Confucianism

유교

• FORMATION OF THE CLASSICAL CONFUCIAN TRADITION
  • Mencius: The paradigmatic Confucian intellectual.
  • Hsün-tzu: The transmitter of Confucian scholarship.
  • The Confucianization of politics.
  • The Five Classics.
  • Tung Chung-shu: The Confucian visionary.
  • Confucian ethics in the Taoist and Buddhist context.
• THE CONFUCIAN REVIVAL
  • The Sung masters.
  • Confucian learning in Chin, Yüan, and Ming.
  • The age of Confucianism: Yi-dynasty Korea, Tokugawa Japan, and Ch'ing China.
• MODERN TRANSFORMATION

FORMATION OF THE CLASSICAL CONFUCIAN TRADITION

고대 유교 전통의 형성

According to Han-fei-tzu (d. 233 BC), shortly after Confucius' death his followers split into eight distinct schools, all claiming to be the legitimate heir to the Confucian legacy. Presumably each school was associated with or inspired by one or more of Confucius' disciples. Yet the Confucians did not exert much influence in the 5th century BC. Although the mystic Yen Yüan (or Yen Hui), the faithful Tseng-tzu, the talented Tzu Kung, the erudite Tzu-hsia, and others may have generated a great deal of enthusiasm among the second generation of Confucius' students, it was not at all clear at the time that the Confucian tradition was to emerge as the most powerful one in Chinese history.

공자가 죽자 추종자들에 의해 8개 학파로 나뉘었으며, 그들은 각각 공자의 가르침을 가장 정통으로 계승했다고 자처했다. 공자의 사상과 가르침은 〈논어〉에 잘 나타나 있으며, 

Mencius (c. 371-c. 289 BC) complained that the world of thought in the early Warring States period (475-221 BC) was dominated by the collectivism of Mo-tzu and the individualism of Yang Chu (440-c. 360 BC). The historical situation a century after Confucius' death clearly shows that the Confucian attempt to moralize politics was not working; the disintegration of the Chou feudal ritual system and the rise of powerful hegemonic states reveal that wealth and power spoke the loudest. The hermits (the early Taoists), who left the world to create a sanctuary in nature in order to lead a contemplative life, and the realists (proto-Legalists), who played the dangerous game of assisting ambitious kings to gain wealth and power so that they could influence the political process, were actually determining the intellectual agenda. The Confucians refused to be identified with the interests of the ruling minority because their social consciousness impelled them to serve as the conscience of the people. They were in a dilemma. Although they wanted to be actively involved in politics, they could not accept the status quo as the legitimate arena in which to exercise authority and power. In short, they were in the world but not of it; they could not leave the world, nor could they effectively change it.

Mencius: The paradigmatic Confucian intellectual.

Mencius is known as the self-styled transmitter of the Confucian Way. Educated first by his mother and then allegedly by a student of Confucius' grandson, Mencius brilliantly performed his role as a social critic, a moral philosopher, and a political activist. He argued that cultivating a class of scholar-officials who would not be directly involved in agriculture, industry, and commerce was vital to the well-being of the state. In his sophisticated argument against the physiocrats (those who advocated the supremacy of agriculture), he intelligently employed the idea of the division of labour to defend those who labour with their minds, observing that service is as important as productivity. To him Confucians served the vital interests of the state as scholars not by becoming bureaucratic functionaries but by assuming the responsibility of teaching the ruling minority humane government (jen-cheng) and the kingly way (wang-tao). In dealing with feudal lords, Mencius conducted himself not merely as a political adviser but also as a teacher of kings. Mencius made it explicit that a true man cannot be corrupted by wealth, subdued by power, or affected by poverty.

전형적인 유가 지식인 맹자

맹자는 유가사상의 정통계승자로 알려져 있다. 공자의 손자 자사(子思)의 제자에게서 가르침을 받은 맹자는 사회비판자, 도덕철학가, 정치적 활동가로서 위대한 삶을 살았다. 맹자는 육체노동을 하지 않는 사대부(士大夫) 계층을 중용하는 것이 국가발전의 관건이라고 주장했다. 농업을 최우선시하고 임금도 노동을 해야 한다고 한 농가(農家)의 주장에 대해 맹자는 정신노동과 육체노동의 구분으로 답했다. 맹자에게 유교 사대부는 관리(官吏)를 의미하는 것이 아니라, 관리와 왕이 인정(仁政)을 베풀도록 가르치는 책임을 지닌 학자를 의미했다. 맹자는 봉건군주에게 단순한 정치적 조언자가 아니라 왕의 스승으로서 임하고자 했다. 

To articulate the relationship between Confucian moral idealism and the concrete social and political realities of his time, Mencius began by exposing as impractical the prevailing ideologies of Mo-tzu's collectivism and Yang Chu's individualism. Mo-tzu's collectivism rested on the advocacy of universal love. Mencius contended, however, that the result of the Mohist admonition to treat a stranger as intimately as one's own father would be to treat one's own father as indifferently as one would treat a stranger. Yang Chu, on the other hand, advocated the primacy of the self. Mencius contended, however, that excessive attention to self-interest would lead to political disorder. Indeed, in Mohist collectivism fatherhood becomes a meaningless concept, and so does kingship in Yang Chu's individualism.

Mencius' strategy for social reform was to change the language of profit, self-interest, wealth, and power by making it part of a moral discourse, with emphasis on rightness, public-spiritedness, welfare, and influence.

 Mencius, however, was not arguing against profit. Rather, he instructed the feudal lords to look beyond the narrow horizon of their palaces and to cultivate a common bond with their ministers, officers, clerks, and the seemingly undifferentiated masses. Only then, Mencius contended, would they be able to preserve their profit, self-interest, wealth, and power. He encouraged them to extend their benevolence and warned them that this was crucial for the protection of their families.

Mencius' appeal to the common bond among all people as a mechanism of government was predicated on his strong "populist" sense that the people are more important than the state and the state more important than the king and that the ruler who does not act in accordance with the kingly way is unfit to rule. Mencius insisted that an unfit ruler should be criticized, rehabilitated, or, as the last resort, deposed. Since "Heaven sees as the people see; Heaven hears as the people hear," revolution, or literally the change of the mandate, in severe cases is not only justifiable but is a moral imperative.

Mencius' "populist" conception of politics was predicated on his philosophical vision that human beings can perfect themselves through effort and that human nature is good. While he acknowledged the role of biological and environmental factors in shaping the human condition, he insisted that human beings become moral simply by willing to be so. According to Mencius, willing entails the transformative moral act insofar as the propensity of humans to be good is automatically activated whenever they decide to bring it to their conscious attention. (see also  populism)

Mencius taught that all people have the spiritual resources to deepen their self-awareness and strengthen their bonds with others. Biologic and environmental constraints notwithstanding, men always have the freedom and the ability to refine and enlarge their Heaven-endowed nobility (their "great body"). The possibility of continuously refining and enlarging the self is vividly illustrated in Mencius' description of degrees of excellence:

He who commands our liking is called good (shan). He who is sincere with himself is called true (hsin). He who is sufficient and real is called beautiful (mei). He whose sufficiency and reality shine forth is called great (ta). He whose greatness transforms itself is called sagely (sheng). He whose sageliness is beyond our comprehension is called spiritual (shen). (VIIB:25)

Furthermore, Mencius asserted that if men fully realize the potential of their hearts, they will understand their nature; by understanding their nature, they will know Heaven. Learning to be fully human, in this Mencian perspective, entails the cultivation of human sensitivity to embody the whole universe as one's lived experience:

All the 10,000 things are there in me. There is no greater joy for me than to find, on self-examination, that I am true to myself. Try your best to treat others as you would wish to be treated yourself, and you will find that this is the shortest way to humanity. (VIIA:4)

Hsün-tzu: The transmitter of Confucian scholarship.

