On The Images Of Scholars In Records Of The Historian

On the Images of Scholars in Records of the Historian(Abstract)Scholars, as the most active stratum of the history of China, has many unique implications. The author of this thesis will analyze scholars' class peculiarity and their basic living style and features, inspect people's expectations for the Scholars. To achieve a qualitative analysis, we will only focus on the period of the rising of Scholars to scholars in the pre-Qin days. Based on these analyses, the author wants to probe the deep cultural implications of this kind of images in Records of the Historian and its profound and lasting influence on the later ages.The scholars' cultural in the pre-Qin days, the alteration of the stratum of scholars and the declining conditions in the early times of xi-Han period are two important factors, which had exerted great impact on Sima Qian's concept on scholars. The pursuit of humanism in the early Han Dynasty and the retrogressive mood of the Warring States have influenced Sima Qian's character or personality. Going through "the Misfortune of Li Ling", Sima Qian doubles his efforts to delve further into scholars' touching faith in lives, to explore and to mould scholars' ideal personalities.In Records of the Historian, there is a dominating idea that a scholar acts on behalf of an understanding friend. On the one hand, with the use of this concept, Sima Qian's purposely vivified his characters and conveyed his strong feelings, which in the meanwhile showed his deep sighing over the fickleness of human friendship. On the other hand, such a concept also reflects the fact that in the long history of "human's waking up", people's sense of loneliness became stronger and stronger and their desire for bosom friends became more and more intense.Scholars' distinctive experiences of dishonor have some connections with their peculiar social status and their special identities entrusted by society. Scholars' reactions to disgrace are very intense and sharp, and the acutest is to commit suicide to revolt against dishonor. The spirit of "scholars are willing to be killed instead of being insulted' is of long standing. But from Sima Qian's, it begins to have new connotation. Wiping out or enduring humiliation is not the emotional pouring and draining of feelings but an active mind to seek a new way of self-fulfillment, which is reflected as a struggling will to strive for being stronger.Ran-nuo, which is the basic principle that people must abide by in their actions, is the rational spirit inherited from the civilizations of ancient times. In Records of the Historian, Ran-nuo and Yi are placed on a par, which is good to perfect the quality of the image of scholars, and to advocate healthy trends and rejecting narrow views. The selection of the two characters "Ren" and "Yi" is to generalize the peculiarities of roving bravoes. Its significance lies in advocating the upright chivalrous spirit, to develop the cultural views that the whole world is one community and doing the upright things is valued, at the same time, to rectify the maladies of the times and to encourage scholars to continue their righteous actions.The concept of rendering meritorious service and then winning honors is deep-rooted in scholars' minds. But in Records of the Historian , the author, tends to spiritualize their actions instead of making a positive description on the process of scholars' searching for wealth and high honors. The generalizationof the image of scholars not only reflects the ideal personalities of scholars but also highlights the rational beauty of scholars' retreat after achieving career success but also admits their rationality and inevitability of pursuing wealth. At the same time, he also demotes scholars' putting too much emphasis on honor and wealth and their ignoring to rectify their actions, which reveals Sima Qian's historical view of dialectical development.Hong-yi, as one of the fine tradition of the earlier intellectuals of China, has been handed down to the later generations as preciously spirit...