The Philosophical Origin Of Mao Zedong Thought Of Seeking Truth From Facts

Originated from the period of Han Dynasty,the Chinese idiom “Seeking Truth from Fact” was used to describe the method and attitude of study in Confucian classics.After inheritance of historiographers and Confucianists in Song and Tang Dynasty,it became a term of textual criticism studies when turned into Qing Dynasty and then evolved into a philosophical proposition while its connotation converted from scholarly research to epistemology.In modern china,Mao Zedong gave this idiom a new meaning and vitality and develop it into a system of philosophy through using the Marxist theory,finally it became the core content of ideological line of the CPC.We can say that this development process is very long.Mao Zedong's Philosophical Thought is influenced by traditional Chinese philosophy,modern Western philosophy and Marxist philosophy separately in varying degrees.While Mao Zedong accepted Marxist Philosophy totally,he chose to keep on researching and absorbing the rational ideas of the former two schools of philosophy and applying the latter one creatively rather than excluding them simply,and built up Mao Zedong's thought of seeking truth from facts.The living spirits of Mao Zedong's philosophical thought——“Seeking Truth from Facts,Mass Line and Independence” are the fundamental position,the viewpoint and method which penetrates Mao Zedong thought.“Seeking Truth from Facts ” is of the most important one and the essence of for it generalizes and reflects dialectical materialism and historical materialism.Containing the fundamental spirits of Chinese and western philosophy,Mao Zedong's thought of seeking truth from facts absorbs and inherits any philosophy critically rather than follow simply and even transcend and sublime it.This is exactly the embodiment of scientific attitude that treating various kinds of theories dialectically and critically.This essay attempts to analyze the formation,origin and development of Mao Zedong's thought of seeking truth from facts from the perspective of traditional Chinese philosophy,modern Western philosophy and Marxist philosophy,to elaborate how this thought apply the world view and methodology of Marxism in the practice of Chinese revolution and on the basis of merging and surpassing of the three philosophies,and how it remolds “Seeking Truth from Facts” from a philosophy proposition into a systematic philosophical thought and realize the organic unity of materialism,dialectics,epistemology and conception of history.In retrospect of the philosophical origin of this thought,we will disclose the full meaning of “Seeking Truth from Facts ” which will push forward the research on localization of Marxism in china and Mao Zedong thought and help us to make scientific policy in the new era.