If Mencius brought Confucian moral idealism to fruition, Hsün-tzu (c. 300-c. 230 BC) conscientiously transformed Confucianism into a realistic and systematic inquiry on the human condition, with special reference to ritual and authority. Widelyacknowledged as the most eminent of the notable scholars who congregated in Chi-hsia, the capital of the wealthy and powerful Ch'i state in the mid-3rd century BC, Hsün-tzu distinguished himself in erudition, logic, empiricism, practical-mindedness, and argumentation. His critique of the so-called 12 philosophers gave an overview of the intellectual life of his time. His penetrating insight into the shortcomings of virtually all the major currents of thought propounded by his fellow thinkers helped to establish the Confucian school as a forceful political and social persuasion. His principal adversary, however, was Mencius, and he vigorously attacked Mencius' view that human nature is good as naive moral optimism.

유가의 학문적 계승자인 순자

맹자가 유가의 도덕적 이상주의를 완성한 인물이라면, 순자(荀子：BC 300~230)는 예(禮)와 권위를 강조함으로써 유교를 통해 인간 조건에 대한 현실적·체계적 탐구를 가능하게 한 인물이었다. 그는 BC 3세기에 부강했던 제(齊)나라의 직하(稷下)학파에서 논리학, 경험론, 실천적 사고, 논쟁 등에 탁월했던 학자였다. 그는 당시의 주요한 사상조류를 대표하는 이른바 12명의 철학자들을 철저하게 비판했는데, 이로써 유가는 당시의 유력한 정치적·사회적 학파가 될 수 있었다. 그러나 순자의 가장 주된 비판대상은 맹자의 '성선설'이었다.

True to the Confucian and, for that matter, Mencian spirit, Hsün-tzu underscored the centrality of self-cultivation. He defined the process of Confucian education, from nobleman to sage, as a ceaseless endeavour to accumulate knowledge, skills, insight, and wisdom. In contrast to Mencius, Hsün-tzu stressed that human nature is evil. Because he saw human beings as prone by nature to pursue the gratification of their passions, he firmly believed in the need for clearly articulated social constraints. Without constraints, social solidarity, the precondition for human well-being, would be undermined. The most serious flaw he perceived in the Mencian commitment to the goodness of human nature was the practical consequence of neglecting the necessity of ritual and authority for the well-being of society.

Hsün-tzu singled out the cognitive function of the mind (human rationality) as the basis for morality. Men become moral by voluntarily harnessing their desires and passions to act in accordance with society's norms. Although this is alien to human nature, it is perceived by the mind as necessary for both survival and well-being. Like Mencius, Hsün-tzu believed in the perfectibility of all human beings through self-cultivation, in humanity and rightness as cardinal virtues, in humane government as the kingly way, in social harmony, and in education. But his view of how these could actually be achieved was diametrically opposed to that of Mencius. The Confucian project, as shaped by Hsün-tzu, defines learning as socialization. The authority of ancient sages and worthies, the classical tradition, conventional norms, teachers, governmental rules and regulations, and political officers are all important for this process. A cultured person is by definition a fully socialized member of the human community, who has successfully sublimated his instinctual demands for the public good.

Hsün-tzu's tough-minded stance on law, order, authority, and ritual seems precariously close to that of the Legalists, whose policy of social conformism was designed exclusively for the benefit of the ruler. His insistence on objective standards of behaviour may have ideologically contributed to the rise of authoritarianism, which resulted in the dictatorship of the Ch'in (221-206 BC). As a matter of fact, two of the most influential Legalists, the theoretician Han-fei-tzu from the state of Han and the Ch'in minister Li Ssu (c. 280-208 BC), were his pupils. Yet Hsün-tzu was instrumental in the continuation of Confucianism as a scholarly enterprise. His naturalistic interpretation of Heaven, his sophisticated understanding of culture, his insightful observations on the epistemological aspect of the mind and social function of language, his emphasis on moral reasoning and the art of argumentation, his belief in progress, and his interest in political institutions so significantly enriched the Confucian heritage that he was revered by the Confucians as the paradigmatic scholar for more than three centuries. (see also  Legalism)

The Confucianization of politics.

The short-lived dictatorship of the Ch'in marked a brief triumph of Legalism. In the early years of the Western Han (206 BC-AD 25), however, the Legalist practice of absolute power of the emperor, complete subjugation of the peripheral states to the central government, total uniformity of thought, and ruthless enforcement of law were replaced by the Taoist practice of reconciliation and noninterference. This practice is commonly known in history as the Huang-Lao method, referring to the art of rulership attributed to the Yellow Emperor (Huang-ti) and the mysterious founder of Taoism, Lao-tzu. Although a few Confucian thinkers, such as Lu Chia and Chia I, made important policy recommendations, Confucianism before the emergence of Tung Chung-shu (c. 179-c. 104 BC) was not particularly influential. Nonetheless, the gradual Confucianization of Han politics began soon after the founding of the dynasty. (see also  Han dynasty)

정치의 유교화

진대에는 법가사상이 크게 유행했지만, 전한(前漢：BC 206~AD 25) 초기의 통치사상은 법가에서 조화와 불간섭의 청정무위(淸靜無爲)를 주장하는 도가사상으로 바뀌었다. 

By the reign of Wu Ti (the Martial Emperor, 141-87 BC), who was by temperament a Legalist despot, Confucianism was deeply entrenched in the central bureaucracy. It was manifest in such practices as the clear separation of the court and the government, often under the leadership of a scholarly prime minister, the process of recruiting officials through the dual mechanism of recommendation and selection, the family-centred social structure, the agriculture-based economy, and the educational network. Confucian ideas were also firmly established in the legal system as ritual became increasingly important in governing behaviour, defining social relationships, and adjudicating civil disputes. Yet it was not until the prime minister Kung-sun Hung (d. 121 BC) had persuaded Wu Ti to announce formally that the ju school alone would receive state sponsorship that Confucianism became an officially recognized Imperial ideology and state cult.

As a result Confucian Classics became the core curriculum for all levels of education. In 136 BC Wu Ti set up at court five Erudites of the Five Classics (see below The Five Classics) and in 124 BC assigned 50 official students to study with them, thus creating a de facto Imperial university. By 50 BC enrollment at the university had grown to an impressive 3,000, and by AD 1 a hundred men a year were entering government service through the examinations administered by the state. In short, those with a Confucian education began to staff the bureaucracy. In the year 58 all government schools were required to make sacrifices to Confucius, and in 175 the court had the approved version of the Classics, which had been determined by scholarly conferences and research groups under Imperial auspices for several decades, carved on large stone tablets. (These stelae, which were erected at the capital, are today well preserved in the museum of Sian.) This act of committing to permanence and to public display the content of the sacred scriptures symbolized the completion of the formation of the classical Confucian tradition. (see also  higher education)

The Five Classics.

