Author: Yu Yunkai
Many people mention Taoist doctrine and mention Lao Zhuang, that is, Lao Tzu and Zhuangzi, but rarely mention Liezi.
In fact, Liezi developed Taoist doctrine after Laozi and before Zhuangzi, which has the effect of carrying on the upper and lower levels: it can be said that the transmission of Laozi's philosophical ideas cannot be separated from the in-depth development of Liezi, and Zhuangzi's grand ideas in the cosmology benefit from the inspiration given to him by Liezi.
Moreover, unlike the pure intuitive truth of Lao Tzu and Zhuangzi, Liezi's philosophical thought has a positivist tendency to establish ideological foundations from a scientific point of view.
Of course, on a certain level, some people think that Liezi is not as extraordinary as Laozi and Zhuangzi, but if you look at it from today's scientific perspective, Liezi is a rare positivist spiritual philosopher.
In fact, many people are unfamiliar with Liezi, but they can casually talk about the cultural spirit of Liezi, such as the yugong moving the mountain, worrying about the sky and other fables, which are the creations of Liezi.
In general, Liezi's philosophical ideas include astronomy, physics, evolution, ecological ethics, Buddhist thought, etc., and are fundamentally consistent with modern scientific theories.
Among them, the most important thing is that after unifying cosmology and the value of life into one, it crosses pessimism and nihilism to propose a "detached" philosophy of life for human beings. I believe that this line of thinking has considerable enlightening significance for today's philosophical dilemma and even the development of human society.
<h1>Liezi's "cosmology" is the "xuanye theory" confirmed by modern astronomy</h1>
The Japanese philosopher Daisuke Suzuki said: "Liezi's thought may be said to be deeper than Lao tzu's." ”
Here, the profundity of Suzuki's statement can be understood as Liezi expounding Laozi's teachings in a more scientific way.
Simply put, Liezi's philosophical thought is to use a materialist point of view to deduce the rationality of Taoist doctrine.
"There is too easy, there is too beginning, there is too beginning, there is too plain. Those who are too easy, they have not seen qi: those who are too beginning, the beginning of qi; those who are too beginning, the beginning of form; those who are too primitive, the beginning of quality. The qi-shaped quality is not separated, so it is known as muddy. He who has fallen into obscurity says that all things are confused and have not been separated. Blind, deaf, unheard, and unruly, so it is easy to know. Easy to formless, easy to change into one, one to seven, seven to nine. The nine changers, the poor, are one of the same. One, the beginning of deformation also. The light one is heaven, the heavy one is the earth, and the one who is flushed with qi is human; therefore, the heavens and the earth contain essence, and all things are incarnated. ”
From this passage of Liezi, we can see that he found a scientific logic for Lao Tzu's "making something out of nothing", in other words, Liezi reveals the realization process of "making something out of nothing". That is to say, Lao Tzu put forward the concept of "making something out of nothing", but did not say the method of "making something out of nothing", how can it be "made out of nothing"? Liezi put forward that "relying on qi", that is, relying on qi, "Tao" realizes "making something out of nothing".
If we want to be more realistic, I think that Here Liezi goes beyond the direct process of Lao Tzu's "making something out of nothing", but "from nothing to have, from being to being", that is, Liezi believes that "Tao" does not directly create all things, but creates "qi", and then "qi" creates all things.
In short, Liezi believes that the entire universe is born of "qi" and stands on "qi". This is the typical "Xuanye Theory" - the scholar Yang Bojun also mentioned in "The Scientific Factors of Liezi Cosmology" that Liezi's cosmology is "Xuanye Theory".
The doctrine advocates that "the sun, moon, and stars naturally float in the void, and their actions must be gaseous", that is, the theory that celestial bodies float in gas, and further developed the idea that even celestial bodies themselves, including distant stars and the Milky Way, are composed of gas. Moreover, Liezi believes that this is a luminous gas, and he says in the Liezi Tianrui Chapter: "The sun, moon, and stars also accumulate in the gas and there are shining ones."
Yang Quan, a scholar of Xuanye in the Three Kingdoms Period, also had a similar view: "Fu Tian, Yuan Qi, Hao Hao, nothing else." He believed that the Milky Way was also gas, and that stars were born out of it. He said: "The breath rises, the essence floats up, it seems to turn with the flow, the name is known as the Heavenly River, the cloud is han, and the stars are out." The Theory of Things.
