Xie Chunhui (Institute of History, Huazhong University of Science and Technology)
On November 16th, at the invitation of the Institute of History of the School of Humanities of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Professor Zhou Shaochuan of the School of History of Beijing Normal University gave an online speech entitled "Mr. Chen Yuan's Historiography and Its Achievements". This lecture is the 41st issue of the Institute of History's "New Knowledge of the Past of the Nation", which aims to commemorate the 140th anniversary of Mr. Chen Yuan's birth. Professor Lei Jiahong, Director of the Institute of History of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, presided over the lecture, and more than 220 teachers and students from Beijing Normal University, Nanjing University, Inner Mongolia University, Jinan University, Yunnan Normal University, Hunan Normal University, Henan University, Guizhou Normal University, as well as the Historical Documentation Center of the Capital Library and the First Historical Archives, met together in the cloud and listened to the lecture online.
Zhou Shaochuan first briefly described Mr. Chen Yuan's early experience. Chen Yuan (1880-1971), courtesy name Yuan'an, was a famous historian, educator and social activist. Born into a family of medicine farmers, he entered a private school in his early years and received a traditional education in the Four Books and Five Classics. After the age of 12, I read Zhang Zhidong's "Bibliographic Answers" and Qing Xiu's "Concise Catalogue of the Four Libraries", and the more I saw it, the more I saw it. Chen Yuan was 21 years old and took the xiucai examination, but was frustrated in the township examination and abandoned the examination. Chen Yuan also served as a teacher at the xinhui new primary school in Guangdong, "teaching Chinese language, arithmetic, naturalism, and public opinion, but also teaching gymnastics", which shows that he was deeply influenced by the new ideas. At the age of 25, he founded the Current Affairs Pictorial in Guangzhou, which attacked the decadent rule of the Qing government and the aggression of foreign powers. At the age of 27, in order to wash away the stigma of the "sick man of East Asia", Chen Yuan was admitted to the Boji Medical College founded by American priests. Due to discrimination against Chinese teachers and students within the medical school, Chen Yuan and some of his classmates withdrew from school in anger, raised funds with colleagues to establish Guanghua Medical College, and entered the study. In 1911, Chen Yuan graduated from medical school, stayed on to teach, and founded aurora daily. After the Xinhai Revolution, Chen Yuan was elected as a member of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly for founding progressive newspapers and periodicals. In 1913, he went to Beijing to attend the Congress and has since settled in Beijing. Due to the corruption of the parliament, Chen Yuan's enthusiasm for politics was diminishing. At the same time, due to his association with the Christian scholars Yingzhi and Ma Xiangbo, Chen Yuan's interest gradually turned to scholarship. In 1917, he wrote and published his first official historiographical treatise, Yuan Ye Li Ke Wen Jiao Kao. In 1922, Chen Yuan resigned from government positions such as vice minister of education and director of the Beijing Normal Library, and devoted himself to historical research and education.
After recounting Chen Yuan's early experience from studying medicine to politics and finally returning to historiography, Zhou Shaochuan divided Chen Yuan's academic career into three stages. 1917-1937 was the first stage, at this time Chen Yuan's academic research was mainly based on research, and his "historiography obeyed Qian Daxin". The history of Transportation at home and abroad was the focus of research in the Sinology circles at that time, and Chen Yuan wanted to compete with overseas scholars and catch up with them, so he wrote the "Four Examinations of Ancient Religion" (that is, "Yuanye Li Kewen Teaching Examination", "Huo Zhao Teaching Into China Examination", "Mani Teaching Into China Examination", "Kaifeng Yizhi Leye Teaching Examination") and "Yuanxi Regions People Huahua Examination", which are internationally renowned. For example, the Japanese scholar Kuwabara Zangzang commented on the book "The Examination of the Huahua of the Yuanxi Regions" and praised the science of his research methods, "there are many people who benefit our people"; in the 1930s, the French scholar Bo Xihe believed that Chen Yuan and Wang Guowei could be called the "world scholars" of modern China; there were also frequent academic exchanges between famous scholars such as Hu Shi and Chen Yinke. This shows the broadcast and influence of Chen Yuan's academic reputation in the world at that time.
On February 7, 1933, Yang Zhongxi and Yin Yanwu invited Bo Xihe and Ke Shaochen to a banquet, and Chen Yuan and Chen Yinke were specially invited to accompany them. The first person from the right in the second row was Chen Yuan.
