The term "Dharma" was first used in mencius' confession: "If you enter, you can't be a family, and if you go out, you can't be invincible to foreign patients, and the country will always die." As a term for "Legalists" of the academic school, it was first seen in Sima Qian's father, Sima Qian, on the Essentials of the Six Schools: "The Legalists are not relatives and alienated, they are not special and noble, and once they are broken off from the Law, the grace of their relatives and respect is absolutely perfect... Therefore, it is said that it is strict and less benevolent, but the distinction between the upper and lower levels of the right king and the subject cannot be changed. ”
The Fajia and "Yin and Yang, Confucianism, Ink, Fame, and Morality" are listed as the "Six Schools". In that particular historical era, the rise of the Legalists can be said to be a historical necessity, and the background of the emergence of the Legalists is mainly the following three:
The first is the political background. After the Zhou royal family moved eastward, it gradually lost control of the princely states, existed in name only, and the various princely states also competed to expand their power, and they would ally to dominate, and successively appeared the famous Spring and Autumn Five Hegemons in history, killing and logging continuously every year, the people were not happy, and the society was turbulent. In the struggle for hegemony, the princes and secretaries of state gradually developed their own strength, seized power, and then controlled part of the power of the state, and the so-called "collapse of ceremonies and happiness" appeared. In the Warring States period, the new landlord classes of various princely states successively stepped onto the political stage, and they were no longer satisfied with tinkering with the previous political system, but had to carry out drastic reforms, so the centralized autocracy centered on the monarch replaced the patriarchal feudal system, and the bureaucratic system of military merit and knighthood replaced the Shiqing Shilu system.
The second is the economic background. The widespread promotion of iron and cattle farming has greatly improved agricultural productivity, increased the area of cultivated land, and provided society with more means of production and living. In the middle and late Spring and Autumn period, the number of private fields continued to increase, land could gradually be exchanged and bought and sold, and the well field system gradually disintegrated. During the Warring States period, the mode of social production also began to change, with individual farming as a unit of one household replacing the collective cooperation of ploughing as a unit, the feudal individual economy gradually dominated, there were many types of commodity exchange, the area of commodity exchange was also quite wide, the result of the prosperity of handicraft industry and commerce, the city was also unprecedentedly prosperous, and some large cities with large populations and developed economies appeared.
The third is the cultural background. The princely states wanted to preserve their countries in the midst of the brutal competition between the weak and the strong, and the strong military, political, and economic power to strengthen the rule of the state required centralized power. Faced with such a situation, the Confucians, Taoists, Mojia and other factions all tried to solve the various problems of the king, that is, began the "hundred schools of contention" between the sons of the pre-Qin Dynasty, as later scholars called it. The kings of various countries are most concerned not with how to seek peace and contentment for the people, but with how to solve the current severe international situation. In this way, a group of "magicians" stepped onto the stage of history. There are some who provide theoretical basis for the ruling strategy they advocate, which constitutes the ideological proposition of the Dharma.
In the long history of the popularity of the Dharma, many figures have emerged, and the more famous ones are the following:
Guan Zhong (?) ~645 BC) Guan Zhong, Ming Yiwu, Zi Zhong. During the Spring and Autumn Period, he was a native of Yingshang (present-day Anhui Province). In his early years, he was engaged in business, and was later appointed as the Qing Dafu by the Prince of Qi Huan, the ruler of the State of Qi, and presided over the political situation of the State of Qi for 40 years. He was the first person to explicitly put forward "rule by law" and put it into practice, and Guan Zhong's thoughts and remarks were included in the book "Guan Zi".
Wu Qi (c. 440 BC – 381 BC) Wu Qi was a Member of the WeiGuo Zuo clan during the Warring States period. The students who had once devoted themselves to Confucius once studied under the disciples, but then gave up Confucianism, studied the art of war, and embarked on the road of politics. Wu Qi's reform was centered on the "Ming Fa Trial Order", that is, the revision of the decree. Wu Qi was the pioneer of the change of law during the Warring States period. He left behind a book, "The Art of War of Wu Qi".
Shang Martin (c. 390 BC – 338 BC) Shang Martingale, originally known as Gongsun Martingale, was the Prince of Wei. Shang Martin believes that the key to governing the country lies in grasping the three fundamentals, namely law, faith, and power. The law is "ruled by the law", that is, with the law as the highest criterion, what to do, what not to do, how to do, everything is transferred by the law. The letter is about reward and punishment, and the so-called reward and punishment have faith. Power is the power of the state, and it must be concentrated in the hands of the monarch. After Shang Martin's death, his disciples sorted out his posthumous works, compiled them into a volume, and named them "Shangzi", which was later called the "Book of Shang Jun".
