On Wang Chuanshan's Interpretation Of Sincerity

"Sincerity"is an extremely important category in Chinese philosophy, since the pre-Qin, many philosophers have ever interpreted it creatively. Especially in the Song and Ming Dynasty, Buddhism made a profound impact on neo-Confucianism. In such an academic background, the interpretation of "Sincerity" has become a focus of neo-Confucianism. Many scholars in the period of Song and Ming Dynasty ,such as Zhou Dunyi,Zhang Zai,Zhu Xi and Wang Shouren, have advanced their own ideas on the interpretation of "Sincerity" in accordance with their own idea systems . Different ideas on interpreting "Sincerity" emerge and it turn out to be a pluralized problem.Wang chuanshan's interpretation of "Sincerity" appears under the academic atmosphere in the period of Song and Ming Dynasty. As an outstanding scholar of neo-Confucianism, he firmly follows the thought of neo-Confucianism and makes an overall comment on the different schools in way of interpretation. First of all, Wang chuanshan adhere to interpret the "sincerity" as "reality", and believe that "reality" is a rule to all of the things. On the one hand, in order to follows the ancient thought of "sincerity", Chuanshan thinks that "sincerity" can be divided into "Sincerity of Heavenly Way (Tian Dao)" and "Sincerity of Human Way (Ren Dao) ". "Sincerity of Heavenly Tao" decides "Sincerity of Human Tao", however, "Sincerity of Human Tao" can realize and understand "Sincerity of Heavenly Tao". Eventually one can arrives at the highest virtue with this mutual movement. The view of Chuanshan's"Sincerity"overcomes Zhu xi and Wang Shouren's differences on this issue. On the other hand, he emphasizes that for the free subject, the foundation of its existence is not Heavenly Way ( Tian Dao), but Human Way ( Ren Dao), and correspondingly the unfree subject just forward Heavenly Way (Tian Dao) so as to eliminate its existence. In other word, only by way of following and carrying forward Heavenly Way (Tian Dao) does the subject can promote itself to the heights of human nature.It seems that chuanshan's interpretation of "Sincerity" shows a strong dissatisfaction of Zhu Xi school's idea and reveals the characteristic of relying on the thought of Wang Shouren from a superficial level, but his way substantially starts a new dimension of interpreting "Sincerity" which is more persuasive than both of the above two schools and approach Zhang Zai. Therefore, Chuanshan's thinking of "Sincerity" has its own unique ideological and theoretical value and significance.