The second phase was from 1937 to 1945. In light of the reality of the War of Resistance Against Japan, Mr. Chen Yuan commended the national integrity and stimulated the patriotic enthusiasm of the Chinese people with historiography. Its academic interest has shifted from evidence to emphasis on "meaningful historiography." He wrote the "Three Books of Religion" (namely, "Examination of Dianqian Buddhism in the Ming Dynasty", "The Examination of the Monks in the Early Qing Dynasty", "Examination of the New Taoist Religion in Hebei in the Early Southern Song Dynasty") and the "Tongjian Hu Zhuan Table", all of which attached importance to expounding the integrity, just as Chen Yuan later called "speech, speech, monk, speech history, and speech evidence, all pretexts, in fact, denouncing Han traitors, rebuking Japanese Kou, and responsible for being the ear of the government", and taking history as a reference to the present. At the same time, after the fall of Peiping, Chen Yuan insisted on serving as the educational position of Fu Jen University, and in his teaching, he demonstrated the deeds of the remnants of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, such as "Rizhilu" and "Collection of Gongxi Pavilion", and stimulated students' patriotic enthusiasm and support for the War of Resistance.
On December 27, 1947, Chen Yuan (second from the left) traveled east to Shichahai with Qi Gong, Liu Naihe, Chai Degeng and others.
The third phase was from 1949 to 1971. After the founding of New China, Mr. Chen Yuan began to study Marxism-Leninism Theory and Mao Zedong Thought, and vigorously advocated that historiography serve the public. He participated in the formulation of the "12-Year Long-term Development Plan for Historical Science" and the point school of the new and old "Five Dynasties History", and served as the director of the Second Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and a member of the Faculty, guiding the exhibition planning of museums such as the Palace Museum, reviewing teaching materials and historical works, and making suggestions for the construction and development of the discipline of history in New China. In 1952, Chen Yuan became the president of Beijing Normal University, devoting himself to the development of education in New China, going deep into the front line of teaching and guiding lectures. In June 1971, Mr. Chen Yuan died of illness at the age of 91.
On December 1, 1955, Chen Yuan listened to the recording of the open class of the teaching reform.
On July 3, 1959, Chen Yuan participated in an academic discussion at the Second Institute of History.
On April 9, 1961, Chen Yuan and Liu Naihe discussed the issue of the "History of the Five Dynasties" of the old and new schools.
November 8, 1970, Chen Yuan and Qi Gong.
Next, Zhou Shaochuan discussed Chen's historical achievements in detail from three aspects: religious history, historical philology, and Yuan history. In terms of religious history, Chen Yinke spoke highly of Chen Yuan's pioneering work in the study of Chinese religious history, saying that "there is almost no perfect religious history in The Second Part of China, but its beginning actually began with the writings of Chen Yuan'an, the New Association in recent years." Chen Yuan's "Four Examinations of Ancient Religions" and "Three Books of Religion" not only involve mainstream religions such as Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Taoism, but also include Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, and other extinct religions, all of which are pioneering works in the fields related to the history of Chinese religion. In short, Chen Yuan's research on the history of religion has the following four characteristics: First, it pays attention to expanding historical materials, and the correct history, anthologies, inscriptions, political books, and local chronicles are all-use; the second is to pay attention to the relationship between religion and secularism and to clarify the relationship between the rise and fall of religion and politics (such as the examination of the rise and fall of Manichaeism and Yeliwenism); the third is to explore the process of the spread of religious culture and examine the spread of religion and the spread of corresponding culture; the fourth is to attach importance to the social function of historiography, praise and disparage right and wrong, combine reality, examine historical facts, and draw corresponding historical understanding.
"Three Books of Religion" book shadow
In terms of historical philology, Chen Yuan summarized the examples and theories of righteousness and theories by means of scattered evidence of the ancients in a scientific way, making them a specialty that can be taught and developed. For example, his bibliographic masterpieces "Examination of the Bibliography of the Four Libraries", "Dunhuang Yulu", "Introduction to Chinese Buddhist History", chronological classics "Chinese and Western Hui History Calendar", "Twenty Shi Shuo Leap Tables", the masterpiece of avoidance of secrecy "Examples of History", the model of collation of "Shen Carved Yuandian Zhang school supplement", "Yuandian Zhang School Supplement" (also known as "School Survey Interpretation Case") and other books such as "Chen Yuan's Historical Source Miscellaneous Texts", a representative study of historical origins, especially his systematic summary of the theory of avoidance and historical source, and proposed the four methods of school survey (for school, this school, other school, science school), The establishment of Dunhuang Studies has pointed out the door for future generations to govern learning.