The compilation of the Wu Ching (The Five Classics) was a concrete manifestation of the coming of age of the Confucian tradition. The inclusion of both pre-Confucian texts, the Shu Ching ("Classic of History") and the Shih ching ("Classic of Poetry"), and contemporary Ch'in-Han material, such as certain portions of the Li chi ("Record of Rites"), suggests that the spirit behind the establishment of the core curriculum for Confucian education was ecumenical. The Five Classics can be described in terms of five visions: metaphysical, political, poetic, social, and historical.

5경

〈시경〉·〈서경〉·〈예기〉·〈주역〉·〈춘추〉의 5경이 형성된 것은 유학의 시대가 도래했음을 구체적으로 선포한 것과 같았다. 5경의 구성을 보면 유학교육의 보편적 정신을 알 수 있다. 5경은 형이상학·정치·사회·역사·시(詩)에 대한 이상(理想)을 나타내고 있다.

The metaphysical vision, expressed in the I Ching ("Classic of Changes"), combines divinatory art with numerological technique and ethical insight. According to the philosophy of change, the cosmos is a great transformation occasioned by the constant interaction of two complementary as well as conflicting vital energies, yin and yang. The universe, which resulted from this great transformation, always exhibits both organismic unity and dynamism. The nobleman, inspired by the harmony and creativity of the universe, must emulate this pattern by aiming to realize the highest ideal of "unity of man and Heaven" through ceaseless self-exertion.

The political vision, contained in the Shu Ching presents kingship in terms of the ethical foundation for a humane government. The legendary Three Emperors (Yao, Shun, and Yü) all ruled by virtue. Their sagacity, hsiao (filial piety), and dedication to work enabled them to create a political culture based on responsibility and trust. Their exemplary lives taught and encouraged the people to enter into a covenant with them so that social harmony could be achieved without punishment or coercion. Even in the Three Dynasties (Hsia, Shang, and Chou) moral authority, as expressed through ritual, was sufficient to maintain political order. The human continuum, from the undifferentiated masses to the enlightened people, the nobility, and the sage-king, formed an organic unity as an integral part of the great cosmic transformation. Politics means moral persuasion, and the purpose of the government is not only to provide food and maintain order but also to educate. (see also  king)

The poetic vision, contained in the Shih ching underscores the Confucian valuation of common human feelings. The majority of verses give voice to emotions and sentiments of communities and persons from all levels of society expressed on a variety of occasions. The basic theme of this poetic world is mutual responsiveness. The tone as a whole is honest rather than earnest and evocative rather than expressive.

The social vision, contained in the Li chi shows society not as an adversarial system based on contractual relationships but as a community of trust with emphasis on communication. Society organized by the four functional occupations--the scholar, farmer, artisan, and merchant--is, in the true sense of the word, a cooperation. As a contributing member of the cooperation each person is obligated to recognize the existence of others and to serve the public good. It is the king's duty to act kingly and the father's duty to act fatherly. If the king or father fails to behave properly, he cannot expect his minister or son to act in accordance with ritual. It is in this sense that a chapter in the Li chi entitled the "Great Learning" specifies, "From the Son of Heaven to the commoner, all must regard self-cultivation as the root." This pervasive consciousness of duty features prominently in all Confucian literature on ritual.

The historical vision, presented in the Ch'un-ch'iu ("Spring and Autumn Annals"), emphasizes the significance of collective memory for communal self-identification. Historical consciousness is a defining characteristic of Confucian thought. By defining himself as a lover of antiquity and a transmitter of its values, Confucius made it explicit that a sense of history is not only desirable but is necessary for self-knowledge. Confucius' emphasis on the importance of history was in a way his reappropriation of the ancient Sinitic wisdom that reanimating the old is the best way to attain the new. Confucius may not have been the author of the Ch'un-ch'iu, but it seems likely that he applied moral judgment to political events in China proper from the 8th to the 5th century BC. In this unprecedented procedure he assumed a godlike role in evaluating politics by assigning ultimate historical praise and blame to the most powerful and influential political actors of the period. This practice inspired not only the innovative style of the grand historian Ssu-ma Ch'ien (c. 145-c. 85 BC), but it was also widely employed by others writing dynastic histories in Imperial China.

Tung Chung-shu: The Confucian visionary.

Like Ssu-ma Ch'ien, Tung Chung-shu (c. 179-c. 104 BC) also took the Ch'un-ch'iu absolutely seriously. His own work, Ch'un-ch'iu fan-lu ("Luxuriant Gems of the Spring and Autumn Annals"), however, is far from being a book of historical judgment. It is a metaphysical treatise in the spirit of the I Ching. A man extraordinarily dedicated to learning (he is said to have been so absorbed in his studies that for three years he did not even glance at the garden in front of him) and strongly committed to moral idealism (one of his often-quoted dicta is "rectifying rightness without scheming for profit; enlightening his Way without calculating efficaciousness"), Tung was instrumental in developing a characteristically Han interpretation of Confucianism.

동중서

동중서는 한대에 유학을 독특하게 발전시킨 인물이다. 

Despite Wu Ti's pronouncement that Confucianism alone would receive Imperial sponsorship, Taoists, yin-yang cosmologists, Mohists, Legalists, shamanists, practitioners of seances, healers, magicians, geomancers, and others all contributed to the cosmological thinking of the Han cultural elite. Indeed, Tung himself was a beneficiary of this intellectual syncretism, for he freely tapped the spiritual resources of his time in formulating his own world view: that human actions have cosmic consequences.

Tung's inquiries on the meaning of the five agents (metal, wood, water, fire, and earth), the correspondence of human beings and the numerical categories of Heaven, and the sympathetic activation of things of the same kind, as well as his studies of cardinal Confucian values such as humanity, rightness, ritual, wisdom, and trustworthiness, enabled him to develop an elaborate world view integrating Confucian ethics with naturalistic cosmology. What Tung accomplished was not merely a theological justification for the emperor as the "Son of Heaven"; rather, his theory of mutual responsiveness between Heaven and man provided the Confucian scholars with a higher law by which to judge the conduct of the ruler.

Despite Tung's immense popularity, his world view was not universally accepted by Han Confucian scholars. A reaction in favour of a more rational and moralistic approach to the Confucian Classics, known as the "Old Text" school, had already set in before the fall of the Western Han. Yang Hsiung (c. 53 BC-AD 18) in the Fa-yen ("Model Sayings"), a collection of moralistic aphorisms in the style of the Analects, and the T'ai-hsüan ching ("Classic of the Supremely Profound Principle"), a cosmological speculation in the style of the I Ching, presented an alternative world view. This school, claiming its own recensions of authentic classical texts allegedly rediscovered during the Han period and written in an "old" script before the Ch'in unification, was widely accepted in the Eastern Han (AD 25-220). As the institutions of the Erudites and the Imperial university expanded in the Eastern Han, the study of the Classics became more refined and elaborate. Confucian scholasticism, however, like its counterparts in Talmudic and biblical studies, became too professionalized to remain a vital intellectual force.

Yet Confucian ethics exerted great influence on government, schools, and society at large. Toward the end of the Han as many as 30,000 students attended the Imperial university. All public schools throughout the land offered regular sacrifices to Confucius, and he virtually became the patron saint of education. Many Confucian temples were also built. The Imperial courts continued to honour Confucius from age to age; a Confucian temple eventually stood in every one of the 2,000 counties. As a result, the teacher, together with Heaven, Earth, the emperor, and parents, became one of the most respected authorities in traditional China.

