The Original Discussion On Kuo Hsiang's Political Philosophy

At present in the academic circle exists the general overlooking and misunderstanding of Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties. It is generally accepted that the philosophers are"empty talk misleading the country"and Neo-Taoism is the passive and downfallen philosophy, which totally deviates from reality. Even though some scholars can face it squarely within the discussion of some philosophical problems, most of them also regarded Neo-Taoism as one of malformation and aberrance in Chinese ideological history, as well as the downfallen of Confucianism. Few would like to include it into the discussion of the inner logical system of the whole Chinese ideological history. This paper attempts to expose the realistic care of the whole Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties through the explanation of Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy with the purpose of correcting people's misunderstanding of Neo-Taoism.The reason for taking Kuo Hsiang as the object of study is that his theory represents the summit of Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties with the comparatively complete theoretical modality. The choice of such object of study helps to tease the evolutional process of the whole Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties and understand the inner logic during the evolution of the whole Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties to Buddhism in Sui-Tang Dynasties and Neo-Confucianism in Song-Ming Dynasties, so that we can recognize the important status of Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties in Chinese ideological history.The introductory part of this paper is mainly discusses the relations of ethic and nature,and analyzes the treatments about the relations of ethic and nature of Confucianists and Taoists in Pre-Qin period. This part is not only taken as the background and matting for the analysis of logic structure of Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy in the following part, but also to some extents the general outline of the whole paper and the most concentrated theoretical expression of author's intention.The main text of this paper is consisted of three parts. The first part discusses the cause of formation and the logic of the developing process of Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties. The second part is concerned with the analysis of the theoretical system of Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy. The last one is the general analysis of it.The first part is mainly discusses the relations of ethic and nature, then with the dimensionality of ethic-nature relations explains the cause of formation of Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties and the inner logic of its development.The second part is mainly concerned with the analysis of the logical frame of Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy from three aspects: methodology, ontological theory, and political theory. Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy is mainly embodied in The Note Book of Chuang Tzu. In fact, Kuo Hsiang did not aim to make the commentary for it, but expressed his own philosophical idea by doing so. As a result, Mr. Fu Weixun awarded him"the first misreading genius"in Chinese philosophical history. Just through the misunderstanding of The Note Book of Chuang Tzu, Kuo Hsiang built a set of sophisticated philosophical system to solve the contradiction between ethic and nature. This part with the center of the political theory is the body of this paper.The third part is mainly the appraisement of Kuo Hsiang's political philosophy. Such as its limitation, its status in Chinese philosophical history, the long-range influence to the future philosophy and etc.This paper aims to illustrate that Neo-Taoism in Wei-Jin Dynasties is not the philosophy from reality, but the rational speculation of the scholars of Neo-Taoism, based on the dissimilation of ethic and the rebuilt philosophical system by the way of being assistant to Taoism for its entrance to Confucianism; it is the scholars'rewarding attempt in endowing ethic the new metaphysical foundation through the theoretical construction of political philosophy.