"Yuandian Zhang School Supplementary Interpretation Example" and "Historical Example" book shadow
In terms of Yuan history, the "Yuanxi Regions People Huahua Examination" cited a total of 210 kinds of books, 168 characters, and discussed the influence of Chinese culture on ethnic minorities in the Western Regions and even central and West Asian countries from the aspects of Confucianism, religion, literature, art, and etiquette. Chen Yinkei praised this book as "the transferor of the academic atmosphere in our country to the greatest", saying that "the book of Mr. Chen Yuan'an of the Xinhui Association is especially admired by Chinese and foreign scholars, mr. Gai's exquisite thinking and knowledge, and the scholar of our country has not had it since Qian Xiaozheng (Da Xin)". In addition, Chen Yuan's other famous work, "Tongjian Hu ZhubiaoWei", studied the annotations of the Yuan Dynasty scholar Hu Sansheng on the Zizhi Tongjian and commented on the opinions on Hu Zhuan, reflecting Chen Yuan's own historical thoughts. There are 20 articles in the book, the first 10 on history and law, the last 10 on history, on the social function of historiography, widely involving ethnicity, religion, frontier and other issues, and combined with the fact that the country and the nation were in danger at that time, concentrated on his worries about the country and patriotism.
"Yuan Xiyu Ren Huahua Kao" "Tongjian Hu Zhu Table Wei" book shadow
Zhou Shaochuan summarized Chen Yuan's historical thinking into five aspects: First, the national concept of the unified development of multiple nationalities. Chen Yuan had planned to write a book entitled "A Strategy for New Clans Since the Han Dynasty," which was to denounce the style of the Han nationality at that time, arguing that there was no pure Han nationality in China's history, but a mixed ethnicity, and the Chinese nation also included multi-ethnic groups, emphasizing the fact that many nationalities jointly built the history of China. The second is to establish a compatible view of national cultural history. In the study of religious history, Chen Yuan is based on Chinese culture, looking at foreign religions, paying special attention to the influence of these religions on Chinese politics, systems, and culture, of which the localization of Buddhism and matteo Ricci's Speaking chinese and wearing Confucian clothes at the end of the Ming Dynasty are the manifestations. The third is the historicist view of religious history. Mr. Chen Yuan emphasized the view of religion from the perspective of objective history and sympathetic understanding, adhered to the equality of religion, freedom of belief, and paid attention to the relationship between religion and politics, as well as ethnic and frontier issues in the context of religion. The fourth is to collect and examine the historical materials of historical materials. Mr. Chen Yuan proposed to use 50% of the time to collect historical materials, 30% of the time to examine historical materials, and 20% of the time to write articles. He advocated the study of historical sources, paying attention to judging the source flow of historical materials and examining the use of materials. Fifth, examine the methodology. Mr. Chen Yuan proposed the following methods of examination in the "General Jian Hu Zhu Table Micro": examination can be doubtful, examination should start in the subtleties, examination should pay attention to numbers, examination history should be based on the emergence of its language, reading history must be examined at the beginning and end, and geography should be personally experienced. Chen Yuan advocates the spirit of skepticism and does not credulously believe in existing conclusions; uses the method of exclusion to exclude those who are not credible and retain those who are close to objective facts; and takes catalogs, proofreading, chronology, and avoidance as the "four keys" of historical research.
At the end of the lecture, Zhou Shaochuan concluded with "Mr. Chen Yuan's excellent study style" and encouraged the future generations to follow the example of the scholars of the previous generations. The first is the spirit of inspirational cultivation and hard work. Zhou Shaochuan cited Chen Yuan's "secret recipe" of "having determination, perseverance, assiduous study, and step-by-step" and showed Mr. Chen Yuan's spirit of hard work in studying the "Twenty-Four Histories" as a teenager, reading the "Four Libraries of the Whole Book" in middle age, reading "Jiaxing Collection" with mosquito bites, and composing "The Story of the Tooth of the Buddha" in his later years. The second is the attitude of having a basis for what is said and seeking truth from facts. In the search for historical materials, Mr. Chen Yuan is a model of "exhausting and fishing" and exhausting historical materials, and his writings must be well-founded. The third is a concise and innovative purpose. The fourth is the practice of modesty, prudence and excellence. Mr. Chen Yuan once said, "Wencheng must have unceremonious slander and criticism", and the article "should be left for a long time", and each article is completed, and then the teacher and friend are presented for advice, and after repeated revision and precipitation, it will eventually become a model.
Zhou Shaochuan's wonderful two-and-a-half-hour lecture deeply shocked the teachers and students present and gained a lot. Director Lei Jiahong concluded that Professor Zhou Shaochuan's profound interpretation has brought us useful enlightenment and profound inspiration, and the classics are often read and updated, and the interpretation of the classics is often listened to. Through Professor Zhou's detailed explanation, we deeply feel that Mr. Chen Yuan's life is exactly the reflection of the spirit of a patriotic scholar. By understanding the life interests of previous generations of scholars, it inspires the academic future generations to reflect on the current historical research, life choices and even the way people live, which is the power of academic passing on the torch.
Editor-in-Charge: Zhong Yuan
Proofreader: Zhang Liangliang