Study On The View Of Destiny In Shang Shu

The Western Zhou civilization,with its unique interpretation of the relationship between man and heaven,has become a key link in exploring the origin of Chinese philosophy.In Shang Shu,the concept of destiny which takes respecting morality and protecting the people as the core shows a new realm of the relationship between heaven and man in religious belief.The creation of the concept of destiny in Shang Shu is not accomplished overnight,but has its ideological origin and production premise.Zhuanxu period "Jedi Tiantong" and the Yin people’s belief in the "emperor" of the supreme god,all provided the necessary ideological nutrients for its production.The rulers of the early Zhou Dynasty,which came into being in the historical upheaval of the Yin Dynasty,had a sense of distress about explaining the legitimacy of the regime,completing national integration and stabilizing the regime,which became the direct premise for the creation of the Mandate of Heaven in Shang Shu.It was out of the strong worry about the stable regime that the founding fathers of the early Zhou Dynasty put forward the concept of the Mandate of Heaven when reflecting on the lesson of how Yin destroyed the country :(1)the Mandate of Heaven is constant and the Mandate of Heaven is changeable;(2)Heaven has no relatives,but virtue is a supplement;(3)The people of heaven are of the same mind,and the will of heaven is in the people.Thus,the Zhou people creatively injected "virtue" into the Mandate of Heaven,forming the Mandate of Heaven system of integrating the will of Heaven,the feelings of the people and the politics and morality.In this system,heaven was endowed with the moral character of rewarding the good and punishing the evil: the will of heaven depended on the feelings of the people,and the feelings of the people depended on the emperor’s respect for the virtue or not,so the emperor’s virtue became the key for the dynasty to obtain and maintain the destiny of heaven.Because of the transition from the temperamental nature to the moral nature of good and evil,people no longer passively accept the favors and punishments of God,but by respecting morality and protecting people to obtain and maintain the destiny of God.This implied the gradual weakening of the divinity of heaven and the elevation of the importance of human(morality),which triggered a great change in religious thought during the Yin and Zhou Dynasties.Along with the deepening of the religious form in Yin and Zhou Dynasties,the humanistic spirit was also gradually highlighted.The breakthrough of humanity awakens the consciousness of human subjectivity and realizes the power of human resources.It should be noted that the germination of such subjectivity consciousness is still under the belief of the Mandate of Heaven.All the measures taken by the people of Zhou were for their children and grandchildren to enjoy their destiny forever.However,the brilliance of the concept of Mandate of Heaven in the Western Zhou Dynasty lies in that the more firmly the people of Zhou believed in the Mandate of Heaven,the stronger the moral consciousness generated by it became.The two promoted each other and achieved mutual benefit.The emergence of the concept of destiny in Shang Shu first provided a powerful ideological support for the Zhou people.Secondly,the humanistic spirit contained in it provided abundant nutrients and resources for the origin and development of early Confucianism.Therefore,we should reposition the ideology and culture of the pre-Axial Age,especially the view of the destiny of the Western Zhou Dynasty,and face up to its ideological and theoretical value.