Zhu Xi
| Names | |
|---|---|
| Chinese: | 朱熹 |
| Pinyin: | Zhū Xī |
| Wade-Giles: | Chu Hsi |
Zhu Xi or Chu Hsi (1130–1200) was a Song Dynasty (960-1279) Confucian scholar who became one of the most significant Neo-Confucians in China. Zhu Xi was also influential in Japan, where his followers were called the Shushigaku (朱子学) school.
Life magazine ranked Zhu Xi as the forty-fifth most important person in the last millennium.
Biography
Zhu Xi (1130-1200 C.E.) was born at the beginning of the Southern Song dynasty in the town of Youxi, in Fujian province. In classical Confucian style, he was schooled in the rites and classics by his father, a lesser official in the Imperial Bureaucracy. After receiving this education, young Zhu Xi followed in his father's footsteps, breezing through the entire gamut of imperial examinations before his nineteenth birthday and accepting a position as a district keeper of records in 1151. Despite the prestige of being accorded such an elevated position at such a young age, he eventually realized that his true calling lay in scholarship, causing him to seek the instruction of Li Tong (an able Confucian scholar who had studied with Cheng I). Zhu Xi became entirely commited to this scholastic path, so when his term as record keeper ended in 1158, he chose not to return to the service of the imperial bureaucracy.
At this time, Zhu Xi took a position as a temple curator - a post that allowed him numerous opportunities to study, to converse with luminaries from various religious and philosophical traditions, and also to meditate (jingzuo (literally "quiet sitting")) upon his learning. Despite his academic focus, he also remainded politically active, writing countless missives to the imperial throne critiquing policies and officials, and suggesting various means of improving (even "humanizing") government. In all, he remained a dedicated student and educator for fifteen years (from 1163 to 1178), participating in many intellectual debates and writing influential commentaries on the Analects and the Mencius. However, even during this period of relative retirement, his commitment to the Confucian ideal of engaged scholarship did not go unnoticed and, through the years, he received frequent requests to resume government service.
Following one of these requests, Zhu Xi accepted a position as a district magistrate in 1178 and, in the subsequent eighteen years, he also served as a minor official, a vice minister of the army department, a junior expositor in waiting, a district prefect of Fujian province and the governor of Honan. In 1179-1180, in addition to his duties as magistrate, he rebuilt the famed White Deer Grotto Academy and taught there, offering lectures that were attended by "all [the] prominent scholars of the time" (Chan, 1963, 588). During this period of political involvement, he also managed to edit two other Confucian classics (the Doctrine of the Mean and the Great Learning) and to write commentaries on them. However, his outspoken criticisms of corrupt officials and his attempts to enact far-reaching reforms earned him many enemies, and his political fortunes were often uncertain, as he was frequently demoted and chastised by the throne and his fellow bureaucrats. These attacks culminated in 1196, when he was "accused of ten crimes, including refusing to serve and spreading false learning, and an official even petitioned for his execution. All his posts were taken away" (Chan, 1963, 588). When he died in 1200 C.E., he was still in political disgrace and many of his teachings were seen as being unorthdox.
In the years following his death, public conception of Zhu Xi underwent a complete reversal. After ten years of scholarly debate, his synthesis of classical materials and their Neo-Confucian counterparts was recognized as a watershed moment in Chinese philosophy. Likewise, in 1208, the emperor "posthumously honored [Zhu Xi] with the title Wen (culture)" for his tremendous service to Chinese philosophy (Chan, 1989, 1). After Zhu Xi's public vindication, his prize pupil (and son-in-law) Huang Kan took it upon himself to write a laudatory biography (xing chuang) of the celebrated philosopher. Huang felt such reverence for his teacher that he spent over fifteen years preparing successive drafts and seeking comments and criticisms from all the leading intellectuals of the day. These honorific efforts reached their culmination in 1241, when Zhu Xi's funerary tablet was placed in the Confucian Temple, placing him in the august company of Confucius, Mencius, and many of Confucius's most notable pupils (including Yan-hui, Zeng Shen and Zi Lu).
Philosophy
Though Zhu Xi was an incisive and critical philosopher in his own right, his most impressive contribution to Neo-Confucian thought was his ability to creatively synthesize together the contributions of his philosophical predecessors into a coherent whole. Indeed, his system managed to incorporate both the classical tradition (as articulated by Confucius and Mencius) and Neo-Confucian modifications (as exemplified by Cheng Yi, Cheng Hao, Zhou Dunyi, and Zhang Zai). This synthetic acumen becomes additionally relevant when one notes the cultural value that Chinese philosophers placed upon congruence with the past:
The Chinese intellectual tradition is generally characterized by a commitment to continuity.... In this traditional paradigm, a figure achieves prominence not from standing out in contrast to his historical influence but rather from the degree to which he embodies, expresses, and amplifies his tradition (Ames, xii-xiii).