Confucian ethics in the Taoist and Buddhist context.

Incompetent rulership, faction-ridden bureaucracy, a mismanaged tax structure, and domination by eunuchs toward the end of the Eastern Han first prompted widespread protests by the Imperial university students. The high-handed policy of the court to imprison and kill thousands of them and their official sympathizers in AD 169 may have put a temporary stop to the intellectual revolt, but the downward economic spiral made the life of the peasantry unbearable. The peasant rebellion led by Confucian scholars as well as Taoist religious leaders of faith-healing sects, combined with open insurrections of the military, brought down the Han dynasty and thus put an end to the first Chinese empire. As the Imperial Han system disintegrated, barbarians invaded from the north. The plains of northern China were fought over, despoiled, and controlled by rival groups, and a succession of states was established in the south. This period of disunity, from the early 3rd to the late 6th century, marked the decline of Confucianism, the upsurge of Neo-Taoism, and the spread of Buddhism.

도교·불교에 대비한 유교 도덕윤리

후한 말기의 한나라 실정은 관학 유생들의 광범위한 항의를 초래했다. 이후 농민반란은 신앙요법파의 도가들뿐만 아니라 유학자들에 의해서도 주도되었다. 한이 멸망하고 북방에서 이민족이 침입해 들어와 남북조시대가 열렸다. 3세기 초반에서 6세기 후반에 이르는 이 기간에는 신(新)도교가 융성하고 불교가 전파되었다. 반면에 유교는 크게 쇠퇴했다. 

The prominence of Taoism and Buddhism among the cultural elite and the populace in general, however, did not mean that the Confucian tradition had disappeared. In fact, Confucian ethics was by then virtually inseparable from the moral fabric of Chinese society. Confucius continued to be universally honoured as the paradigmatic sage. The outstanding Taoist thinker Wang Pi (226-249) argued that Confucius, by not speculating on the nature of the Tao, had an experiential understanding of it superior to Lao-tzu's. The Confucian Classics remained the foundation of all literate culture, and sophisticated commentaries were being produced throughout the age. Confucian values continued to dominate in such political institutions as the central bureaucracy, the recruitment of officials, and local governance. The political forms of life also were distinctively Confucian. When a barbarian state adopted a Sinicization policy, notably the case of the Northern Wei (386-535), it was by and large Confucian in character. In the south systematic attempts were made to strengthen family ties by establishing clan rules, genealogical trees, and ancestral rituals based on Confucian ethics.

The reunification of China by the Sui (581-618) and the restoration of lasting peace and prosperity by the T'ang (618-907) gave a powerful stimulus to the revival of Confucian learning. The publication of a definitive, official edition of the Wu Ching with elaborate commentaries and subcommentaries and the implementation of Confucian rituals at all levels of governmental practice, including the compilation of the famous T'ang legal code, were two outstanding examples of Confucianism in practice. An examination system was established based on literary competence. This system made the mastery of Confucian Classics a prerequisite for political success and was, therefore, perhaps the single most important institutional innovation in defining elite culture in Confucian terms. (see also  T'ang dynasty)

The T'ang dynasty, nevertheless, was dominated by Buddhism and, to a lesser degree, by Taoism. The philosophical originality of the dynasty was mainly represented by monk-scholars such as Chi-tsang (549-623), Hsüan-tsang (602-664), and Chih-i (538-597). An unintended consequence in the development of Confucian thought in this context was the prominent rise of the metaphysically significant Confucian texts, notably Chung yung ("Doctrine of the Mean") and I-chuan ("The Great Commentary of the Classic of Changes"), which appealed to some Buddhist and Taoist thinkers. A sign of a possible Confucian turn in the T'ang was Li Ao's (d. c. 844) essay on "Returning to Nature" that foreshadowed features of Sung (960-1279) Confucian thought. The most influential precursor of a Confucian revival, however, was Han Yü; (768-824). He attacked Buddhism from the perspectives of social ethics and cultural identity and provoked interest in the question of what actually constitutes the Confucian Way. The issue of Tao-t'ung, the transmission of the Way or the authentic method to repossess the Way, has stimulated much discussion in the Confucian tradition since the 11th century.

THE CONFUCIAN REVIVAL

The Buddhist conquest of China and the Chinese transformation of Buddhism, a process entailing the introduction, domestication, growth, and appropriation of a distinctly Indian form of spirituality, lasted for at least six centuries. Since Buddhist ideas were introduced to China via Taoist categories and since the development of the Taoist religion benefited from having Buddhist institutions and practices as models, the spiritual dynamics in medieval China was characterized by Buddhist and Taoist values. The reemergence of Confucianism as the leading intellectual force thus involved both a creative response to the Buddhist and Taoist challenge and an imaginative reappropriation of classical Confucian insights. Furthermore, after the collapse of the T'ang dynasty, the grave threats to the survival of Chinese culture from the Khitan, the Juchen (Chin), and later the Mongols prompted the literati to protect their common heritage by deepening their communal critical self-awareness. To enrich their personal knowledge as well as to preserve China as a civilization-state, they explored the symbolic and spiritual resources that made Confucianism a living tradition.

유교의 부흥

불교사상은 도가사상을 매개로 해서 중국에 도입되었고, 도가사상의 도교화는 불교의 체제와 수련법에서 크게 영향받으며 발전했다. 이 과정에서 불교와 도교는 중세 중국의 정신계를 지배했다. 유교가 지도적인 사상으로 재등장하기 위해서는 불교와 도교의 도전을 창조적으로 극복해야 했고, 고대 유교의 통찰력을 다시 회복해야 했다. 더욱이 당의 멸망 이후 거란족·여진족·몽골족 등 북방민족의 침략은 중국의 문화적 유산을 위협했다. 개인적 지식을 풍부하게 하고 문화민족으로서의 중국을 보전하기 위해서 유학자들은 유학을 살아 있는 전통으로 만들 수 있는 상징적·정신적 자원을 개발했다.

The Sung masters.

The Sung dynasty (960-1279) was militarily weak and much smaller than the T'ang, but its cultural splendour and economic prosperity were unprecedented in human history. The Sung's commercial revolution produced flourishing markets, densely populated urban centres, elaborate communication networks, theatrical performances, literary groups, and popular religions--developments that tended to remain unchanged into the 19th century. Technological advances in agriculture, textiles, lacquer, porcelain, printing, maritime trade, and weaponry demonstrated that China excelled in the fine arts as well as in the sciences. The decline of the aristocracy, the widespread availability of printed books, the democratization of education, and the full implementation of the examination system produced a new social class, the gentry, noted for its literary proficiency, social consciousness, and political participation. The outstanding members of this class, such as the classicists Hu Yüan (993-1059) and Sun Fu (992-1057), the reformers Fan Chung-yen (989-1052) and Wang An-shih (1021-86), the writer-officials Ou-yang Hsiu (1007-72) and Su Shih (pen name of Su Tung-p'o; 1036-1101), and the statesman-historian Ssu-ma Kuang (1019-86), contributed to the revival of Confucianism in education, politics, literature, and history and collectively to the development of a scholarly official style, a way of life informed by Confucian ethics.

