When Qian Mu is mentioned, many readers think of "warmth and respect" and "a lifetime of summoning the soul of the homeland".
Yang Zhao was deeply influenced by Qian Mu, and in his view, summoning the soul of his homeland was Qian Mu's life's work. "Qian Mu's conservatism is not a step backwards, he is a very rigorous historian, which is his most important academic and life identity."
So what is the "homeland"? How to understand Qian Mu's "conservatism"? Looking at Chinese history and Chinese culture today, what exactly do we want to inherit? .... These are exactly what Yang Zhao wants to interpret and answer when watching the ideal's latest program "Warmth and Respect: Qian Mu Xuesi Overview 80 Lectures", and today's article is selected from this program.
The editor of this show said: "This is probably the longest and most tangled show to write the introduction text", "I want people to know that Qian Mu is not conservative." I want people to know that he loves the 'homeland' very deeply. I want people to know that he is not bound by the preciousness of the trend. I want people to know his deafening reminders. I want people to know that his spirit of keeping the path of death and goodness is actually the spirit of Chinese. Hardships make me strive, and I am trapped in sentimentality. Encourage, read, listen, and think together. ”
Qian Mu's writings
Constitutes a vast treasure trove
Qian Mu was born in 1895, the year the Qing Dynasty suffered a major setback and signed the extremely humiliating Treaty of Maguan with Japan.
In the process of Qian Mu's growth, he did not obtain a formal modern education, and his formal school education process only went to ChangzhouFu Middle School and Zhong Ying Middle School. The reason why he did not get an official secondary school diploma was because he encountered the Wuchang Uprising Revolution.
In the first year of the Republic of China, that is, in 1912, when Qian Mu was 18 years old and his actual age was only 17 years old, he went to teach at a rural middle school. Then from elementary school to higher primary school to normal school and middle school, he worked as a teacher all the way. But during this time, he really studied diligently and self-taught, and thus had a very strange turning point in learning and thinking.
At the earliest, continuing the old rules of the imperial examination, he learned to write texts, and then changed from the eight strands of text to the ancient text, which of course has been a step forward. Then, he turned to a very high degree of interest in science. Next, under the influence of the new trend of Sinology later, he turned to the study of history.
The most special thing is that Qian Mu has taken a path of self-study that is almost impossible and difficult to imagine. Because he taught himself what he was learning—with no family background and no convenient library collections, he went so far as to delve into historical evidence and laid an unshakable and extremely solid foundation. This became the most basic and important basis for his later ability to assert himself and to be able to argue with others.
Yes, let us not forget that Qian Mu's position and propositions are very strong in history, culture, and tradition.
His personality is very difficult and he does not easily follow the trend. For example, when he was young, he did not think that teaching middle school was necessarily better than teaching primary school, and he once voluntarily used the opinion of others to go backwards, and he had already taught to middle school, and even changed to primary school to become a teacher.
A little older, he was not necessarily impressed by the reputation of learning in the eyes of others. For example, when he read Gu Jiegang's "Ancient History Discernment", he felt that the various historical assertions in the "Ancient History Discernment" were not stable in foundation and could not withstand the test of evidence. Therefore, he went from the opposite side of the "Ancient History Discernment" to lay out a very complete examination evidence, and wrote the "Pre-Qin Sons of the Year" to challenge Gu Jiegang, the academic star at that time.
Again, seeing Liang Qichao write "Academic History in the Past Three Hundred Years", he disagreed, and he would not consider that this was Liang Qichao - he deliberately opened a class with the same name in the school, which was directly directed at Liang Qichao, which was simply staggering in that era. Moreover, he also published the lecture notes of "Academic History in the Past Three Hundred Years" in the school, a book published by the Commercial Press, which has the same name as Liang Qichao's book, also called "Academic History of the Past Three Hundred Years".
At Peking University, he was sent to teach a general studies class in the history department, and he did not agree with this practice, so he loudly said directly to the students in the class, although I came to teach, I think it is wrong to teach general history in this way. I don't know what the people in front of me are talking about, and I can't even predict how the people behind me will teach history. So he argued that general history should be taught by one person, and by whom? I'll teach it myself.
Because of this attitude, he not only changed Peking University, but even changed the views, concepts, and teachings of the course on the general history of China in the Nationalist government, from the mainland to Taiwan. In addition, more importantly, there will also be the "Outline of National History" that he later wrote.
