A Discussion Of Xu Fuguan’s Study On The Doctrine Of The Mean

The Doctrine of the Mean was originally one of the articles in The Book Of Rites, and gradually caught people’s attention during the Tang and Song Dynasties. Since Zhu Xi of Song Dynasty compiled it into the Four Books, its status as Confucian classics was established. Neo-Confucians of Song and Ming Dynasties all gave some explanations on the Doctrine of the Mean, and Most of them established their own philosophical systems based on the thoughts of Doctrine of the Mean. Modern New Confucian scholars, who regard saving the nation and revival of Confucianism as their own mission, have a major feature, that is, they embrace Neo-Confucianism of Song and Ming Dynasties. Thus they can not avoid explaining the Doctrine of the Mean. The elucidations of the thoughts of Doctrine of the Mean occupy a certain position in all of their theoretical system. And among New Confucians, Xu Fuguan pays most attention on the Doctrine of the Mean, and he gives a explanation differ from other contemporary scholars. This paper intends to take Xu Fuguan’s study on the Doctrine of the Mean as an example, since he is a representative of Modern New Confucianism. I try to clearly show his development of the Doctrine of the Mean through discussion of Xu Fuguan’s concrete elucidation of the Doctrine of the Mean and make his theoretical Features stand out, while compare his elucidation with other Modern New Confucians’ elucidations. This paper consists of an introduction and four chapters as body.The introduction mainly discusses about the living and writings of Xu Fuguan, the significance of his research on the Doctrine of The Mean and the summary of the current study.Chapter one are mainly about the significance of the Doctrine of the Mean. I mainly make clear the dispute of the time when the book was finished and its thoughts between Xu Fuguan and Qian Mu. In their dispute, Qian Mu claims the Doctrine of the Mean was finished in a very late time, and it resulted from compounding the thoughts of Laozi, Zhuangzi, Confucius and Mencius. Xu Fuguan disagrees with this opinion, and he put great effort into researching the text of the Doctrine of the Mean, He divided the Doctrine of the Mean into last and next parts, and he believed the Doctrine of the Mean was the work between The Analects of Confucius and Mencius. Therefore, from the aspects of text research and thinking venation, Xu Fuguan proved the great significance of the Doctrine of the Mean in the series of Confucian classics:In the development of the orthodox Confucian theory of human nature, the Doctrine of the Mean refers to Confucius theory of human nature, and gives references to the theory of Mencius goodness. Therefore, the paper highlights the important status of Doctrine of the Mean in Xu Fuguan’s whole system of thought.Chapter two discusses on Xu Fuguan’s interpretation of the content of the Doctrine of the Mean. Based on his researching on the text, this chapter mainly focuses on the Xu Fuguan’s interpretation of the central concept:Neutralization and Sincerity. Since Xu Fuguan’ elucidation on Neutralization begins with refutation against the thoughts of Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi, so in this part I firstly clarify the views of Neutralization of Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi, and then state Xu Fuguan’s view of Neutralization and his refutation against the views of Neutralization of Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi, finally I make a evaluative summary. He thinks it is not suitable to interpret the Doctrine of the Mean in the form of mind, human nature, and passion affection. Therefore, Xu Fuguan pointed out the biggest misunderstanding of Neutralization of Cheng Yi was to confuse thoughts and emotions. And he thought Zhu xi focused on the work of "Jing" and he could not really understand the Neutralization of Cheng Yi. To Neutralization of essence points of Xu fuguan, main body and ontology were integrated into a unity, which was similar to the view of Cheng Yi. The only difference is Xu Fuguan thinks it could also be used to "self-supervision". And the criticism to Zhu Xi may be his personal opinion, though the role of static was stressed in Zhu Xi’s life, but it is not true essence, while the true meaning is claiming "Jing" in the process of combining Jing and Dong. The essence neutralization of Xu Fuguan has played the role of consummating oneself and the nature, it also regulates people’s emotions, and what’s more, it means the concept of lifting up in the Doctrine of the Mean, which is the explanation ways of mind, human nature, and passion affection to the neutralization idea, respectively. But in this, he puts more emphasis on the importance of neutralization in the essence. The interpretation of Sincerity of Xu Fuguan is mainly considered from inheritance and developments of the Benevolence of Confucius. Xu Fuguan interpreted Sincerity with Benevolence, he thinks Sincerity is the presentation of Benevolence and it is a combination of everything. In this paper, Xu Fuguan explained Sincerity by combining people, things, and ourselves, and he also links up his idea between man and nature. The Sincerity got by Xu Fuguan is based on benevolence and the related analysis. Xu Fuguan treats Sincerity as wise and kindness, which is known internally as knowledge. At this point, Sincerity is opened crossly and the main body is integrated from inward to outward. The Sincerity is more obvious by integrating everything, thus it present the body of Sincerity.Combining Neutralization and Sincerity of Xu Fuguan, he puts emphasis on the importance of human nature through "human nature of destiny" in the Doctrine of the Mean. He puts more emphasis on the explanation of Neutralization in the essence, while the Sincerity is explained from other aspect, they both reflect the essence of Sincerity. For Neutralization and Sincerity in the Doctrine of the Mean, Xu Fuguan extracted the upward concept using Neutralization and the doctrine of the mean. Harmony stands for the doctrine of the mean in many cases and Sincerity is the concept of doctrine of the mean, therefore, it presents that Sincerity is the core spirit of the Doctrine of the Mean.And Xu Fuguan’s elucidation on Sincerity of the Doctrine of the Mean chiefly inherits and develops from Confucius’s Benevolence. He maintains that Sincerity is the whole emergence of the Benevolence. Based on the inheritance of Sincerity from Confucius’s Benevolence, he starts to interpret the Sincerity of the Doctrine of the Mean. After that I briefly analyze the relation between the meaning of Sincerity and the doctrine of Neutralization according to Xu Fuguan. Finally, I make a summary of his core spirit of the Doctrine of the Mean.Chapter three analyzes the other New Confucianism’s study of the Doctrine of the Mean. Firstly, I give a brief description of four great Modern New Confucianism’s interpretation of the Doctrine of the Mean, including Feng Youlan, Qian Mu, Mou Zongsan and Tang Junyi. Then I compare their works with Xu Fuguan’s study separately, in order to supplement the lack explanations of the Doctrine of the Mean of Xu Fuguan in the previous chapter, so as to present the differences and similarities between Xu Fuguan and other Modern New Confucianism.Chapter four is the evaluation of Xu Fuguan’s study on the Doctrine of the Mean. By briefly evaluate his study, I point out his distinguishing feature, it is the request of history of human nature and intellectual history that make explanations for the Doctrine of the Mean.