송대의 대유학자들

송(960~1279)은 군사력이 약했고 그 판도도 당보다 매우 축소되었다. 그러나 송대의 경제적 번창과 과학기술·예술 등의 문화적 발전은 역사상 유래가 없을 정도였다. 당의 귀족제가 무너지고 서책과 교육의 광범위한 보급과 확산, 과거제도의 완전한 시행은 새로운 사회계급으로 사대부를 출현시켰다. 그들은 특히 높은 학문적 소양과 사회의식, 정치적 참여의식을 가지고 있었다. 송대의 탁월한 사대부로는 고전학자인 호원(胡瑗：993~1059)과 손복(孫復：992~1057), 개혁가인 범중엄(范仲淹：989~ 1052)과 왕안석(王安石：1021~86), 관직에 있던 문학가인 구양수(歐陽修：1007~72)와 소동파(蘇東坡：1036~1101), 정치가·역사가인 사마광(司馬光：1019 ~86) 등을 들 수 있다. 이들은 교육·정치·문학·역사에서 유교를 부활시키는 역할을 했다. 

The Confucian revival, understood in traditional historiography as the establishment of the lineage of the Tao-hsueh ("Learning of the Tao"), nevertheless can be traced through a line of Neo-Confucian thinkers from Chou Tun-i (1017-73) by way of Shao Yung (1011-77), Chang Tsai (1020-77), the brothers Ch'eng Hao (1032-85) and Ch'eng I (1033-1107), and the great synthesizer Chu Hsi (1130-1200). These men developed a comprehensive humanist vision in which cultivation of the self was integrated with social ethics and moral metaphysics. In the eyes of the Sung literati this new philosophy faithfully restored the classical Confucian insights and successfully applied them to the concerns of their own age.

유교부활의 과정을 성리학 사상가들의 학통(學統)으로 살펴보면 주돈이(周敦 : 1017~73)·>소옹(邵雍：1011~77)·장재(張載：1020~77)·정호(程顥：1032~85)·정이(程 : 1033~1107)와 위대한 집대성자인 주희(朱熹：1130~1200)로 이어진다. 이들은 개인과 사회의 윤리, 도덕적 형이상학이 통합되어 있는 포괄적인 인(仁)을 중심으로 한 사상체계를 발전시켰다. 당시의 사대부들은 이러한 새로운 철학이 유교경전의 정신을 충실히 회복시키면서 동시에 현재의 문제들을 해결할 수 있다고 믿었다.

Chou Tun-i ingeniously articulated the relationship between the "great transformation" of the cosmos and the moral development of human beings. In his metaphysics, humanity, as the recipient of the highest excellence from Heaven, is itself a centre of cosmic creativity. He developed this all-embracing humanism by a thought-provoking interpretation of the Taoist diagram of T'ai Chi ("Great Ultimate"). Shao Yung elaborated on the metaphysical basis of human affairs, insisting that a disinterested numerological mode of analysis is most appropriate for understanding the "supreme principles governing the world." Chang Tsai, on the other hand, focused on the omnipresence of ch'i ("vital energy"). He also advocated the oneness of li ("principle"; comparable to the idea of Natural Law) and the multiplicity of its manifestations, which is created as the principle expresses itself through the "vital energy." As an article of faith he pronounced in the "Western Inscription": "Heaven is my father and Earth is my mother, and even such a small being as I finds a central abode in their midst. Therefore that which fills the universe I regard as my body and that which directs the universe I consider as my nature. All people are my brothers and sisters, and all things are my companions."

주돈이는 〈주역〉과 부분적으로 도교사상을 계승하여 태극(太極)을 중심으로 간단하면서도 체계 있는 우주구성론을 제시했다. 그는 만물의 중심에 가장 빼어난(秀) 지적 존재로서 인간을 위치시켰다. 소옹은 〈주역〉의 8괘 형성에 관한 해석에 근거를 두면서 도교사상을 섞어 하나의 우주 구조 학설을 구성했고, 이를 통해 그의 상수학(象數學)을 완성했다. 장재는 우주의 실체인 '기'(氣)의 변화에서 모든 사물과 현상이 형성된다고 보았다.

This theme of mutuality between Heaven and human beings, consanguinity between man and man, and harmony between man and nature was brought to fruition in Ch'eng Hao's definition of humanity as "forming one body with all things." To him the presence of T'ien-li ("Heavenly Principle") in all things as well as in human nature enables the human mind to purify itself in a spirit of reverence. Ch'eng I, following his brother's lead, formulated the famous dictum, "self-cultivation requires reverence; the extension of knowledge consists in the investigation of things." By making special reference to ko-wu ("investigation of things"), he raised doubts about the appropriateness of focusing exclusively on the illumination of the mind in self-cultivation, as his brother seems to have done. The learning of the mind as advocated by Ch'eng Hao and the learning of the principle as advocated by Ch'eng I became two distinct modes of thought in Sung Confucianism.

Chu Hsi, clearly following Ch'eng I's School of Principle and implicitly rejecting Ch'eng Hao's School of Mind, developed a pattern of interpreting and transmitting the Confucian Way that for centuries defined Confucianism not only for the Chinese but for the Koreans and the Japanese as well. If, as quite a few scholars have advocated, Confucianism represents a distinct form of East Asian spirituality, it is the Confucianism shaped by Chu Hsi. Chu Hsi virtually reconstituted the Confucian tradition, giving it new structure, new texture, and new meaning. He was more than a synthesizer; through conscientious appropriation and systematic interpretation he gave rise to a new Confucianism, known as Neo-Confucianism in the West but often referred to as Li Hsüeh ("Learning of the Principle") in modern China.

주희는 정이의 이학파를 계승했으며, 은연중에 정호의 심학은 배격했다. 주희는 유학을 단순히 종합한 것이 아니라, 지금까지의 유학에 새로운 구조·특색·의미를 부여함으로써 '이학'이라는 새로운 유학을 구성했다.

The "Doctrine of the Mean" and the "Great Learning," two chapters in the Li chi, had become independent treatises and, together with the Analects and Mencius, had been included in the core curriculum of Confucian education for centuries before Chu Hsi's birth. But by putting them into a particular sequence, the "Great Learning," the Analects, Mencius, and the "Doctrine of the Mean," synthesizing their commentaries, interpreting them as a coherent humanistic vision, and calling them the Four Books, Chu Hsi fundamentally restructured the Confucian scriptural tradition. The Four Books, placed above the Five Classics, became the central texts for both primary education and civil service examinations in traditional China from the 14th century. Thus they have exerted far greater influence on Chinese life and thought in the past 600 years than any other book.

As an interpreter and transmitter of the Confucian Way Chu Hsi identified which early Sung masters belonged to the lineage of Confucius and Mencius. His judgment, later widely accepted by governments in East Asia, was based principally on philosophical insight. Chou Tun-i, Chang Tsai, and the Ch'eng brothers, the select four, were Chu Hsi's cultural heroes. Shao Yung and Ssu-ma Kuang were originally on his list, but Chu Hsi apparently changed his mind, perhaps because of Shao's excessive metaphysical speculation and Ssu-ma's obsession with historical facts.

