An Outstanding Symbol Of Chinese Political Culture

Zhou Gong is an important and critical historic figure in researching Chinese ancient culture and early civilization. In the 1980s and 1990s the attention of Chinese scholars is mostly focused on the problem whether Zhou Gong had been the regent or king of the Zhou regime. Since the beginning of the 21st century, Chinese scholars have paid greater attention to Zhou Gong and have written several important and systemic works about Zhou Gong. These efforts not only continue to expand the current "national studies fever", but also retrospective reflect on the Chinese culture in the Primal Axial Period before Confucius. All these are worthy endeavoring. The problems about Zhou Gong involve many academic fields and aspects, adding to the complexity of the on-going studies.This dissertation attempts to clarify and fill up the gaps by choosing the important topics covering the political identity, the controversial deeds and the cultural implications concerning Zhou Gong. It adopts a multi-disciplinary research method involving history, archeology and language analysis to deal with those doubtful points about facts and reasons so as to do my part in promoting the research on the Chinese traditional culture.The controversy on Zhou Gong having become a king or not is not only a hotpot in current academic debates, but also an unavoidable problem in studying Zhou Gong. It involves not only historical facts but also historical methodology. This comes down to evaluating his place in history. The crises facing the early Western Zhou Dynasty, the rigorous efforts which Zhou Gong made to turn the tide and helped the dynasty out of the crisis in his role as the prime minister of the young and inexperienced King Cheng. Viewed in this light, Zhou Gong played a critically important role in this. We can not thus conclude that Zhou Gong had laid claim to the Zhou throne because of this. It is the critical situation of king Wu death, king Cheng young and the armed rebellion of the remnant of the vanquished Yin-Shang and leading members of the Zhou ruling clan resulting in Zhou Gong's great achievements, which later lead to the misunderstanding about Zhou Gong's role and ambitions. My conclusion is that these hardly proves that Zhou Gong have ever ascended the throne and become king according to recorded wordings in the Zhoushu section of the Shangshu, such as "the king said" or "the king said so" in should be regarded as Zhou Gong's speech on behalf of the King Cheng or the formulated phraseology of the Zhou court historiographer. The words "Head of the vassals, my brother, young Feng" in the Kanggao has been considered hard evidence which Zhou Gong had become king. However, just as some scholars have proved that which is parenthesis of Zhou Gong based on the addressee. If we probe into the subject again with the fact that bronze inscriptions in Western Zhou are lack of recordings on Zhou Gong as a king, we could draw inferences that Zhou Gong has never been a king in history. We may confirm the fact that Zhou Gong was not a king. He only assisted King Cheng governing the state in early Western Zhou Dynasty, but extraordinary history conditions made him to be a kingly persona in political life playing a great role in the Western Zhou Dynasty. He assisted King Cheng in the so-called Zhou Gong regency. As a matter of fact, this regency does not necessarily mean Zhou Gong was a king. Studies on other doubtful points about Zhou Gong should respect and use the achievements of previous researches for reference, combining historical analysis with intellectual historical study, and using also those legendary accounts about Zhou Gong as meaningful research material.The contents and sources of Zhou Gong's thought are very colorful. Many senior Chinese scholars had already written about this, but there are misunderstandings needed to be clarified. Ideas about the Mandate of Heaven visa-avis humanistic efforts, critical awareness about conditions of the state, etc., as expressed by Zhou Gong was probably not the sole characteristics of his thought but the common concerns of all capable and far-sighted rulers, or the common intellectual trends of early Zhou time. These intellectual concerns were symbolic of the Primal Axial Age in China, and greatly influenced China'traditional political culture. These enlightened notions of Zhou Gong's signified a step forward in China's ancient intellectual-ideological development. The sayings reportedly coming from Zhou Gong, such as "Heaven assists those of good faith", "Heaven could not be gain-said for sure", "Heaven could not be completely trusted " constituted major currents in Chinese traditional thought, which often crisscrossed and complimented each others. These demonstrate humanistic reasoning from different respects still with their positive and progressive significance today.The relationship between Zhou Gong and the traditional culture of China is a significant problem. This dissertation focused on analyzing three typical Confucianist classics, the Book of Songs(shijing), the Book of changes (Yijing), and the Book of History (Shujing). It studies how Zhou Gong is thought to be related to the classics. Specifically speaking, there are some poems in the Book of Songs written by Zhou Gong indeed, i.e. Chi Xiao, Da ya Wen wang, Zhou song qing miao and Da wu which consists of Shi mai, Wu,Lai, Ban, Zhuo, Huan. It is unsuitable to say that Zhou Gong is the author of the Book of Songs on the basis of this. But some of poems mostly were his. Regarding the Book of Changes, we mainly discuss the relationship that the role of King Wen and Zhou Gong on the Book of Changes and put forward the viewpoint that they both wrote some of it. According to many historical documents and the thought flavor of the book, it is likely that king Wen and Zhou Gong are closely related in authoring the Book of Changes. On the other hand, the statement that Confucius wrote the Yi zhuan section in the present Book of Changes can hardly hold water. The fact that Confucius read and love the yi is not the same as he wrote Yi zhuan. There are twelve chapters about Zhou Gong in Zhou shu. It is observed that Zhou Gong is a man of planning well, ponderous and cautious, considerate and of easy access. This is about the real inner world of Zhou Gong. It shows that he is not only a statesman and thinker, but also that he is intimately related to the traditional culture of China and stands an important position in the history of Chinese intellectual-cultural development.Zhou Gong played a critical role not only in the political filed of early Zhou Dynasty, but also in the history of Chinese culture. He contributed to the formation and development of Chinese political culture and influenced cultural values primarily. All in all, we may rightly consider Zhou Gong as a outstanding symbol of Chinese political culture.