With some productive Googling queries I came up with this:
The word ‘Mormon’ does not sound good in Chinese. (Muo men vs. Muo guei, which means ‘Devil.’) The official name of the Church in Chinese was recently changed from ‘Last days’ to ‘later-period days’ because it is a more acceptable term here." Tthe Book of Mormon has been re-translated into Chinese, and that the new translation now corrects problems with the old translation of the word “Mormon:” it is now “translated Muo Er Men rather than Muo Men. This is good because it now looks like a transliteration of an English word rather than a term with meaning itself.”
More here:
China and the Church
and
Looking Through the Gates of Hell: Examining a Curious Linguistic Claim
The truth is revealed in examination of the name of the Mormon church when spelled out in Chinese characters. “In Chinese, ‘Mormon’ means ‘gates of hell,’” reports Ed Decker in his popular exposè, The God Makers.1
First, the actual name of the Church is not even “Mormon” (popular though that nickname may be). Rather, it is “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” In Chinese, this is rendered as:
http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/chname.gif
In Mandarin (the majority, or “official” dialect in the People’s Republic of China and in Taiwan), this is pronounced Yesu Jidu Moshi Shengtu Jiaohui. Literally, taking the characters two at a time (these are all two-character words), “Jesus Christ Last-days Saint Church.”
Second, even looking at the nickname, “Mormon,” it is rendered into Chinese thus:
http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/chnick.gif
Pronounced Momen Jiao, these three characters are very plain to understand. The first two characters, mo and men were simply chosen to represent the sounds of the English word “Mormon,” and have no actual meaning other than to allow transliteration of this proper noun into Chinese. The last one, jiao (short for jiaohui) simply means (in this context) “church,” and is the suffix found at the end of nearly every Christian denomination, from Catholics (Tianzhu Jiao) to Presbyterians (Zhanglao Jiao), and even such faiths as Judaism (Youtai Jiao), Taoism (Dao Jiao) and Islam (Hui Jiao).
The individual characters themselves do have meanings, and it’s not too difficult to see how the middle character, men, visually suggests a “door” or “gate,” and indeed if it were standing as a word by itself that would in fact be its meaning. However, it is not standing alone, but is merely the second syllable of another word. Hence, it doesn’t mean “gate” in this context any more than the English words “brotherhood” and “neighborhood” refer to varieties of head coverings, whatever the word “hood” may mean in other contexts. In fact, the character men is found in many other Chinese words, including “lightswitch” (dianmen).
The Devil, You Say?
The heart of the controversy, then, lies with the initial character, mo. How does one get the idea that this means “hell” or “Satan,” leading to the “hell’s gate” or “Satan’s gate” accusation? The most likely character in Chinese to have this connotation is:5
etc.
James