We know that whether it is the ancient Chinese theory of Gaitian and Huntian, or the ancient Western geocentric theory, or even Copernicus's heliocentric theory, all regard the sky as a hard shell, and the stars are fixed on this shell.
Xuan Ye rejects this view, arguing that the universe is infinite, that the universe is filled with gas, and that all celestial bodies float and move in the gas. The laws of motion of the stars, suns, and moons are determined by their respective characteristics, and there is no hard celestial sphere or what kind of current and uniform wheels bind them.
In this respect, xuanye theory is very incisive in its speculation in natural philosophy, and in many respects it is consistent with many conclusions of modern astronomy.
Of course, the exploration of the universe by modern astronomy is still developing, and many answers still need to be revealed.
But more than two thousand years ago, Liezi broke the concept of solid celestial spheres and approached modern astronomy, which is very rare among many cosmological theories.
It can be said that Liezi's "cosmology" not only confirmed the rationality of Lao Tzu's thought with scientific factors, but also inspired Zhuangzi's majestic thoughts, and we can see from a passage in "Zhuangzi Getaway" that Zhuangzi's grand understanding of the universe was influenced by Liezi's profound influence: "The heavens are right and evil. It's far away and nothing is extremely evil?"
<h1>Onenessism, a pioneer of modern ecoethics</h1>
Of course, the most characteristic part of Liezi's cosmology is the emphasis on the unity of all things, and Liezi said:
"Heaven and earth have no full power, saints have no full power, and all things are useless." Therefore, the vocation of heaven is overthrown, the earthly work is loaded, the priesthood is indoctrinated, and the material office is appropriate. However, the heavens are short, the earth is long, the holy is not, and the things are connected. Why? Those who are born and overthrown cannot be carried in form, those who are carried in form cannot be educated, those who are indoctrinated cannot be disobeyed, and those who are suitable are not out of place. Therefore, the way of heaven and earth is not yin and yang; the teaching of the saints, not benevolence is righteousness; the convenience of all things, the non-softness is rigid: these are all appropriate and cannot be out of their places. "Liezi Tianrui"
Here Liezi said that everything in the world, including us human beings, is not omnipotent and only plays a correspondingly limited role.
Therefore, Liezi advocates that "there is no class of nobility", and that human beings should cherish nature and protect nature - these theories are advocated by modern human environmental awareness. Protecting the environment is not an unfamiliar word to us today, but for the people more than two thousand years ago, it is a very advanced and strange consciousness.
Of course, Liezi emphasizes that the protection of the environment is to know that these are one with us, rather than today mainly based on the basic idea of "for human use". It is also this "for human use" line of thought that prevents human beings from being able to face environmental problems in a serious way. But if it is based on the consciousness of "oneness", perhaps human beings will not appear so lazy and neglectful in the face of environmental problems.
Therefore, Liezi is very cautious to emphasize that human beings need to realize that nature is the basis of our survival, and without nature, human beings simply cannot exist. Although man has his own unique position in the natural world, in terms of source and composition, it is the same as all natural things, that is, it is developed by the natural evolution of qi, that is, "the light one is the heaven, the heavy one is the earth, and the one who flushes the qi is human" (Liezi Tianrui).
In addition, the "Guo clan" of the great wealth in "Liezi Tianrui" said to the "Xiang clan" of the great poverty: "Sometimes the heavens are favorable to the earth." I steal the heavens and the earth, the clouds and rain, the mountains and the breeding, to give birth to my grass, to breed my crops, to build my walls, to build my house. Land thieves beasts, water thieves fish turtles, dead non-thieves also." Here, Liezi believes that all human conditions of existence are stolen from nature.
Further, Liezi believed that everything in the world was a whole, and that heaven and earth, saints, and all things were only an integral part of nature.
Therefore, Liezi believes that heaven, earth, and people cannot be separated and cannot be cut together, and only when harmony constitutes an orderly whole can the world be sustainable.
Therefore, Liezi proposed that human beings should be "in tune with nature and in harmony with all things." That is to say, human beings can only conform to nature and follow the laws of nature, and all construction and creation must be built on the basis of not harming nature, and ultimately realize the purpose of "and all things".
