? In selecting those words what took place in their thought? For replying to these questions I gathered some chinese, japanese and korean catholic catechisms published from the 15th century to the 19th century. And then for making sure of the East Asian particularities an additional comparison of the 15th century`s Tridentine catechism is added. Some arguments that I would insist are as in the following.
1. Jesuit missionaries in the 15th century Japan did not translate the notion of purgatory, they preferred to the style respecting the original pronunciation.
2. Jesuit missionaries, e.g. Michele Ruggieri, Manuel Dias, Gaspar Ferreira, etc. who lived in the 16th century China translated it into the concept of `Yeon Ok`(Purifying Hell).
3. Korean Catholics received it through reading the Chinese catechisms.
4. Some Chinese catechisms evidently explained the doctrine of purgatory, but the others omitted it intentionally. From this fact, we could suppose that there was a sort of double system of catechism in East Asian Catholic context.
5. Henceforward it is necessary to analyse the ritual manuals containing the prayers for the souls in purgatory and the funeral and ancestral rites in the 18th and 19th centuries.