The Wei-Jin Famliyand The We-ijin Scholars’ Spirit

Of course we’ll think of an important word “the Wei-Jin demeanor” first of allwhen we mention the Wei-Jin times and the Wei-Jin scholars. The word “Wei-Jindemeanor” summarized the scholars’ features and the characters of the whole times andthe style or the new look of the times strongly and in short. In the long way and theendless ‘history river’, the Wei-Jin demeanor was the unmatched thought for thescholars in the “long history river’, and the Wei-Jin scholars’ thought was existed aloneand acted alone, too. At that times, the scholars depended on the family and the familywith its culture created the scholars’ characters and qualities. The Wei-Jin family and theWei-Jin scholars’ spirit were very close to each other as one body, and can not be cutaway from. Based on this main idea. the writer of this article mainly took therelationship between the two points–the Wei-Jin demeanor and the scholars’ familyculture as the key point to set forth her idea on the question. And the writer tried todescribe and analyze the scholars’ thought which affected by the Wei-Jin family,culture and its spirit by means of in a deep graduation and levels.Wei–Jin times was a society that specially paid great attention to the family status.The society was just structured with the families, and it was just the style of the familyto be existed in the society. The family mentioned above has been developed rapidly byleaps and bounds since the local separatist rule happened in Han dynasty. In We-Jintimes, the rights of the national politics, economy and culture were controlled by everyfamily in the society. So we can say the Wei-Jin society just was a society whichconsisted of different families and the families were just the bridges ‘built’ between thesociety and the scholars. In that times, the family grasped and controlled many kinds ofrights in order to make it stand and live steady in the turbulent days. In fact, the familywas the basis and prerequisite for the scholars to live and exist in the unsteady societyon which the scholars depended. In the meanwhile, the family culture was easilyaccepted by the scholars because the culture was imbued with what they had seen andheard in their daily life. The struggle of rights, the upheaval of the society lead thecreation of the evading thought from the society for the scholars.. In order to preservethemselves in the unsteady society and the troubled times, they kept themselves away from the political affairs and were keen on free talk and chat, had more drinking andmore medicine taking etc. These behaviors were just the symbol of the unsteady societyand the turbulent days and also the express of the family culture in that times. For thescholars, they paid great attention to their own images, publicized their personalqualities and characters, valued the value of their existing in the society. Based on this,they were travelling all over the land and enjoying the mountains and rivers--thesceneries with hills and waters. They were willing to make merry and fun. All theactions mentioned above were formed and grown up under the family culture of thetimes. The scholars even upheld Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu, the family status society andthe family culture when they had chat so that they widely accepted the Taoism schoolthoughts.The Wei-Jin scholars’ spirit was not created alone. We must mention that why theylived so leisurely with carefree. The reason is because there were some backup forcebehind them–the strong family culture and the economical strength which supportedthem all the time. While we are admiring their life style which they sang or whistled tothe mountains, sang to the forests and which they rose above the common herd, thesupport only can be given by the family so that the Wei-Jin scholars can have chance tobe living pleased and satisfied with travelling around the wide land, wonderfulmountains, forests and rivers. And they were writing poems while drinking and so on intheir life. Ji Kang the one who was among the “Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove”,for example, he forged iron in his early years in Luoyi. He was carefree and contentbecause he was living based on the great support offered by the family. In this case JiKang, the blacksmith (forger) was not worried about the means of his livelihood orhow to make living most. He thought that if someone can ignore the common customsof the world when he dissatisfied with the realities of the society. Ji Kang detested theworld and its ways because he thought that his pure Confucian beliefs can not come trueand these so-called beliefs just came from the family culture. The family taught thescholars that they must regard the world, the landscape which under heaven as their ownresponsibilities and taught them that they must comply with the Confucianism and theDaoism so that they can fight the society so strongly after the Confucianism and theDaoism were trodden under feetThe family of Wei-Jin times was very concerned about the cultural and educational work and bore the task of teaching the scholars. The most obvious example was that aperson named Xie An taught the younger generations both with his words and hisactions. He taught them how to do the affairs and what were the rules to follow. It wasjust this kind of family culture and the education principle made the common peopleknow Xie Daoyun who was with the great abilities and talents of intoning poems Andwe have learned that there were a lot of public officials in Wei-Jin times. Of course thissituation was relative to the political control of the family but if someone wanted to behigher, he must have his own abilities to reach the higher position. We say the newgenerations–the scholars whom were taught and grown up under the family culturewere excellent in that times. Looking back the history, we noticed that the scholarssometimes tried to be public officials or sometimes tried to be the recluses. And theysometimes aroused to run high or sometimes were very calm in their daily life. Andsome of them upheld Confucianism or some of them expounded the Daoism. Thecharacters, demeanor and manners of all the scholars were formed by the influence ofthe family culture in that times, indeed.