The Exploration Of Historical Data Value Of WeiShu

The thought of Chenwei, which had been prosperous during the Han Dynasty, is an important component of the history of the Han Dynasty thoughts and has especially produced far-reaching effects in all areas of society. As an important carrier of the thought of Chenwei, Weishu was produced in particular background of times and almost falsely attributed to Confucius. Using mystical prediction it provided the theory proof and the academic support for political rule. For the connection with the traditional Confucian Classics Weishu constitutes an important component of the ideology and culture of the Han Dynasty. Moreover, there is a great deal of information and opinion on the astronomy, geography, religion, culture, myth and history in the book, so it is helpful to the study of the ancient myths, history, science, literature and other important aspects. This thesis is divided into six chapters. The first chapter expatiates on the development and change of Weishu, including the aspects of the meaning, nature, origin, prosperity, change and revival. It has not been certain about the time of the origin of Weishu since the Han Dynasty.Because most of the contents of Weishu were falsely attributed to God's prophecy and the authors had not put their names and times on their works, we can not make sure the exact time of the formation of them. But according to Weishu's nature and the quotations in other ancient literatures, the time of systematic creation of Weishu should be from the late Western Han Dynasty to the period of Wangmang. The rise and wide dissemination of Weishu closely related to the prosperity of studies of Confucian classics, the social status of Confucian scholars and the generally type of thinking in the Han Dynasty. It was the necessity of the development of Chinese academic thoughts.For the close connection with politics, Weishu is a double blade sword. It could become an effective tool of the protection of political rule and may also a tool for people who coveted about political power. At the time of its production Weishu had been doomed the destiny of destruction and never stopped from the late Eastern Han Dynasty. All the text of Weishu had almost disappeared. From the Ming Dynasty, some scholars began to put the focus on the value of Weishu as a sort of literature instead of the political value. The task of compilation of the text of Weishu began to rise too. At the basis of the efforts of the scholars of Ming and Qing Dynasty, the numbers of the chapters which had been compiled increased gradually and the text of Weishu is also completed. This provided a main premise for the collation and research of Weishu.The first chapter also described the appraisal of the truth and value of Weishu. By what kind of standard to determine the authenticity of a book involves the question how to regard the cultural development. When we judge the value of a book we should place it in the time the book is produced. We couldn't ignore the historical data value of Weishu merely because of the false authors and incredible content.The thesis elaborates the historical data value of Weishu as a sort of literature in terms of the history of society, science, philosophy, and literature and art from the second to the fifth chapter. In general, as a special sort of literature the content of Weishu is complex and full of element of mystery and superstition. But Weishu preserved many historical materials before the Han Dynasty and supplemented the content of theology, fangshu, yunqi, and unity of heaven and man which the Confucian Classics involves little. By Weishu we could understand early Chinese culture better and restore the ancient history and legend and religious myths which had been covered up by the humanities ideological trend. Also Weishu could become a supplement of the history. In addition, the majority of Weishu bad been created in the Han Dynasty and it is important literature for the study of the thoughts and culture in the Han Dynasty. Just because of its historical data value we could not abandon it. Specifically, the second chapter is about the philological value of ancient history and legend and political view. The third chapter is about the history of science including ancient astronomy, geography, physic, and phenology. The fourth chapter is about the history of philosophy including the simple dialectics and the theory of divinatory symbols gas, production of the universe and primordial qi. The fifth chapter is about literature and art including the exposition of characters, historical data of the literature and the theory of music.In summation, the last chapter of the thesis summarized the unique characters of the historical data of Weishu and the principle of usage. First, in the aspect of academic value, there are both true and false historical data in Weishu. Second, most of the data are about the history of thoughts and science and have a high historical data value. Third, each chapters of Weishu appeared sooner or later and was not written by one person. Fourth, the content of Weishu had a close relationship with the Confucian Classics and some of the content quoted directly from them. The historical data is the foundation of historical research and also the excavation and explanation of the historical data is the core of the task of history. So we must make a careful study of Weishu and clarify the time and source during the usage of Weishu. Also, we should avoid using it alone and verify the mutually with other historical datas.