Up until Chu Hsi's time the Confucian thinking of the Sung masters was characterized by a few fruitfully ambiguous concepts, notably the Great Ultimate, principle, vital energy, nature, mind, and humanity. Chu Hsi defined the process of the investigation of things as a rigorous discipline of the mind to probe the principle in things. He recommended a twofold method of study: to cultivate a sense of reverence and to pursue knowledge. This combination of morality and wisdom made his pedagogy an inclusive approach to humanist education. Reading, sitting quietly, ritual practice, physical exercise, calligraphy, arithmetic, and empirical observation all had a place in his pedagogical program. Chu Hsi reestablished the White Deer Grotto in present Kiangsi Province as an academy. It became the intellectual centre of his age and provided an instructional model for all schools in East Asia for generations to come.

Chu Hsi was considered the preeminent Confucian scholar in Sung China, but his interpretation of the Confucian Way was seriously challenged by his contemporary, Lu Chiu-yüan (Lu Hsiang-shan, 1139-93). Claiming that he appropriated the true wisdom of Confucian teaching by reading Mencius, Lu criticized Chu Hsi's theory of the investigation of things as fragmented and ineffective empiricism. Instead he advocated a return to Mencian moral idealism by insisting that establishing the "great body" (i.e., Heaven-endowed nobility) is the primary precondition for self-realization. To him the learning of the mind as a quest for self-knowledge provided the basis upon which the investigation of things assumed its proper significance. Lu's confrontation with Chu Hsi in the famous meeting at the Goose Lake Temple in 1175 further convinced him that Confucianism as Chu Hsi had shaped it was not Mencian. Although Lu's challenge remained a minority position for some time, his learning of the mind later became a major intellectual force in Ming China (1368-1644) and Tokugawa Japan (1603-1867).

Confucian learning in Chin, Yüan, and Ming.

For about 150 years, from the time the Sung court moved its capital to the South and reestablished itself there in 1127, North China was ruled by three conquest dynasties, the Liao (907-1125), Hsi Hsia (1038-1227), and Chin (1115-1234). Although the bureaucracies and political cultures of both Liao and Hsi Hsia were under Confucian influence, no discernible intellectual developments helped to further the Confucian tradition there. In the Juchen Chin dynasty, however, despite the paucity of information about the Confucian renaissance in the Southern Sung, the Chin scholar-officials continued the classical, artistic, literary, and historiographic traditions of the North and developed a richly textured cultural form of their own. Chao Ping-wen's (1159-1232) combination of literary talent and moral concerns and Wang Jo-hsü's (1174-1243) scholarship in Classics and history, as depicted in Yüan Hao-wen's (1190-1257) biographical sketches and preserved in their collected works, compared well with the high standards set by their counterparts in the South.

금·원·명대의 유교

1127년 남송의 건립을 전후한 150여 년간 중국 북부는 요(遼：907~1125)·서하(西夏：1038~1227)·금(金：1115~1234)이 통치했다. 요와 서하에서는 유학이 그다지 발전하지 못했다. 그러나 금에서는 비록 유교가 부흥한 남송과의 교류가 적었지만, 북부의 사대부들이 학문과 예술의 전통을 지속시켰고, 그들 고유의 독창적인 문화 양식을 발전시켰다.

When the Mongols reunited China in 1279, the intellectual dynamism of the South profoundly affected the northern style of scholarship. Although the harsh treatment of scholars by the conquest Yüan (Mongol) dynasty (1206-1368) seriously damaged the well-being of the scholarly community, outstanding Confucian thinkers nevertheless emerged throughout the period. Some opted to purify themselves so that they could repossess the Way for the future; some decided to become engaged in politics to put their teaching into practice.

 1279년 몽골족의 원나라가 중국을 다시 통일하자, 남부의 학문사상은 북부의 학문에 깊은 영향을 주었다. 원나라(1279~1368)는 학자들에게 가혹했으나, 탁월한 유학자들이 원의 전시대에 걸쳐 배출되었다. 그들은 은거하여 지조를 지키기도 했고 출사하여 현실 정치에 참여하기도 했다.

Hsü Heng (1209-81) took a practical approach. Appointed by Kublai, the Great Khan in Marco Polo's Description of the World, as the president of the Imperial Academy and respected as the leading scholar in the court, Hsü conscientiously introduced Chu Hsi's teaching to the Mongols. He assumed personal responsibility for educating the sons of the Mongol nobility to become qualified teachers of Confucian Classics. His erudition and skills in medicine, legal affairs, irrigation, military science, arithmetic, and astronomy enabled him to be an informed adviser to the conquest dynasty. He set the tone for the eventual success of the Confucianization of Yüan bureaucracy. In fact, it was the Yüan court that first officially adopted the Four Books as the basis of the civil service examination, a practice that was to be observed until 1905. Thanks to Hsü Heng, Chu Hsi's teaching prevailed in the Mongol period, but it was significantly simplified.

 허형(許衡：1209~81)은 정치 참여의 길을 택했다. 원의 쿠빌라이 칸에 의해 등용된 그는 조정의 의례와 관직제도를 정하고, 국가제도에 대한 계획을 세우면서 이를 유교적으로 이끌었다. 사실상 과거시험에서 4서를 교본으로 삼은 것은 원나라였다. 원대에는 허형에 의해 주희의 성리학이 널리 보급되었지만, 이는 매우 단순화된 것이었다.

The hermit-scholar, Liu Yin (1249-93), on the other hand, allegedly refused Kublai Khan's summons in order to maintain the dignity of the Confucian Way. To him education was for self-realization. Loyal to the Chin culture in which he was reared and faithful to the Confucian Way that he had learned from the Sung masters, Liu Yin rigorously applied philological methods to classical studies and strongly advocated the importance of history. Although true to Chu Hsi's spirit, by taking seriously the idea of the investigation of things, he put a great deal of emphasis on the learning of the mind. Liu Yin's contemporary, Wu Cheng (1249-1333), further developed the learning of the mind. He fully acknowledged the contribution of Lu Chiu-yüan to the Confucian tradition, even though as an admirer of Hsü Heng he considered himself a follower of Chu Hsi. Wu assigned himself the challenging task of harmonizing the difference between Chu and Lu. As a result, he reoriented Chu's balanced approach to morality and wisdom to accommodate Lu's existential concern for self-knowledge. This prepared the way for the revival of Lu's learning of the mind in the Ming (1368-1644).

 은거한 학자 가운데 유인(劉因：1249~ 93)은 고전연구에 철학적 방법론을 엄격하게 적용했고, 역사의 중요성을 크게 강조했다. 그는 주희에서 벗어나려고 하지 않았지만 심학을 크게 강조했다. 같은 시대의 오징(吳澄：1249~1333) 또한 심학을 더욱 발전시켰다. 이러한 준비 끝에 명(明：1368~1644)에 이르러 육구연의 심학이 재흥하게 되었다.

The thought of the first outstanding Ming Confucian scholar, Hsüeh Hsüan (1389-1464), already revealed the turn toward moral subjectivity. Although a devoted follower of Chu Hsi, Hsüeh's Records of Reading clearly shows that he considered the cultivation of "mind and nature" to be particularly important. Two other early Ming scholars, Wu Yü-pi (1391-1469) and Ch'en Hsien-chang (1428-1500), helped to define Confucian education for those who studied the Classics not simply in preparation for examinations but as learning of the "body and mind." They cleared the way for Wang Yang-ming (1472-1529), the most influential Confucian thinker after Chu Hsi.