In his later years, Qian Mu could hardly see his eyes, which made it impossible for him to continue his research work. But even in that situation, he was still blind or not blind, and he was still diligent in writing. Because he had accumulated a lot of depth in the front, he was not a product of a college after a high degree of division of labor, so his involvement in Chinese culture and Chinese history was very, very broad.
How widespread is it? He wrote "Ancient Mountain Residence Examination". What kind of historical concept is "Mountain Residence Examination", or what kind of historical background is it? In fact, this already involves prehistory. We are going to study prehistory today, and that is the scope of archaeology. However, Qian Mu has no archaeology (learning experience), he does not explore in this way, he is from paleography (starting), unique. Therefore, although his history is studied on the historical materials of the text, he can also be ingenious in this way, pushing the time all the way to prehistory. The lower limit of his historical research or historical assertion has adhered to the process of general knowledge and has continued to the present.
In such a long historical practice, his pre-Qin part had the "Years of the Sons of the Pre-Qin Dynasty", and he was a teacher of Qin and Han history at Peking University; later in the history of the science of Song Ming all the way to the intellectual history of the Qing Dynasty, which was his ironclad major; and in his later years, he wrote such a thick book of "Zhu Zi Xinxue Case", which was an extremely complete and simply insurmountable arrangement of the ins and outs of not only Zhu Zi Zhu Xi, but also all the academic ideas surrounding Zhu Zi.
Works by Qian Mu in the Republic of China (the first eight types)
All of These writings by Qian Mu constitute a huge treasure trove. This set of programs, "Warmth and Respect: Qian Mu Xuesi Overview 80 Lectures", is hoping to provide you with a guide to enter the huge treasure house and let you choose the route of the treasure by yourself. Because most of Qian Mu's books are still available to everyone, which is why in this treasure house you can not only enter, you can also take out the treasures you are interested in and what you want.
Qian Mu's conservatism is not a step backwards
Qian Mu's learning is often called ethnohistory, or he is classified as an ethnic culture school, and sometimes he is included in neo-Confucianism, no matter what the name, everyone thinks of Qian Mu, he is a conservative.
The reason why Qian Mu has such an attitude and emotion comes from the era in which he lives.
What kind of era was that? The whole world is gushing and fierce, all of which are the forces that pursue freshness and westernization. At that time, the pursuit of freshness and the pursuit of Westernization were the mainstream, but the mainstream quickly destroyed the original way of life of the people at that time in this way, and thus stimulated a few of the attitudes that intensified against the tide.
In what way do a few people who resist the trend? It is often manifested as exaggeration and myth about China, thinking that China is so good, 100 times better than the West. In the past, the Chinese tradition that once existed was right, all good, and you used this way to defend or defend the Chinese tradition, and the result was the opposite effect, so that the younger generation at that time, they looked down on China even more.
But This is not the case with Qian Mu, Qian Mu's knowledge and thinking come from his very solid research and evidence, that is, he really knows what China's past really looked like, so he can affirm these Chinese components and Chinese elements in it, and there is warmth and respect in the middle. But please also note that there is no hypocrisy here, absolutely no exaggeration.
A prejudice that comes from me personally, like all these conservative academic scholars at that time, they all added up, their original ideas in Chinese history and Chinese culture are not as good as Qian Mu alone.
So with regard to Qian Mu as a conservative historian, I would like to emphasize a few points:
First, Qian Mu's conservatism is definitely not a retrogression, and the so-called retrogression is to advocate the use of history to help the current changes and development. It is true that some people see it this way and advocate it until today, that is, what China was like in history, and today's Chinese should always maintain that look.
Let us not forget that Qian Mu was a very rigorous historian, which was his main academic and life identity. His dedication to the changes in history has enabled him to become a brilliant historian. The most fundamental thing in historiography is to record and explain changes. Qian Mu is definitely an outstanding and remarkable practitioner of historiography.
So how can you expect such a person to have an "essential" China in his mind, and if you want to find such a China to regulate and restrict the present and contemporary, I ask you, is it the China of the Zhou Dynasty? Or tang dynasty China, or Song Dynasty China? If you think that the China of the Zhou Dynasty, the Tang Dynasty, and the Song Dynasty is the same China, and it all looks the same, it is obvious that you have not read Qian Mu's Outline of National History. If China is treated as homogeneous and identical, and the China of the Zhou Dynasty, Tang Dynasty, and Song Dynasty can be treated equally, Qian Mu does not need to write the Outline of National History.