Han Fei (c. 280 BC – 233 BC), a Korean nobleman at the end of the Warring States period, "liked the study of the spell of punishment, and its origin was Huang Lao", and studied with Li Si at Xunqing. Han Fei is the master of the ideas of the Legalists, and the "law", "technique", and "potential" based on the absolute monarchy are the core of his thinking.
Among the figures of all the schools of law, Han Feizi was the most famous, which pushed the ideas of the legalists to the peak. Next, I would like to introduce you to the core ideas of the Dharma:
Sexual evil theory. The "theory of sexual evil" is represented by Xunzi, and Han Fei further enriched the content of the "theory of sexual evil" and deepened the connotation of "sexual evil theory" on the basis of his teacher Xunzi's ideological theory. Human nature is selfish and manifested in two ways: one is for one's own sake and the other is the pursuit of profit. Proceeding from this human nature, the Legalists proposed a set of political countermeasures with interests as the axis. The Dharma believes that all people are self-interested, this is human nature, and everyone is for himself. In the view of the Dharma, whether it is a father-son relationship, a husband and wife relationship, a monarch-subject relationship, or a general social relationship, people will not think about problems from each other's point of view, and everyone is standing on their own stand, all for themselves. So, what are people fighting for? For the sake of interests, there is no difference between the two in terms of starting from their own interests, just as stupid and intelligent people are human beings, and interests are the core of the relations between states and between people.
Heavy sentences. The idea of heavy punishment originated from the "rule of law" theory of the legal scholars in the pre-Qin period and occupies an important position in the history of Chinese jurisprudence. Although "heavy punishment" gives people the impression of inhumanity and even cruelty, heavy punishment has an irreplaceable effect on the progress of history. The idea of heavy punishment played a huge role in the Qin unification of the six kingdoms and the establishment of China's first feudal autocratic dynasty. Since then, because the idea of "heavy punishment" has adapted to the needs of the absolute rule of the feudal monarchy, it has occupied an important position in all subsequent feudal dynasties. Han Fei was not the first to put forward the idea of heavy punishment, his idea of heavy punishment is only one of the representatives of traditional Chinese legal culture. Before Han Fei, Shang Martin had systematically expounded the theory of heavy punishment, pointing out that as long as there were "serious and minor crimes", it was possible to "remove punishment with punishment". Han Fei inherited the pre-Qin jurist idea of heavy punishment and put forward his own proposition of heavy punishment: (1) rewards must be punished ;(2) heavy rewards and heavy punishments; (3) minor crimes and heavy punishments.
Law, technique, potential. Law: The core is the decree, the written law formulated and promulgated by the government, and the rules and regulations on which the officials rule the people; the technique: skill, is the power technique, which is the means by which the monarch controls, uses, and examines his subordinates. The obvious difference between law and art is that one is announced to the people of the country, and the other is hidden in the "chest" of the monarch; the main body of the art is the monarch, which is mastered and used by the monarch; the object of the art is the courtier, which the monarch uses to deal with the subordinates; the purpose of the art is to control the courtiers and make good use of talents through examination and punishment; the potential: the foundation, that is, the authority of the monarch, that is, the power to kill and seize. With this power, the monarch was able to subordinate his subjects to himself and use them for his own purposes. Han Fei believed that the monarch must firmly hold this power in his own hands and must not share it with anyone, otherwise the power will be weakened or even lost. Potential can be understood as position of power and power, and people habitually call it power.
The goal of the Dharma is to make the country rich and the army strong, and they believe that to make the country strong, it is not morality or wisdom, but strength. This has certain guiding significance and application for us in enterprise management and doing things.
The application of law, art, and potential: law, institutionalized management, there are laws to follow, laws must be followed, law enforcement must be strict, violations of the law must be investigated; art: human resource management, management art and management methods; potential, leadership art, centralization and decentralization.
Application in business management: to the Division of the Rule of Law. 1, in line with the interests of the majority of the people; 2, the system is written and clearly open; 3, everyone is equal before the system; 4, heavy rewards and heavy punishments.
The legalists believe that the rule of virtue is wrong for the country, but the legalists only oppose morality as the main body of governing the country, not reject morality. The ideas of the Dharma are relatively close to the Taoists, and Lao tzu's ideas of inaction, femininity, and justice have greatly influenced the Dharma. The Legalists advocate the politics of tension, believing that wisdom does not determine success or failure, but must speak with strength.