Song Shu Confucianism Thought

Songshu's academic thouhgt is supported by the two main pillars-Confucianist and Buddhist philosophy. In his view, the necessary essence of Confucianist philosophy lies in benevolence and tolerance, which is for the weak people and against the powerful. But for Buddhist philosophy, he keeps away its doctrine of universe love. Instead, he thinks that there must be a exclusive boundary. Therefore understanding his love in Buddhist philosophy becomes key to understanding his thought about Confucianism philosophy.Songshu comes into immense contact with lowest their ruffering very well.He holds firmly that the immediate reason causing the suffering is absolute monarchy, and that the essential reason is the base of theories staying behind absolute monarchy, that is, superficially adoption the main reasons accounting for the suffering the hardness of the sowest.So accordingly he criticizes the Han and Song school of classical philosophy in terms of the following aspects: the coexistence of thought and power as well as the function of academy. In this research, he studies the origin of Confucianism-the Confucianism before Qin Dynasty. He holds strongly that the essence of the Confucianism before Qin Dynasty lies in kindheartedness to people and love to objects. Hence he speaks highly of only a few scholars since Han Dynasty. In addition, he accepts the critical spirit of Wangchong(a famous scholar in Chinese history).In doing so, he finally forms a new school of classical philosophy-superficially taking Huang school but deeply Yan school. In his close rereading of the six Chinese classes, he interpreted them in a so-called "sympathetic understanding" approach which shares much in common with the modern interpreting approach.Comparing with Kang Youwei, and Zhang Taiyan, Songshu holds a constant positive attitude toward Confucianism. His thought about Confucianism is mainly featured by his strong advocation of Humanism, which is decided by his use of love as the researh starting-point and his close attention on the folklore.