The tradition of historiography pioneered by Qian Mu
Qian Mu was a very strange man, and he was actually a man who, by virtue of his pioneering and very, very bold assertions, had brought such a conservative position of ethnographical historiography to so many people.
I often say that in fact, many people who deserve to know each other must have his contradictions. I will also talk about The contradiction between Qian and Mu, that is, he basically wrapped his originality under an attitude that seems to be very old, and then retains the Chinese tradition in an old way, and the two form a very strong conflict.
To give an example, the simplest thing, in the case of "bringing down the Confucius family shop" and then this ritual is completely destroyed in this way and loses all legitimacy, not to mention Confucianism, especially Confucianism is considered to be the most important origin of this rigid ritualism, that is, "science", which also has the possibility of being inherited or the value of being inherited.
But Qian Mu, and these intellectuals, including these neo-Confucians, wanted to re-evaluate Song Ming's theory. Then of course, Qian Mu talked about from his "Overview of Song Ming Science" to the later "Zhu Zi Xinxue Case", which was so remarkable that he wanted to establish such a system of learning.
This academic system is the tradition of scholarship, so that you know how much you would lose if you threw Song Ming Theory into the trash so easily? And if we look at Chinese history and Chinese civilization in this way, what we will see will be the broken Chinese culture and Chinese history, how big will the gap between that and the real state? So that's a big question.
So what is Qianmu's attitude? I want to express it in this way.
First, the beautiful thing should not ignore its beauty because it is old and not new;
Second, something beautiful should not be denied that it is beautiful just because it is our own;
Third, beautiful things should not be just because they have disappeared from our current lives, we do not know and cannot appreciate its beauty.
Summoning the soul of the homeland as a kind of cause
For Qian Mu, who died in 1990 at the age of 95, Yu Yingshi, the disciple of his protégé who was closest to his academic thoughts in his lifetime, wrote two consecutive memorials. There is a comparison of personal memories, from an emotional point of view to recall the teacher Qian Mu, the title of this article is called "Remember the Wind Blowing Water Scales".
The other one is that Yu Yingshi himself indicated that he wanted readers to understand Mr. Qian's academic spirit in a relatively simple and concise way, so the nature of that article was more serious and serious, and the title was called "A Lifetime of Summoning the Soul of the Homeland". This title is very accurate, and indeed very concise, just from seven words, let us understand the most important key points in Qian Mu's life.
If we look at it from a professional point of view, Qian Mu's life is actually known to everyone, he did not get a stable life guarantee, he did not find a teaching, research, fixed job in the university, so he has been there to study, has been doing research, has been teaching, has been writing, he is not. As mentioned, when he was 17 and not yet 18, he went to teach elementary school, then middle school, and then college. With the turmoil of a great historical era like modern China, during the War of Resistance Against Japan, he took refuge in the southwest with the Southwest United Congress.
After the civil war, he first went into exile in Hong Kong, where he worked hard to establish and run New Asia College, and Yu Yingshi was also The earliest student of Qian Mu at New Asia College. Therefore, in Qian Mu's reminiscences, it is very clear to us how the new Asia College was operating dismal at that time, the school had less than 20 students, and often the funds were not settled, and even the school buildings and classrooms were not so fixed and stable places.
In the article "Remembering the Wind Blowing on the Water Scales", Yu Yingshi has such a memory, that is, about Qian Mu when he was in Hong Kong. He said that one year during the summer vacation in Hong Kong, when the teacher Qian Mu had a serious stomach ulcer and was lying alone on the ground in an empty classroom recuperating, I went to see him, and I really felt uncomfortable for him. I asked him if there was anything he wanted me to do for you? How does the teacher tell the student what he needs? He said he wanted to read Wang Yangming's anthology, so Yu Yingshi went to the Commercial Press and bought one for the teacher. When I returned, he was still lying alone on the floor of the classroom, and it seemed that the whole new Asia College was completely empty.
