Liu Shuxian Religious View Studies

As a New Confucianism representative personage contemporarily, Liu shuxian hasbeen active in the international academic arena since1970s. With a rigorous style ofstudy, an air of depth, a broad span of cultural involvement, and works full of criticalthinking, he is influential in academic circle at home and abroad. Today study on Liu'sacademic thought is unfolding, and many problems related are worth digging into.Especially, his view on religion is unique among his peers and needs our attention.The idea "ultimate concern"is the key to understand and grasp Liu's religiousoutlook. This core conception is not established overnight, but has going throughmultiple selection. So the first chapter is divided into four parts to explicate how heconstructed his theory and developed it. The idea "ultimate concern"definitely stemmedfrom religious philosopher Tillich's, and this is the key point of the second chapter.The main reason why Liu absorbed Tillich's "ultimate concern"theory is to study thecommunication and dialogue between different civilizations. Liu improved Tillich's"ultimate concern"theory, and highlighted "self-transcendence"which is a goldensaying to Confucian. Consequently, this provided a platform for dialogue betweeneastern and western civilizations to make Western scholars clear: in terms ofmetaphysics, Confucian "self-transcendence"complies better with the futuredevelopment trend of philosophy. As to the structural hierarchy of his "ultimateconcern", it is not only in one dimension, but multidimensional."Function worldoutlook"is the sublimation of traditional "entity world look";"Li Yi Fen Shu" backs"ultimate concern"both in methodology and metaphysics;"Liang Hang Zhi Li"answers the possibility of "self-transcendence". Naturally, the religious trait ofConfucianism rendered by "ultimate concern"and its development in the future, remainundefined.Following is the main focus of each chapter:The first chapter mainly investigates the shaping and developing of Liu's religiousview. This thesis divides the process into4phases: family education, schooling and teaching in Taiwan, studying and teaching in America, teaching back to Hong Kong andparticipating in international exchange. In the first phase, he got enlightenment ofphilosophy from his father and perceptual knowledge of Buddhism. In the second phase,he mainly approached Cassirer's religious philosophy of symbolic form. This is the startof his view system of religion, which includes: religious outlook in the visual thresholdof philosophy of symbolic form, religious judgment of all kinds of cultures in the world,evaluation of religion, and so on.When he studied and taught in America, he formed his single religious belief of"ultimate concern". Since the formation of the religious belief, Liu Shuxian firstlycompared the difference between the Confucianism and the "ultimate concern" from theaspects including God, human being, Christ, grace, church in Christian, and suggestedthat modern Christian culture had the trend to develop into the culture of Confucianism.When he taught in Hong Kong and attended international communication, he expresseddeepened understanding of religious belief of "ultimate concern", which is reflected inthe understanding of "surpass" and "inherent", and further inspired traditional Chinesephilosophic thought of universality and particularity to reflect world philosophy.The second chapter mainly studied the theoretical origin of Liu Shuxian's religiousbelief. According to the chapter, Liu Shuxian's religious belief of "ultimate concern"stemmed from Tillich's religious belief of "ultimate concern". It was a series ofprocesses that he began to contact western theology and religion when he studied inAmerica and accepted the thought of Tillich. In line with the acceptance, he acceptedthe beginning point of Tillich's thinking mode, modified the form of problem-solving,and further expressed his confirmation process of "ultimate concern" in Confucianism.Meanwhile, he investigated the original meaning of Tillich's thought of "ultimateconcern". In the end, according to Liu Shuxian's extension and explication of Tillich's"ultimate concern", the paper suggested that, through comparative analytical method,Liu Shuxian matched disposition thought of Confucianism, life Confucianism, andidealism, existentialism, justification by faith in Tillich's "ultimate concern".The third chapter mainly studied the theoretical construction of Liu Shuxian'sreligious belief. The chapter is divided into three parts to discuss his religious belief:firstly, Liu Shuxian improved "ultimate concern" based on Tillich's religious belief, andregarded superior belief and wish as the judgment standard of religion. According to thejudgment standard, the paper mainly analyzed the complex relation between the "surpass" and "belief" to explain the relevance between his judgment standard and hisreligious belief, which concluded that his judgment standard was constructed based onfeature of "self-transcendence" in Confucianism to perform communication between theEast and the West. Then, we found another thought in Liu Shuxian's religious beliefthrough analysis, the religious belief in the construction of world ethics, to explain thathe believed the relation between religious belief and world peach was very close and thedifference among various cultures led to harmony and integration instead of conflict.Furthermore, in the integration process of eastern culture and western culture,"self-transcendence" and the "li yi fen shu" would contribute to the resource for theconstruction of world ethics. In the end, the problem of metaphysics and ultimateconcern was analyzed, which suggested that according to Liu Shuxian, metaphysicsreferred to belief and wish for surpass, and ultimate concern is the materialization of thebelief and wish for surpass. Therefore, firstly, the origin of metaphysics