The Retribution Stories And Traditional Chinese Legal Communication

The popularization and application of law,the cultivation and formation of legal consciousness,and the construction of a legalized society all rely on legal communication activities to achieve.Traditional Chinese legal communication has a long history.In addition to the official means of disseminating the law,the public has a large number of channels to learn legal knowledge and concepts.As a literary form widely spread among the people,because of its unique causal compensation structure,the retribution stories have become one of the main forms of the dissemination of legal ideas and legal rules.Through combing,examining,and interpreting this kind of materials,we can not only understand its influence and help on legal communication,but also further grasp the behavioral patterns of ancient Chinese society to promote the internalization of the law,and then provides help to the construction of a society ruled by law.This paper first analyzes the retribution stories and their related concepts,and clearly defines the relationship between retribution,retribution concept and retribution stories.The essence of retribution is actually a causal relationship,which is the logical necessity of the behavior and the corresponding result of the same nature of good or evil.The retribution concept refers to a concept accepted by the public that is formed by the combination of this logical relationship and a certain kind of value concept.The retribution stories are concrete manifestation of the retribution concept.Then this paper explains the form and characteristics of the retribution stories,and summarizes the subject and the retribution method of the retribution stories.Then this paper discusses the relationship between the retribution stories,the law and its communication.It is worth emphasizing that the ancient Chinese law discussed in this paper mainly refers to criminal law.The retribution stories have the same value base as the law.As the development of the society and the influence between it and law,it gradually becomes an important legal concept in the popular mind.The retribution stories themselves are the carriers of law.As the retribution stories spread,the corresponding legal rules and concepts are spread among the people,as well.Next,taking both paths from the perspective of the people and the officials,this paper analyzes the legal content of the retribution story.From the perspective of the people,the retribution stories first describe the retribution on a large number of legally prohibited acts,and directly regulated the behavior of those people.Secondly,there are a large number of specific legal norms in the retribution stories,which makes some basic laws and regulations directly spread.Finally,the retribution stories contain many values and concepts of law,and their dissemination further helps these values and concepts to be deeply rooted in people's minds.From the perspective of the officials,the retribution stories mainly spread the judicial concept.The retribution stories provide intrinsic motivations for the officials themselves to maintain their official ethics,besides,their effects are expressed concentratedly in the influence on the judicial practice.Retribution stories have important impacts on finding out the truth,making judges according to the law,and determining the penalty cautiously.Finally,this paper analyzes the actual effect of legal communication by the retribution stories,namely,theirs substantial help for the internalization of ancient Chinese law.Internalization of the law is a social state that people accept the law and use it as the code and basis of their conduct,and voluntarily obey and uphold the law.On the one hand,the retribution stories provide the motivation both of tool rationality and value rationality for internalization of the law.In those retribution stories,violating the law or failing to follow the philosophy advocated by the law would inevitably result in retribution.The retribution stories reflects the most simple values of good and evil in people's minds,which are consistent with those expressed in law.On the other hand,the retribution stories provide a medium for internalization of the law.The rules in the retribution stories are highly consistent with the secular law.The legal concepts advocated by the combination of the rules in the retribution stories and the secular law gradually became the creed of popular behavior,which achieve the goal of internalization of the law.