The overall way of thinking of the unity of heaven and earth and man is a characteristic of Chinese philosophy, that is, the unity of heaven and man. This idea is the characteristic of Chinese culture, and it is also the most vital place of Chinese culture, which has deep theoretical connotation significance for guiding modern human beings to ecological environmental protection.
<h1>Liezi philosophy is the peak of the philosophy of life and has a guiding effect on the progress of the philosophy of science</h1>
In "Liezi Tianrui", shun asks Hu Yu, "The Tao can be obtained and there is a hu?" Qi Ri: "Ru body is not Ru Youye, why does Ru have a husband?" Shunri: "I don't have my body, what do I have?" Day: "It is the form of heaven and earth." Birth is not Ru you, it is the commission of heaven and earth and also. Life is not a matter of ru, but of heaven and earth. The descendants are not ruyou, but the commissions of heaven and earth."
In this passage, Liezi discusses the problem of the positioning of human beings themselves, that is, man comes from nature, that is, he is not owned by himself. So we don't have to be too egotistical, too attached, too materialistic. That is to say, when we do this, it is a wrong attitude toward life, that is, an attitude of life that is thankless and undesirable.
Generally speaking, Liezi's treatment of human life is based on the evolution and evolution of the entire universe, and it is found that the whole process of human beings comes from the invisible, becomes tangible, and finally returns to the invisible. Therefore, this life is a natural life that is not decided by others.
Liezi said in the Book of the Yellow Emperor: "The activity of the form does not produce a shadow without the birth of the form." The sound fluctuates and does not produce the original sound and produces an echo. 'Nothing' does not incarnate 'nothing' but incarnates 'being'. Everything that is physical must have an end, but will there be an end to heaven and earth? Of course, heaven and earth will have an end like us, but is the end the end? Then I don't know. The end of the avenue is that there is no beginning (time); there is no existence (space). Whoever has life will return to the absence of life, and everyone who has a form will return to the formless. There is no life, not originally 'no life'; no form, not originally 'no form'. Life, according to the theorem, is bound to end, and the end is inevitable, just as life has to be born.
Here, Liezi argues that human life is nothing more than a one-on-one return, the "cycle of life and death"—some consider this to be a copy of Buddhist ideas.
In fact, from the perspective of time, Buddhism in the pre-Qin period also belonged to the embryonic state in the Indian period, and the theory of plagiarism cannot be discussed, if there is plagiarism, only Buddhism plagiarizes Liezi and Laozi.
In addition, Liezi's "cycle theory" is very different from the Buddhist "theory of reincarnation", which is a cycle of natural states, while the religious "theory of reincarnation" is a cycle of cause and effect (interference of good and evil).
Based on this, Liezi proposed that the ultimate human being is not in this world, the existence of life is only a passer-by, and we must eventually return to the invisible, so human beings should transcend this world and live a transcendent life, without being delayed by the fame and fortune of this world - this is the typical Taoist view of life.
In the past, the Taoist view of life has been considered a negative view of life, which is a misunderstanding of cultural appearances. In fact, Taoism considers the meaning of life from the perspective of the ultimateity of life, so it can clearly understand the limitations of life. Because of the existence of this limitation, no matter what ways man perfects the meaning of human existence, he must eventually return to the "void", and this "void" can not be solved by any human knowledge at all, but can only be solved by returning to the "invisible world".
Once, Schopenhauer wanted to find this solution, and finally he found that the void was the essence of life, so he fell into pessimism; although Nietzsche solved Schopenhauer's pessimism and mobilized the passion of human progress, the void after the passion was even more frightening- and the problems of postmodernism began to arise.
In addition, many religions have metaphysically discovered divinity for the purpose of solving this conundrum – but we need to understand that many religions have a certain narrow meaning, so they have many problems that are difficult to fill.
Therefore, for the "void" that human beings finally have to face, only by detaching, treating life as a passer-by, and taking the invisible world as a destination, can we solve the huge proposition of "void".
According to modern scientific research, our world seems to be just an image, and the real world is invisible—perhaps our spiritual world, the soul world.
Lisa Randall, a world-famous theoretical physicist, an authority on cosmology and a professor at Harvard University in the United States, once accidentally found that a particle had mysteriously disappeared without a trace in an experiment on nuclear fission. From this, Lisa proposed the theory of "extra dimensions", the hypothesis of the fifth dimension space: "I think there are other dimensions such as the fifth dimension space. If this assumption is correct, then other spaces are not far away from us, and can even be said to be close. It's just that they're well hidden, so we can't see it. ”
This fifth dimensional space is an invisible world (or the soul world, the spiritual world, and the like), and this invisible world is very close to us, but we can't see or touch it. In recent years, many scientists have paid attention to this topic and conducted related experimental research.