After so many years, Yu Yingshi still remembers this scene, and this scene is indeed fully revealed, one is Qian Mu's life under such a turbulent and displaced situation, and the other is his spirit, upside down, no matter how he committed a stomach ulcer, there is only one person left in the whole academy, lying in the classroom recuperating, and what he thinks about is still Chinese tradition, traditional learning, traditional history, and the research he has to do.
By 1967, when he was over 70 years old, Mr. Qian moved from Hong Kong to Taipei, a life he spent in a variety of upheavals. But he always focused on doing the same thing, and the firmness of this will was really surprising.
This is his life, what kind of things has he done in his life? Qian Mu told us to summon the soul of the homeland.
Next, let's explain what the homeland is.
Of course, the homeland refers to China, but what stands out in the old country is not the real China, but the Past, mainly the China that remains in the old books. Generally we identify historical China. In this sense, Qian Mu's most important identity is, of course, a historian. But everyone should know that when he studies history and Studies Chinese history, he has a very different attitude.
Let me say it again, Qian Mu's study of history is a career, not his profession. As a matter of professional research history, only for a short period of time, mainly during the two periods of office at Peking University and Southwest United University, it provided Qian Mu with food and clothing for life. Other times he taught, he ran Xinya Academy, and even later he went to Taipei to give lectures, and honestly he didn't have to study Chinese history. Elementary school teaching only needs to teach those few articles, what Chinese history to study? Even when it comes to the New Asia College, it is necessary to find money well, to recruit students well, to manage well, to teach well, and to recruit teachers well, which has nothing to do with the study of Chinese history.
When you are lecturing in the SushuLou, you have reached this age, and students come to listen to you talk about the I Ching, the History of History, and different classics.
In contrast, many of today's history professors in the academy are particularly different in this matter, and he does not study Chinese history because of his profession. Secondly, Chinese history is not an external knowledge for Qian Mu, not a fixed objective foreign object of death, but a part of his own life, and even further he argues that it is part of the life of the Chinese collective self.
This means that how we understand Chinese history, and the knowledge excavated from Chinese history will clearly and directly affect how Qian Mu and he lived as a person.
The homeland refers not only to the country of the past, but more importantly, to its own country. Because it is his own root history, Qian Mu has always maintained a very strong sense of the problem when studying Chinese history.
This is his "homeland"
It is also the "origin" of you and me.
The first level of consciousness on this question is, to understand the current reality of China, can you not understand China's past? If you don't understand China's past, do you see the accuracy of the current reality you portray as China?
Further to the second level, if we are going to judge the right and wrong of China at present, is it possible for you to leave the history of China? This goes a step further and involves our vision and standards of looking at the reality of the moment.
We compare it this way, for example, to a stranger, to a public figure we have never really known, and we see him on the news, in everyone's gossip, there are all kinds of gossip, saying what kind of things he has done, what kind of bad things he has done, what kind of people he has harmed in what ways.
At that time, it was full of mouths, and we felt that this was our judgment. And we have a sense of confidence in our judgment, and we look at such a person with that judgment. But it's easy to imagine if today it was this person's friend, or his family, who knew his personality, what kind of things he went through, from his point of view, the context, the different processes he went through. At this time, when they come to explain why this person did this, they must have another judgment.
Further, if this thing is happening to you, you go through every process, your thinking, your struggle, your hesitation, your decision, after the decision, your guilt, your responsibility, and further you have to bear the consequences of all this negative bad harm. If this were what you've experienced yourself, of course you'd have a different judgment.
Therefore, Qian Mu especially reminded that there is such an attitude. That is, if we regard China as our own country, this is the homeland, this is our origin. If you understand your own history, at this time you will inevitably use different standards to judge the current reality of such an environment, such a society and such a culture.
If there is no such understanding and understanding, first, we will always disconnect the China of the past from the current China and deal with it separately. Second, there is no step-by-step deduction from the source of how today's China came about. We will not only never have an accurate grasp and understanding of the current situation of reality, but more importantly, it is worse, we will certainly not have this kind of judgment that can really help us, and our judgment of reality will be arbitrary.
We are so anxious to make such judgments, and often misjudgments will bring errors and even disasters. Can we not think about this? At least Qian Mu has spent his whole life thinking about this set of big problems, and has worked hard to put forward some of the knowledge and wisdom he has gained from history and provide them for everyone's reference.