Shu And Thought Of Han Historian

Dong Zhongshu, an outstanding thinker and great master of Confucian classics in early and middle period of West Han Dynasty, was respected as the leading scholar of group Confucianists in Han Dynasty. He was well versed in Confucian classics and his academic ideas were both extensive and profound, which produced significant influences on academic ideas of Han Dynasty. This article, entitled"On Dong Zhongshu and the History Thoughts of Han Dynasty", is aimed to prove Dong Zhongshu has plentiful history thoughts and these thoughts have great influences on historians and thinkers in Han Dynasty, such as Si Maqian,Liu Xiang,Liu Xin,Wang Chong,Ban Gu,He Xiu and Xun Yue. To some degree, the trend of history thoughts development of Han Dynasty cannot be separated from the effect of Dong Zhongshu's history concepts.The basic idea of Dong Zhongshu's history ideas contains three points. First, he systematically advocated the theory of interaction between man and nature and made use of which to express his views on history prosperity and decline. This theory primarily propagated that royal right was God's will and heaven condemned man. The former proceeded from political requirement of esteeming sovereign, while the latter dictated to warning. So, in substance, Dong Zhongshu's theory of interaction between man and nature was not universe philosophy, but historical and political one. Second, he stated his views of history changes through systematic exposition to SanTong Doctrines. As far as the appearances go, Dong Zhongshu's SanTong Doctrines expressed circulation and change theory of history for they believed that history dynasties circulated and altered according to the orders of Black,White and Red systems. In fact, they aimed at changing and rectifying system drawbacks. Third, he advertised the concepts of"grand unification"and through which elucidated the theory of politics and history orders. The connotation of"grand unification"lied in two aspects. One was Xing Er Shang(the formiess), which was to establish"Yuan"for sterling start; the other was Xing Er Xia(the formal), which was to build up ruling orders for a whole empire under one ruler.The influences of Dong Zhongshu's history ideas on historiography thoughts of Han Dynasty were also mainly about three points. First, paying attention to history prosperity and decline was one of the theme of history during Han Dynasty. Dong Zhongshu established the theory of interaction between man and nature and use this to make a spiritual expression on that concept, which in turn had...