In fact, if we use intuition theory to understand, this invisible world is almost existent, for example, we seem to be a line of objects, if you look at it with a magnifying glass, you can find that there is actually another world inside——— the fibers inside are thick and thin, with different directions. In other words, the world that we cannot see with the naked eye is much larger than the world that can be seen.
Of course, the "invisible world" proposed by Liezi and his Lao Tzu is a theory of intuitionism, and although Liezi has some scientific factors, it is still a scientific intuitionism. But this intuitive philosophy of life has its own transcendence and is very guiding to science, as Lisa Randall famously said: Trust your intuition and boldly enjoy science.
Then, if this invisible world is confirmed, it will be a cognitive upgrade or breakthrough for all mankind, and the changes brought about by this cognitive breakthrough are that human beings will not be delayed by the gains and losses, melancholy, clouds of smoke and so on in this world, and people will not need the bitter persuasion of religious scholars, philosophers, etc. to put down their material pursuits, and will flock to the "invisible world".
So, understood from the theory of intuition, I think that the philosophy of Liezi can philosophically guide the progress of the philosophy of science and reveal the fundamental principles.
<h1>Liezi's enlightenment to modern philosophy: beyond postmodernism, may illuminate the direction of new philosophy</h1>
American philosopher Richard Rorty: "Postmodernism is not a way out, postmodernism is mostly destructive, there is no positive achievement." ”
The collapse of postmodernist philosophy lies in the inability to propose a leadership that is higher than modern humanistic values, so human beings are generally in a confused self-snare, that is, dominated by a "self-centered" cognitive worldview.
It can be said that the contribution of postmodernism on the material level has far exceeded its contribution to the spiritual level, which has led mankind to the dangerous abyss of materialism, but has not established a beacon to illuminate people to cross the abyss of materialism.
In fact, people are not really greedy for enjoyment, but more that they do not find more valuable pursuits than this.
Therefore, I think that when we see Liezi in the fog of postmodern philosophy, we may be able to ignite the philosophical spiritual flame of Liezi transcending life and death and find a path for mankind.
Liezi said: If you want to live forever and stop dying, you are making the mistake of being 'confused by numbers' (delusional pursuit of longevity in the number of years). The human spirit belongs to heaven and the skeleton belongs to earth. What belongs to heaven is light and can be divergent, and what belongs to earth is heavy and condensed. (The spirit and the skeleton are originally together), but when the spirit and the skeleton are separated, they both return to the place where they originally belonged. The Yellow Emperor said: 'The spirit enters his own portal; the skeleton returns to his original roots.' Does this me still exist? ’”
To understand simply, Liezi gives us a "life and death look down" outlook on life, guiding us to understand the more essential "invisible world", and does not have to fight for the satisfaction of this form that will eventually disappear in this real world. In essence, it is to teach us to live a detached, free, harmonious life.
Just imagine, when the pursuit of this invisible world by human collective consciousness becomes a new trend of new consciousness, the problems faced by mankind such as disputes over the interests of the world will be solved.
Thus, then, the transcendence of its philosophy, which was proposed more than two thousand years ago, is evident in the transcendence of its philosophy.
Of course, we cannot recognize the importance of the lyceum now, because we do not recognize the importance of the invisible world, or that we are bound by the tangible. But I think that with the continuous breakthrough of cognition, the philosophical foresight of Liezi and Laozi and Zhuangzi, like the cape lighthouse, can play a certain enlightening role in the whole philosophical voyage.
Of course, for Liezi, I am only a kind of shallow taste of bricks and stones here, and the deeper connotation still needs to be excavated by people of insight.
bibliography:
1. Liezi "Liezi"
2. Zhuangzi "Zhuangzi"
3. Yang Quan's Theory of Things
4. Lisa Randall, "Crooked Journey: Unraveling the Mystery of the Hidden Dimensions of the Universe"
5. Richard Rorty, The Mirror of Philosophy and Nature
6. Yang Bojun, "Scientific Factors of Liezi Cosmology"