Yu Yingshi: Confucianism and Everyday Life

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Confucianism has traveled a long and bumpy road throughout the 20th century, and until recent years. By and large, it's a downhill road. Today, as we draw to the end of this century, we should be able to transcend all passions and stereotypes and re-evaluate the role that Confucianism might play in China in the next century. The word "probably" used here is crucial because we must take into account man's subjective efforts. If Chinese continue to see Confucianism as an obstacle to modernization, then our estimation is merely a possibility.

Any estimate of the future of Confucianism cannot but be based on the history of Confucianism; only by contrasting the traditional functions of Confucianism can we try to find a way of integration between Confucianism and modern society.

As we all know, the influence of Confucianism in traditional Chinese society is omnipresent, from individual morality, family ethics, and interpersonal relations to the canonical system of the state and international exchanges, all of which are governed to varying degrees by Confucian principles. From a long-term historical point of view, the greatest contribution of Confucianism has been to provide a stable spiritual foundation for the traditional political and social order.

But the reason why Confucianism can exert such a huge and lasting influence is obviously closely related to the universal institutionalization of Confucian values. From the imperial court ceremonial music and the state canonical system, to the school and general social etiquette, to the family and individual code of conduct, all of which more or less embody the values of Confucianism. As the historian Chen Yinke pointed out: "All public and private actions in political society are related to the code, and the code is the concrete realization of Confucianism." Therefore, in the past two thousand years, the Chinese nation has been most deeply influenced by Confucianism, which is actually the aspect of the system, law, public and private life. My so-called "institutionalization" or Chen Yinke's so-called "codification" are taken in the broadest sense, and unlike those who have said that the establishment of Confucianism is entirely politically motivated, that is, designed for the rule of the emperor. This simple generalization does not correspond to historical facts. Institutionalization in a broad sense is gradually formed in the long-term historical evolution, and its driving force mainly comes from society and people. Nor can we simply separate Confucianism from institutionalization, and then affirm the former and deny the latter. This is the most common tactic used today by Confucian apologists. From a historical point of view, this dichotomy cannot be established. Confucianism and institutionalization are an ideal-reality relationship, so there must be a distance and tension between ideal and reality. But in the concrete historical process, the two are mutually reinforcing. In fact, if it were not for the development of institutionalization, Confucianism would not have become the mainstream of Chinese culture.

No matter how much rationality the Confucian establishment may have been in the traditional era, it has begun to disintegrate completely since the Xinhai Revolution. Confucianism has been forced to retreat from all levels of institutions, including state organization, the education system, and the family system, of which the education system is particularly critical. Confucianism, unlike organized religions, is not centered on church organizations but public and private schools at all levels, while traditional Chinese education is directly integrated with the imperial examination system. The abolition of the imperial examination in 1905 was one of the earliest signs of the disintegration of the Confucian system, which preceded the Xinhai Revolution.

It is an undeniable fact that the Confucian establishment cannot adapt to modern society. The rise of new schools is naturally a major improvement. But with it came the diminishing weight of the basic Confucian classics in the new-style education. In the early years of the Republic of China, many sutras and Confucius words and deeds were also used in the self-cultivation and Chinese language curricula of middle and primary schools, and even less Confucian literature could be accommodated in the textbooks of general primary and secondary schools after May Fourth.

The above only shows the dilemma of Confucianism in the 20th century from the disintegration of the traditional educational establishment. This is very different from the situation of the separation of church and state in modern Times in the West, after the separation of Christianity and political establishment, there is still the establishment of the church as its support, priests continue to explain doctrine in churches, theologians continue to interpret the scriptures in seminaries, and the reading of the Old Testament and the New Testament by the general believer has not been interrupted by the separation of church and state. In contrast, after the separation of Confucianism from the traditional establishment, it has not yet found a modern way to spread. Kang Youwei and Tan Si were equally concerned about this, so there was an initiative to organize the "Confucius Church". However, due to the difference in historical and cultural backgrounds, and because the fundamental nature of Confucianism is completely different from that of ordinary religion, this attempt has not been successful. I have compared modern Confucianism to "wandering souls," and this is the basis for this.

