The Ture-or-False Debates On Historical Events Stated By Meng Ke In The Book Of "Mencius"

Content: The widely-spread book "Mencius", as the Confucian classics,not only produces significant effects to people's thought, the historicalevents stated by Meng Ke in it also affect the people's ideas and attitudestowards history. Because there are limited materials and most of thesematerials are written later than the book "Mencius", until now thosescholars haven't achieved general agreement on those problems, such asthe problems on the system of well field, the system of turning over thethrone to another, the park of Wen Wang and the duke of Ge attacked byTang and so on. In this thesis, the author intends to put those differentideas on these problems together and make integrative comparisons andanalysis, expecting to find out the cause of those debates made by bothancient and modern scholars, and also expecting that this study can help alot for the later research on these problems.After discussing on the above four problems, i.e. the problems onthe system of well field, the system of turning over the throne to another,the park of Wen Wang and the duke of Ge attacked by Tang, the authorthen draws the following conclusions: 1. For the first problem on theresearch and localization on the well field system problem stated by MengKe in the "Mencius", it can't be separated from the background whenMeng Ke stated it; on the contrary, the study of it should take the contextsat that time into consideration. In this case, objective conclusions can bemade. 2. For the second problem on the system of turning over the throneto another stated by Meng Ke in the book "Mencius", it should beanalyzed objectively but not subjectively. It should be known that themandate of heaven was an outer clothing of abdicating and giving thecrown to another and the essence can be seen clearly only by seeingthrough those phenomenons. 3. For the third problem that the park of WenWang had seventy miles stated by Meng Ke in the book "Mencius", it should consider not only the contexts when Meng Ke stated it in the"Mencius", but also the Meng Ke's debate skills. 4. For the fourthproblem on the duke of Ge attacked by Tang stated by Meng Ke in thebook "Mencius", this thesis mainly discusses the reason for the duke Geattacked by Tang, whether the reason was that the duke of Ge did not offersacrifices to ancestors or the reason was that the duke of Ge killed the boywho give them food. After detailed analysis, the reason for the duke of Geattacked by Tang in this thesis was thought that the duke of Ge did notoffer sacrifices to ancestors and the purpose for which Meng Ke said itwas thought of propagating his thought of a ruler's politics.After the comparison and analysis for the above four questions, theauthor summarized the reasons for former people's endless debates on theproblem of historical events stated by Meng Ke in the book "Mencius:The first reason is that they are short of the reliable historical material'sproof. On one hand, Meng Ke lived in the later years of the WarringStates when the most documents were damaged in the affair of burningbooks; on the other hand, most of the related documents that we can havewere written by the Han people. The second reason is that with theincreasing prestige of Meng Ke and the raising position of the book"Mencius", the ancient and modern scholars gradually form two schools:one school esteems "Meng" and the other doubts "Meng". They getdifferent conclusions from different positions, so it is difficult to make achoice among them. There is the third reason. In the later years of thewarring states, dukes struggled for supremacy and people lived in deepdistress. Meng Ke wanted to save the people and to create a peaceful andsteady society, so he delivered a speech to persuade those dukes to adopthis ruling strategies. Therefore, the historical events stated by Meng kebecause of that special time and special events in the book "Mencius"can't be believed completely. Finally is the fourth reason. Meng Kewanted to persuade those dukes, so he must speak with skills in order thathis opinions are more persuasive and then be adopted. Because of his debating arts, those historical events stated by Meng Ke in the book"Mencius" can not be believed completely.In conclusion, for the historical events stated by Meng Ke in thebook "Mencius", we'd better throw away the prejudice and recognize itscientifically. On one hand, they should not be treated as completely trueand reliable history records; on the other hand, they should not be whollyunbelievable. The right attitude towards them is to do some research andanalysis, then choose to follow those reliable parts Moreover, we shouldtake the analysis of historical events stated by Meng Ke in the book"Mencius" as references. For the historical events recorded in thosepre-qin times' books, as they are orally stated by scholars, they shouldneither be believed completely, nor be doubted completely.