명대 최초의 뛰어난 유학자들인 설선(薛瑄：1389~1464)·오여필(吳與弼：1391~1469)·진헌장(陳獻章：1428~1500) 등의 사상에서 도덕의 주체 문제가 관심을 모았다. 이들을 바탕으로 주희 이후 최대의 사상가인 왕양명(王陽明：1472~1529)이 출현할 수 있었다. 

As a critique of excessive attention to philological details characteristic of Chu Hsi's followers, Wang Yang-ming allied himself with Lu Chiu-yüan's learning of the mind. He advocated the precept of uniting thought and action. By focusing on the transformative power of the will, he inspired a generation of Confucian students to return to the moral idealism of Mencius. His own personal example of combining teaching with bureaucratic routine, administrative responsibility, and leadership in military campaigns demonstrated that he was a man of deeds.

왕양명은 육구연의 심리학을 발전시켜 경전에만 매달리는 정주학(程朱學)에 대항했다. 그는 '지행합일'(知行合一)을 주장하여 지식과 실천을 구분하는 정이 등의 학설에 반대했고, 맹자의 도덕적 이상주의로 돌아갈 것을 주장했다. 또한 학문과 더불어 관직에 나아갔고 군대를 지휘했는데, 이것은 그가 행동하는 인간이었음을 보여준다.

Despite his competence in practical affairs, Wang's primary concern was moral education, which he felt had to be grounded in the "original substance" of the mind. This he later identified as liang-chih ("good conscience"), by which he meant innate knowledge or a primordial existential awareness possessed by every human being. He further suggested that good conscience as the Heavenly Principle is inherent in all beings from the highest spiritual forms to grass, wood, bricks, and stone. Because the universe consists of vital energy informed by good conscience, it is a dynamic process rather than a static structure. Human beings can learn to regard Heaven and Earth and the myriad things as one body by extending their good conscience to embrace an ever-expanding network of relationships. (see also  self-cultivation)

 실무에 소질이 있었음에도 그의 일차적인 관심은 마음을 근본적인 바탕으로 한 도덕적 수양에 있었고, 이것을 나중에 '양지'(良知)라는 말로 나타냈다. 양지는 모든 사람이 태어날 때부터 갖고 있는 본래적인 지식이다. 나아가 도덕의 원리(天理)인 양지는 최고의 정신적 존재에서부터 초목에 이르기까지 모든 사물의 본래적인 것이라고 했다.

Wang Yang-ming's dynamic idealism, as Wing-tsit Chan, the dean of Chinese philosophy in North America, characterized it, set the Confucian agenda for several generations in China. His followers, such as the communitarian Wang Chi (1498-1583), who devoted his long life to building a community of the like-minded, and the radical individualist Li Chih (1527-1602), who proposed to reduce all human relationships to friendship, broadened Confucianism to accommodate a variety of life-styles.

Among Wang's critics, Liu Tsung-chou (1578-1645) was perhaps the most brilliant. His Human Schemata (Jen-p'u) offered a rigorous phenomenological description of human mistakes as a corrective to Wang Yang-ming's moral optimism. Liu's student Huang Tsung-hsi (1610-95) compiled a comprehensive biographical history of Ming Confucians based on Liu's writings. One of Huang's contemporaries, Ku Yen-wu (1613-82), was also a critic of Wang Yang-ming. He excelled in his studies of political institutions, ancient phonology, and classical philology. While Ku was well-known in his time and honoured as the patron saint of "evidential learning" in the 18th century, his contemporary Wang Fu-chih (1619-92) was discovered 200 years later as one of the most sophisticated original minds in the history of Confucian thought. His extensive writings on metaphysics, history, and the Classics made him a thorough critic of Wang Yang-ming and his followers. (see also  education, philosophy of)

The age of Confucianism: Yi-dynasty Korea, Tokugawa Japan, and Ch'ing China.

Among all the dynasties, Chinese and foreign, the long-lived Yi (Choson) in Korea (1392-1910) was undoubtedly the most thoroughly Confucianized. Since the 15th century, when the aristocracy (yangban) defined itself as the carrier of Confucian values, the penetration of court politics and elite culture by Confucianism had been unprecedented. Even today, as manifested in political behaviour, legal practice, ancestral veneration, genealogy, village schools, and student activism, the vitality of the Confucian tradition is widely felt in South Korea.

유교의 시대: 한국의 이씨 왕조, 일본의  토쿠가와, 및 중국의 청왕조

Yi T'oegye (1501-70), the single most important Korean Confucian, helped shape the character of Yi Confucianism through his creative interpretation of Chu Hsi's teaching. Critically aware of the philosophical turn engineered by Wang Yang-ming, T'oegye transmitted the Chu Hsi legacy as a response to the advocates of the learning of the mind. As a result, he made Yi Confucianism at least as much a true heir to Sung learning as Ming Confucianism was. Indeed, his Discourse on the Ten Sagely Diagrams, an aid for educating the king, offered a depiction of all the major concepts in Sung learning. His exchange of letters with Ki Taesung (1527-72) in the famous Four-Seven debate, which discussed the relationship between Mencius' four basic human feelings--commiseration, shame, modesty, and right and wrong--and seven emotions, such as anger and joy, raised the level of Confucian dialogue to a new height of intellectual sophistication. (see also  self)

In addition, Yi Yulgok's (1536-84) challenge to T'oegye's re-presentation of Chu Hsi's Confucianism, from the perspective of Chu's thought itself, significantly enriched the repertoire of the learning of the principle. The leadership of the central government, supported by the numerous academies set up by aristocratic families and by institutions such as the community compact system and the village schools, made the learning of the principle not only a political ideology but also a common creed in Korea.

In Japan, Chu Hsi's teaching, as interpreted by T'oegye, was introduced to Yamazaki Ansai (1618-82). A distinctive feature of Yamazaki's thought was his recasting of native Shintoism in Confucian terminology. The diversity and vitality of Japanese Confucianism was further evident in the appropriation of Wang Yang-ming's dynamic idealism by the samurai-scholars, notably Kumazawa Banzan (1619-91). It is, however, in Ogyu Sorai's (1666-1728) determination to rediscover the original basis of Confucian teaching by returning to its pre-Confucian sources that a true exemplification of the independent-mindedness of Japanese Confucians is found. Indeed, Ogyu's brand of ancient learning with its particular emphasis on philological exactitude foreshadowed a similar scholarly movement in China by at least a generation. Although Tokugawa Japan was never as Confucianized as Yi Korea had been, virtually every educated person in Japanese society was exposed to the Four Books by the end of the 17th century. (see also  Japanese religion)

The Confucianization of Chinese society reached its apex during the Ch'ing (1644-1911/12) when China was again ruled by a conquest (Manchu) dynasty. The Ch'ing emperors outshone their counterparts in the Ming in presenting themselves as exemplars of Confucian kingship. They transformed Confucian teaching into a political ideology, indeed a mechanism of control. Jealously guarding their Imperial prerogatives as the ultimate interpreters of Confucian truth, they undermined the freedom of scholars to transmit the Confucian Way by imposing harsh measures, such as literary inquisition. It was Ku Yen-wu's classical scholarship rather than his insights on political reform that inspired the 18th-century evidential scholars. Tai Chen, the most philosophically-minded philologist among them, couched his brilliant critique of Sung learning in his commentary on "The Meanings of Terms in the Book of Mencius." Tai Chen was one of the scholars appointed by the Ch'ien-lung emperor in 1773 to compile an Imperial manuscript library. This massive scholarly attempt, The Complete Library of the Four Treasures, is symbolic of the grandiose intent of the Manchu court to give an account of all the important works of the four branches of learning--the Classics, history, philosophy, and literature--in Confucian culture. The project comprised more than 36,000 volumes with comments on about 10,230 titles, employed as many as 15,000 copyists, and took 20 years to complete. The Ch'ien-lung emperor and the scholars around him may have expressed their cultural heritage in a definitive form, but the Confucian tradition was yet to encounter its most serious threat. (see also  ju-chia)