Today we must first recognize the indisputable fact that Confucianism has become a "wandering soul" since the beginning of the 20th century, and then we can further discuss how Confucian value consciousness can be embodied in modern society. Recognizing this fact, we have to admit that the era when Confucianism fully dominated the Chinese order of life through institutionalization is gone. Those who aspire to "summon the soul" of Confucianism do not have to waste their efforts in this regard. But because Confucianism has a history of more than two thousand years in China, with its profoundness and refinement, its wandering soul will not be dissipated in the short term. As long as a subset of intellectuals are willing to devote themselves seriously to the modern interpretation of Confucianism and to obtain the support and cooperation of civil society (civil society on the mainland is now showing signs of repeating), Confucianism can still create new spiritual resources in the process of transforming civil society into civil society. (In the process, the government was at best in a position of collateral patronage for the new development of Confucianism, rather than direct interference.) )

In recent years, I have pondered the question of how Confucianism fits into the lives of modern Chinese. The basic view I have come to is that the modern way out of Confucianism lies in everyday humanization, and only then can Confucianism seem to avoid the establishment and reincarnate the influence of spiritual values. However, "everyday humanization" is only a concept of the whole, and the following will make a preliminary distinction on this concept.

From historical point of view, the daily humanization of Confucianism began to sprout at the latest in the Ming and Qing dynasties. The Confucians of the Tang and Song dynasties still had great expectations for the imperial court from the viewpoint of comprehensively arranging the order of life, so the pattern of "saints and sages" occupied a central position in their political ideals. Du Fu's poem "To Jun Yao Shun, let the customs be pure" specifically express this yearning. Wang Anshi promised himself to be a "virtuous person", so he also asked Song Shenzong to go to Fa Yao and Shun, and could not only take the Han and Tang Dynasties as a model. After the Southern Song Dynasty, although Confucians had attached great importance to education and politics, Zhu Xi still remembered to speak of the emperor with the four words of "righteousness and sincerity". He gave full play to the idea of the second journey, compiled a "Four Books", and first published the "University" as its program, so that the Confucian scale of the "Inner Saint and Outer King" was clearly revealed. According to Zhu Xi's own account, the annotations of the "University" were the most attentive places in his life, and even before his death, he was still revising the annotations of the "Sincerity" chapter. This is precisely because the "Three Programs" and "Eight Articles" of the "University" can best express the overall concept of Confucian comprehensive arrangement of the order of life and its gradual order. In short, Zhu Xi believes that the full realization of the "Tao" still needs a "holy king" in the end, because if the central place of power cannot be purified, the overall operation of the Confucian system will eventually fail. "Obtaining the Way of the King" is still an indispensable link in the Confucian system.

But confucianism since the Ming and Qing dynasties, especially since Wang Yangming, has clearly undergone an important shift. They no longer seem to have placed their "Dao" realization entirely on the establishment, and they did not attach as much importance to the role of the emperor and even the imperial court as Song Ru. Let's compare the anthologies of Zhu Xi and Wang Yangming, the former of which was inscribed with countless "seals" or "sons" for the sake of Emperor Chen Zhidao, while the latter was almost blank in this regard. Not only that, Zhu Xi's doctrine, whether it is "self-cultivation" or "governing people", is mainly aimed at emperors and even scholars; Wang Yangming's "To conscience" is dedicated to daily life, and it is also pervasive to "fools and foolish women". Therefore, Wang Yangming wants to emphasize that "the same as the fool and the foolish woman is the same virtue." He also has a verse on the "Tao" cloud: "Do not leave the daily use of the usual line, until the congenital unpainted." This is to pass the innate mysterious way through to the daily use of the regular line, especially vividly illustrate the trend of the daily life of Confucianism, so Yang Ming's later learning, especially the Taizhou Wangmen, emphasizes the concept of "the streets are full of saints", and likes to invent the magic use of "conscience" with immediate examples such as "tea boys".

From this, we can see that the daily humanization of Confucianism has brought about a shift in emphasis, and the "sages and sages" on which Confucians used to pin their hopes on it are now focusing on how ordinary people below can become saints and sages in their daily lives. Wang Yangming's use of gold as a metaphor for saints shows great significance here. Saints, like gold, are not in the weight of the color. This breaks the stereotype of judging the value of the individual by political and social status. We can also say that Wang Yangming returned to the original proposition of the pre-Qin Confucians that "everyone can become Yao Shun". This is the Confucian old and the new, not the metabolism of the straight line.

