Discussion On The Relationship Of Ritual, Political And Legal Decrees And Reulations In Qing Dynasty

“Etiquette should be the basis of all human activities”, etiquette is the rule thatpeople must abide by. In ancient times, the connotation of the etiquette was veryabundant, it contained a lot of contents such as manners, customs and so on. Theinner spirit and essence of the etiquette was ritual ceremony. Everyone whether it wasthe emperor or the common people had a specific ritual ceremony, which includedpolitical and military events and weddings and marriages of the individual. Ancientrulers civilized people to be a loyal minister, a kindly father and a filial son, thuscreating a harmonious social order. There should be order among the elders and theyoungers within a family, the elder brother should be friendly to the younger one andthe younger brother should be obedient to the elder one. In this well-organized socialorder, everyone must comply with their own identity, and the higher should not bullythe lower and the strong should not bully the weak.After the Qing ruler dominated the Central Plains, they attached greatimportance to the construction of etiquette. Especially during the Qianlong period, itgot many achievements in the field of etiquette. They compiled the Qing DynastyEtiquette, which is the basic ceremony of the country. In addition, they compiledHuangChaoLiQiTuShi, ManZhouJiShenJiTianDianLi, GuoChaoGongShi, LiBuZeLi,BaXunWanShouShengDian, NanXunShengDian. These ceremonies were the ritualdegrees and regulations of Qing Dynasty. In addition to the ritual decrees andregulations, the compilation of political degrees and regulations reached a peak.Started from the Kangxi period, they mainly compiled five political degrees andregulations, namely KangXiHuiDian, YongZhengHuiDian, QianLongHuiDian,JiaQingHuidian and GuangXuHuiDian. With respect to the nature of the politicaldegrees and regulations, some scholars believe that it is the country’s politicians, it isthe administrative code of the country.From the Sui Dynasty, a large number of ritual customs and systems had beenwritten to the decrees and regulations of the country. Behaviors which seriously violated the ritual etiquette also had been written to the country’s legal code.The lawguaranteed the compliance with ritual etiquette. Until Tang Dynasty, there were a lotof punishments in the legal code about the violation of ritual etiquette.The legal codeof Ming and Qing Dynasty were compiled as six departments, and the provision tobreach the ritual behavior were specially compiled in “the ritual law” article, so it wasadvantageous for study. As the legal degrees and regulations of Qing Dynasty, QingDynasty Statutes provided the behaviors which seriously violates the etiquette. On theproblem of the relationship between etiquette and law, my mentor’s point is that theChinese ancient legal system was distinctive, and categories of laws followed innerlogic, which was “Tripartite Model”, namely the separation of “Administrativeinstitution, etiquette institution and Law”. The model gave priority to virtue, ratherthan criminal law. Therefore, etiquette is the nation’s basic judgments, the study of itsrelationship with the other two judgments is of great significance.Since the Western Jin Dynasty, the dynasties formulated the ceremony followingthe “Five Rites” order. Qing Dynasty are the last feudal society of China, its laws andinstitutions had learned the essence of Chinese dynasties, becoming complete in formand content. Firstly, the basic situation of Qing Dynasty Etiquette is introduced in thearticle, so as to pave the way for the study on the relationship of ritual, political andlegal decrees. Whether it was the emperor or the common people had a very detailedetiquette, everyone must act in accordance with the ceremony, in order to establish awell-organized and stable social order. Qing Dynasty Etiquette is the basic ceremonyof the country, it was compiled as the order of Jili, Jiali, Junli, Binli and Xiongli. Inthe respect of the content, it inherited the traditional ritual etiquettes, but there weremany changes. Especially, it creased a number of etiquettes with nationalcharacteristics. Meanwhile, as the basic ceremony of the country, the Qing DynastyEtiquette just record the ceremony of salutation, it didn’t record the history anddrawing of the ceremony. The history and drawing of the ceremony were record inDaQingHuiDian. Therefore, there will be the comparative study on Qing DynastyEtiquette and DaQingHuiDian in the following. The article will compare them onthree aspects which are the perspective of codification, style and content. Comparedwith the DaQingHuiDian, a prominent feature of the Qing Dynasty Etiquette is that it is compiled as the natural order of salutation, there are detailed records of eachceremony.Therefore, Qing Dynasty Etiquette is very easy to comply with, it is thewing of DaQingHuiDian.The rulers of Qing Dynasty hoped to constrain people’s behavior depending onthe Qing Dynasty Etiquette, so as to maintain their own power. Therefore, thepunishments for the behaviors which violate the ceremony were especially important.Because people will be able to act in accordance with the ceremony and not overstepthe ceremony only depending on the guarantee of the law. How the law guarantee thecompliance with the ceremony. Firstly, the author classify the etiquette crimes in theQing Dynasty Statutes from the perspective of violating “Five Rites” and analyzehow these etiquette crimes are provided in the Qing Dynasty Etiquette andDaQingHuiDian. Secondly, the author analyze the reason why the behaviors whichviolate the ceremony are provided in the law. Qing Dynasty Statutes only providebehaviors which seriously violate the etiquette, especially, the behaviors whichinfringe the personal rights of the emperor are provided on the terms of the “evil” ofQing Dynasty Statutes, and this behaviors are provided severe punishment. Theauthor reach conclusion that Qing Dynasty Etiquette and DaQingHuiDian iscomplementary relationship in content, Qing Dynasty Etiquette is the wing ofDaQingHuiDian, and Qing Dynasty Statutes guarantee the compliance with QingDynasty Etiquette.