청대의 유교

중국에서 유교의 발전은 만주족이 중국을 정복하여 세운 청조(淸朝：1644~1911) 때 절정에 달했다. 청의 황제들은 유교의 가르침을 정치적인 이데올로기, 말 그대로 통치의 수단으로 바꾸었다. 그들은 일종의 학문 사찰인 '문자(文字)의 옥(獄)'과 같은 가혹한 방법으로 도덕적 전통을 잇는 유생들을 탄압했다. 고염무로부터 18세기에 고증학이 발전했는데, 그 이유는 그의 정치적 개혁 지향성에 있는 것이 아니라 바로 그의 연구가 현실정치와 상관 없는 고전이었기 때문이다. 대진(戴震：1723~77)은 〈맹자자의소증 孟子字義疎證〉에서 송학에 대해 탁월한 비판을 했다. 그는 건륭제(乾隆帝)가 1773년 〈사고전서 四庫全書〉의 수찬자로 임명한 학자였다. 〈사고전서〉는 경학·역사·철학·문학 분야의 모든 주요저작에 대해 해설을 붙이려는 의도로 편찬되었다.

MODERN TRANSFORMATION

At the time of the first Opium War (1839-42) East Asian societies had been Confucianized for centuries. The continuous growth of Mahayana Buddhism throughout Asia and the presence of Taoism in China, shamanism in Korea, and Shintoism in Japan did not undermine the power of Confucianism in government, education, family rituals, and social ethics. In fact, Buddhist monks were often messengers of Confucian values, and the coexistence of Confucianism with Taoism, shamanism, and Shintoism actually characterized the syncretic East Asian religious life. The impact of the West, however, so fundamentally undermined the Confucian roots in East Asia that it has come to be widely debated whether or not Confucianism can remain a viable tradition in modern times.

현대의 유교

Beginning in the 19th century, Chinese intellectuals' faith in the ability of Confucian culture to withstand the impact of the West became gradually eroded. This loss of faith may be perceived in Lin Tse-hsü's (1785-1850) moral indignation against the British, followed by Tseng Kuo-fan's (1811-72) pragmatic acceptance of the superiority of Western technology, K'ang Yu-wei's (1858-1927) sweeping recommendation for political reform, and Chang Chih-tung's (1837-1909) desperate, eclectic attempt to save the essence of Confucian learning, which, however, eventually led to the anti-Confucian iconoclasm of the so-called May Fourth Movement in 1919. The triumph of Marxism-Leninism as the official ideology of the People's Republic of China in 1949 relegated Confucian rhetoric to the background. The modern Chinese intelligentsia, however, maintained unacknowledged, sometimes unconscious, continuities with the Confucian tradition at every level of life--behaviour, attitude, belief, and commitment. Indeed, Confucianism remains an integral part of the psycho-cultural construct of the contemporary Chinese intellectual as well as of the Chinese peasant. (see also  political philosophy)

19세기 초엽 이후 서양으로부터의 충격을 유교문화가 막아줄 것이라는 중국 지식인들의 신념이 점차 흔들리기 시작했다. 유학의 본령을 필사적으로 지키려고 한 장지동(張之洞：1837~1909)의 노력과 캉유웨이[康有爲]의 정치개혁 시도와 같이 중체서용론(中體西用論)에 입각하여 서양사상과의 현상적인 조화를 모색해보려고도 했다. 그러나 모든 것은 무위로 돌아가고, 결국 1919년 구습타파운동인 5·4운동이 일어났다. 1949년 중화인민공화국의 수립으로 마르크스-레닌주의가 공식적인 이념이 되었고, 유교는 역사의 뒤안길로 사라졌다. 그러나 비록 현대 중국 지식인들은 받아들이려고 하지 않지만 유교의 전통은 중국의 모든 생활 수준, 즉 행동과 태도, 말과 믿음에서 아직도 계속되고 있으며, 그들의 문화적·심리적 구조에서 통합적 기능을 수행하고 있다고 할 것이다. 

The emergence of Japan and other newly industrialized Asian countries (e.g., South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore) as the most dynamic region of economic development since World War II has generated much scholarly interest. Labeled the "Sinitic World in Perspective," "The Second Case of Industrial Capitalism," the "Eastasia Edge," or "the Challenge of the Post-Confucian States," this phenomenon has raised questions about how the typical East Asian institutions, still suffused with Confucian values--such as a paternalistic government, an educational system based on competitive examinations, the family with emphasis on loyalty and cooperation, and local organizations informed by consensus--have adapted themselves to the imperatives of modernization. (see also  socialization)

Some of the most creative and influential intellectuals in contemporary China have continued to think from Confucian roots. Hsiung Shih-li's ontological reflection, Liang Shu-ming's cultural analysis, Fung Yu-lan's reconstruction of the learning of the principle, Ho Lin's new interpretation of the learning of the mind, T'ang Chün-i's philosophy of culture, Hsü Fu-kuan's social criticism, and Mou Tsung-san's moral metaphysics are noteworthy examples. Although some of the most articulate intellectuals in the People's Republic of China criticize their Confucian heritage as the embodiment of authoritarianism, bureaucratism, nepotism, conservatism, and male chauvinism, others in China, Taiwan, Singapore, and North America have imaginatively established the relevance of Confucian humanism to China's modernization. The revival of Confucian studies in South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore has been under way for more than a generation, though Confucian scholarship in Japan remains unrivaled. Confucian thinkers in the West, inspired by religious pluralism and liberal democratic ideas, have begun to explore the possibility of a third epoch of Confucian humanism. They uphold that its modern transformation, as a creative response to the challenge of the West, is a continuation of its classical formulation and its medieval elaboration. Scholars in mainland China have also begun to explore the possibility of a fruitful interaction between Confucian humanism and democratic liberalism in a socialist context. (see also  social interaction)

현대 중국에서 탁월하고 영향력 있는 몇몇 학자들은 아직도 유학에 근원을 두고 사상활동을 하고 있다. 슝스리[熊十力：1884~1968]의 신유식론(新唯識論), 량수밍[梁漱溟：1893~]의 문화분석, 펑유란[馮友蘭：1894~ 1990]의 신이학(新理學), 허린[賀麟]의 신심학(新心學)이 그 대표적인 사상들이다. 중국의 학자들은 유교의 유산을 전제주의·관료주의·친족주의·보수주의·남성우월주의의 온상으로 비판하지만, 타이완·홍콩·북아메리카 등지의 일부 학자들은 유교의 인본주의와 중국 근대화 사이의 상관성을 주장하기도 한다. 현재 중국의 학자들은 사회주의적 맥락 속에서 유교의 인본주의와 민주적 자유주의 사이의 긍정적인 상호작용의 가능성에 대해서 탐색을 시도하고 있다.

Tu Wei-ming 글