After the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the basic trend of Confucianism was to go down rather than upward, to face society rather than the imperial court. In the Tang and Song Dynasties, the consciousness of "To Junyao and Shunshang" also gradually faded. Let me give you an interesting example. Luo Rufang of Taizhou Wangmen once asked Zhang Juzheng: "When Junjin is speaking, do you really want Yao and Shunqi junyi?" Zhang Juzheng sighed for a long time and replied, "This is also very difficult. From this question and answer, we can clearly see that not only did the questioner no longer believe in the Confucian theory of "to Jun Yao and Shun", but the respondent also lost confidence in it. With the depth of Zhang Juzheng's relationship with Wanli's teachers and students, he did not dare to expect the young emperor to become a "holy king" when he entered the lecture. There is another reason why ming and qing Confucians no longer expect "holy kings", that is, they have come to understand that ordinary people can do their best for their own interests, which is far more reliable than waiting for the "holy kings" to do their best from top to bottom. Therefore, Gu Yanwu said: "The people of the world have their own homes, each has his own son, and his common feelings are also." For the Son of Heaven and the heart of the people, it will not be as good as his own. This has been done for more than three generations. "This sentence is very penetrating." More than three generations" is the era of the so-called Holy Emperor Yao and Shun in Confucianism, and the hearts of Yao and Shun for the people are not as good as the people's own, let alone the emperors of the future generations.

The daily humanization of Ming and Qing Confucians has developed so far, in fact, it has broken the ancient myth of "inner saint and outer king". On this crucial question, we cannot but revisit the eight articles of the University, for this is the most important documentary basis for the theory of the "Inner Saint and Outer King" in later generations. As mentioned earlier, Cheng and Zhu advocated "University" and indeed had their painstaking intentions. If Confucianism must be realized through a political establishment, then the "Inner Saint and Outer King" theory has a strong reason. But once Confucianism was freed from the entanglement of political establishments by means of everyday humanization, the whole situation changed. The eight articles of "University" are qualities, knowledge, sincerity, righteousness, self-cultivation, family unity, governance of the country, and peace in the world. In the order of the original text, this seems to be an inevitable process from the inside out. The above self-cultivation belongs to the category of "inner saints", and the Qi family, ruling the country, and the peaceful world are pushed outward layer by layer, and the so-called "outer king" mainly refers to the last two items. The controversy over the University in the Ming Dynasty largely focused on the kung fu of "Inner Sage", in which the word "Grid" was particularly divergent. Now, for the convenience of discussing the "Inner Saint and Outer King", only the cultivation, Qi, Zhi, and Ping are limited, that is, "Cultivation" represents the "Inner Saint" (including Ge, Zhi, Cheng, and Zheng), Yi Zhi and Ping represent the Outer King, and the Qi Family is a transition between the Inner Saint and the Outer King.

According to the general understanding, the "inner saint" is the spiritual core of the "outer king", so it is necessary to cultivate the body first, to be able to build a family, to be able to rule the country, and to govern the country before it can be peaceful. This view has long become a matter of course in Confucianism, and almost no one has formally questioned it, and even today there are many believers. However, Chen Qing in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, because he doubted that the "University" was not a "Bible", did not believe that there was an inevitable connection between the ancients' self-cultivation and the Qi family, governing the country, and the world. He said, "The ancients cultivated their bodies carefully, and did not do anything about it." And the family is in harmony, the country is governed by it, and the world is peaceful, which is not what I dare to do. This view is well founded. Confucius said: "Virtue is not cultivated, learning is not taught, hearing righteousness cannot be migrated, and not being good cannot be changed. This is precisely the purpose of self-cultivation, not the means of achieving the "foreign king". Mencius once quoted the "Hengyan" cloud at that time: "The foundation of the world is in the country, the foundation of the country is at home, and the foundation of the family is in the body." Although this passage is literally similar to the "repair, qi, rule, and peace" of the "University", it does not imply that the "inner saint" in the original text of the "university" must inevitably introduce the "outer king". The most consistent with Mencius's introduction in the University is the sentence "From the Son of Heaven to the Common Man, all are based on self-cultivation".

In the Ming and Qing dynasties, Tan Sitong questioned how the "Qi family" could be pushed to "governing the country". He discussed the issue of "the family is united and then the country is ruled, and the country is ruled and the world is at peace", saying:

He who speaks, the words of the feudal world also. In the feudal world, the monarchs and subjects were ruled by patriarchy. The great sects of the world, the princes and the qing masters are all worldly, and each of them is their own sect. ...... Patriarchy works like one family. Therefore, he must first gather his family, and then he will be able to govern the country and the world. Since the Qin and Han Dynasties, feudalism has been obliterated for a long time, patriarchy has been exhausted, and the country and family have nothing to do with each other. Although the family is in harmony, the country is still not governed, and although the family is uneven, the country is not incurable. ...... Most of them are the rule of the feudal world, and often contrary to today's situation, the wise know that it is not feasible.