andcorresponding development and evolution in western philosophy was discussed; andtwo forms of metaphysics including realm metaphysics in China and actual metaphysicsin the West was compared, and the theoretical mode of meaningful (or realm)philosophy was constructed based on criticism to western actual metaphysics. Further itis suggested that the thought of disposition in Confucianism had religious content, withsuperior spiritual meaning, which has inspiration to further understand construction ofmeaningful philosophy. The chapter also tried to analyze the constructive meaning of"superior experience" and "li yi fen shu" in metaphysics. In the end, several types ofultimate concern were divided to analyze the inherent superiority included in ultimateconcern. In the conclusion of the chapter, the connection of "self-transcendence" and"realm metaphysics" and corresponding introspection was analyzed, which supportedthat the driving power behind was the cultural communication and dialogue between theEast and the West. Without the attack of western culture on Chinese culture, Chinesescholars would not develop these concepts against western culture to extrude its culturalfeature. The communication and dialogue will continue, and academic circles willexplore these aspects.The fourth chapter investigated the theoretical level of Liu Shuxian's religiousbelief. According to the chapter, Liu Shuxian's meaningful (prospect) philosophystemmed from the Cassirer symbol form. He deleted the ideal of entity cosmology, andaccepted function world outlook to develop realm metaphysics. From the idea of functional uniformity, it is suggested that religion is particular matter, and religion is thecommon matter. In Liu Shuxian's religion,"functional uniformity" and "li yi fen shu"are evidence of each other, including the cosmology and methodology. Meanwhile, the"li yi fen shu" includes the content of metaphysics, methodology, and cosmology. In thischapter, the metaphysical meaning in the thought of universality and particularity wasanalyzed. Therefore, the content of "Liang Hang Zhi Li" was included in the chapter toecho the last chapter, for the thought of Liang Hang Zhi Li proved the possibility ofself-transcendence. Therefore, the "self-transcendence" included in confucianism,buddhism and taoism was analyzed. Through the chapter, we fully presented the overallstructure of Liu Shuxian's religious belief: function uniformity, realm metaphysics,ultimate concern, and self-transcendence These a few respects, linked together, advancestep. The foothold of Liu Shuxian's religious belief was the evidence ofself-transcendence. Functional uniformity, realm metaphysics (meaningful philosophy)were the foundations. Ultimate concern was the cognition of the core content. The "li yifen shu" was the guidance principle in methodology and the line connected theseaspects.The fifth chapter investigated the firm religion of Confucianism under theperceptive of "ultimate concern". According to the chapter, the understanding of modernNew Confucianism is a gradually deepening process. The first modern NewConfucianism had a reservation on relation between religion and Confucianism due tothe influence of enlightenment though in the May Fourth Movement. The secondgeneration of modern New Confucianism began to develop superior thought inConfucianism to echo the attack of western value. The third generation of modern newConfucianism had more positive and vaster communication with western culture,resulting in constantly deepening and strengthening involvement aspect and commonthought of diversified cultures. In the discussion on nature of Confucian religion, thereare three discussions on the religion of Confucianism, taking place in the late stage ofMing Dynasty, the end of Qing Dynasty, and after the Cultural Revolution, which werelaunched by Mathew Ricci, Kang Youwei, and Re Jiyu. Currently, the dispute on ReJiyu's thought that "Confucianism is the school" includes four opinions:1.Confucianism is the religion;2. Confucianism is not religion;3. Compromised theory:part of Confucianism is the religion or is a specific religion.4. Constructive theory:other supplementary opinion on whether Confucianism is a religion; it is emphasized that the dispute on religion of Confucianism is the understanding of Confucianism andcontradictory double standard in understanding of religion. Based on the abovedemonstration, the paper finally investigated religious meaning of Liu Shuxian'sConfucianism and religion, modern value, and meaning under the view of "ultimateconcern", and made the following conclusion: Liu Shuxian believed understanding ofConfucianism's transcendence had the religious meaning, but the Confucianism was notreligion.The sixth chapter introspected Liu Shuxian's religion. Firstly, the paper believedthat under the view of "ultimate concern", the exploration on transcendence indisposition of Confucianism had positive meaning on confirming life value, but it easilygot rid of the reality and fell into the metaphysics to separate the reality and humanbeings. The shortage of disposition is that, with insufficient attention to physicalphenomena and value presentation to cause and contribution, the public has littleacceptability, resulting in insufficient participation of common people. Therefore, LiuShuxian's thought becomes the academic activity of few professional talents, which isnot good for the development of Confucian. Secondly, Chen Jianhong, the expert inNankai University, has disputed Liu Shuxian's thought on religion of Confucianism, andgot answer from him. Both parties have disputes on some problems. The author clearedthe problem from the angle of the third party. Thirdly, as for Liu Shuxian's confusingthe culture and religion, the author put forward some suggestions. In the end, the authorproposed some imagination for future development status of discussion on religion ofConfucianism.