Tan's interpretation of the "University" from a historical point of view is "family unity and then national rule", and his vision is very sharp. Historians after May Fourth further supported his observations. For example, Gu Jiegang once pointed out that the "Qi family" in the "University" is not the "home" of the ordinary people, but the "three families of Lu" and the "high and national home" of Qi, that is, "the nobles in a country and those who have the political power to influence the country.".

The historical background of the "University" theory of Xiu, Qi, Zhi, and Ping has been clarified, and there can be no inevitable connection between the "Inner Saint" and the "Outer King" since the Qin and Han Dynasties, and this is precisely the historical fact. The general trend of the daily humanization of Confucianism in the Ming and Qing dynasties further pushed the distance between cultivation, Qi and Zhi, and Ping, and from this as a starting point, we can further speculate on how the value consciousness of Confucianism can be implemented in modern society.

The Ming and Qing Confucians once proposed the distinction between the public and the private, and from the 16th century to the 19th century, there was much debate, which has long attracted the attention of modern scholars. Although the Confucian theory of "public" and "private" is not entirely consistent with the so-called "public domain" or "private domain" in modern Times in the West, after all, there is a place where they can be invented by each other. We may wish to borrow it to illustrate the modern positioning of Confucianism. If we continue to use the language of "University", we can logically classify "self-cultivation and family unity" into the private sphere, and "governing the country and the world" into the public sphere. Although there are inextricable negotiations between these two areas, there is also a clear line. The public sphere is no longer a direct extension of the private sphere, but the two realms still influence each other. Modern Confucianism, which is a daily life, can only be realized directly in the private sphere, and it is a layer of relationship between it and the public sphere. This is roughly similar to the situation of the separation of church and state in modern Times in the West. In other words, Confucianism can still play an important role at the level of self-cultivation and family unity, but compared with governing the country and the world, Confucianism can only project indirect influence with the status of "background culture". Our division of the public and private spheres in this way is not completely imitated by the West, but rather a further development of the general trend of Confucian daily humanization since the Ming and Qing dynasties. The West is here only in the position of reference. This is clearly pointed out above, and everyday humanization is not without roots in primitive Confucianism. Consider the account of the Analects for Government:

Or confucius said: "Zi Xi is not a politician?" Zi Yue: "The Book of Clouds: 'Filial piety is filial piety, friendship is to brothers, and charity is to government.'" 'Is it also for the government, and it is for the government?'

Zhu Xi's "Collected Notes" explains this passage:

The "Book" says that Jun Chen can be filial to his relatives, friends to his brothers, and can promote this heart, thinking that it is the government of the family. Confucius quoted it, saying so, it is also a government, why should it be in a position for the government?

Therefore, Confucius also affirmed that self-cultivation and the Qi family have self-sufficiency value, and it is not necessary to directly participate in politics. This passage has a major enlightening effect on the modern reconstruction of Confucian value consciousness.

Western Christianity has also taken the path of "affirming everyday life" since the Reformation. Protestantism rebelled against the establishment of the Medieval church, leaving every Christian to face God directly and carry out the earthly mission that God had entrusted to him. This mission can be scientific, corporate, social improvement, or any other work that benefits humanity. Although the specific content of the daily life of Ming and Qing Confucians is different from that of Western Protestantism, in terms of the general direction, there is indeed a comparison between China and the West. This is truly amazing.

Modern Confucianism no longer directly interferes in the public sphere, as has already been said above. This does not mean, however, that Confucianism has completely severed its ties with the public sphere. The American humanist master Bai Bide, in the book Democracy and Leadership, particularly cites Confucius and Aristotle. He believed that the teachings of Confucius could provide the qualities that democratic leaders need most. The Confucian spirit of "leading by example" can shape "just man," not just "justice in the abstract." This is where Confucianism can contribute to modern democracy. What Bai values is obviously the Confucian theory of self-cultivation. Taking this example, it can be seen that the Confucianism of daily life can continue to help govern the country and the world through indirect means.