Though it should be noted that not everyone agreed with his (re)construals of classic thought (as can be seen below), Zhu Xi's grand synthesis of virtually the entire Confucian tradition into a single cohesive philosophical system became the orthodox interpretation for over six hundred years.
Metaphysics and Cosmology
Given the classical lacunae on metaphysical issues (both Confucius and Mencius stressed concrete reality to the exclusion of metaphysical speculation), Neo-Confucian thinkers developed numerous explanations of the fundamental nature of the world. By Zhu Xi's time, the most important of these included Zhang Zai's theory that material force (qi) was both the generative principle for the universe and its underlying substance, the Cheng brother's (Cheng Yi and Cheng Hao) view that li (principle) was the basic nature of reality, and Zhou Dunyi's Daoist- and I Jing-inspired cosmological theory of the Supreme Ultimate (Taiji). Arguably, Zhu Xi's most important contribution to Confucian philosophy was his creative synthesis and unification of these somewhat disparate theories.
Building upon Zhou Dunyi's understanding, Zhu Xi concurred that the source and sum of creation is the Supreme Ultimate (Taiji). The Tai Ji was understood as the cause of qi's movement and change in the physical world, resulting in the division of the world into the two energy modes (yin and yang) and the five elements (fire, water, wood, metal, and earth). Zhu Xi expanded upon this concept by positing that the Tai Ji was, in fact, the "principle of Heaven, Earth and the myriad things" (Chan, 1989, 147). In this way, the nature of worldly things and their structure/function becomes tied to an overarching cosmic schema that guides their genesis and development (as in the Greek understanding of telos). By grounding principle in the Supreme Ultimate, Zhu Xi provided a cosmological foundation that had been lacking in the Cheng brother's doctrine of li.
Despite the seeming preference for li in his system, Zhu Xi also stressed the fundamental necessity of qi. Specifically, he argued that vital force (qi) and rational principle (li) were mutually dependent, and that the existence of any form of matter depended upon their interaction. In his system, the concept of qi was "necessary to explain physical form, individuality, and the transformation of things. [Qi] is physical, many, transitory, and changeable, unequal in things, constituting their physical substance, involving both good and evil (depending on whether its endowment in things is balanced or partial), and is the agent of creation" (Chan, 1963, 590). In this way, he also addressed Zhang Zai's doctrine of material force. The interplay between Zhu Xi's understandings of principle and material force were most pronounced in his view of human nature (as discussed below).
As a final cosmological point, Zhu Xi did not hold to traditional ideas of God or Heaven (Tian), though he discussed how his own ideas mirrored the traditional concepts. He encouraged an agnostic tendency within Confucianism by believing that the Great Ultimate was a rational principle, though he considered it to be an intelligent and ordering will underlying the physical reality of the universe.
Ethics
As mentioned above, Zhu Xi posited that every physical object (including human beings) contains a principle (li) that is ultimately derived from, and has continued contact with, the Great Ultimate (Tai Ji). As such, the human mind (in an ideal case) is this supreme regulative principle at work in a person.
Original mind is principle [as derived from Tai Ji] in itself, unmoved, and perfectly good, while physical nature, on the other hand, is principle mixed with material force [qi]; it is the aroused state, involving both good and evil. The two natures, however, are always interfused, one the substance and the other, function (Chan, 1963, 590).
In this way, ethics become an issue of ultimate importance, as one's ontological nature has the potential to be entirely good (and, simultaneously, to be entirely in harmony with the principle of the Universe). This statement is made explicit in Zhu Xi's conclusions on ren (the primary Confucian virtue, alternatively translated as "humanity", "benevolence", or "humankindness): "Master [Zhu] said: 'Mencius spoke about humanity [ren] being a person's mind.' This is a most fitting remark. Mind is naturally a humane [ren] thing. So long as we preserve this mind, then there is not need to worry that such a person will be inhumane" (Zhu, 1.64). Likewise, he argues that the perfected mind rests in (or literally consists of) the cardinal Confucian virtues: "Heaven has only spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Humans have only humanity [ren], rectitude, propriety, and wisdom. These four are those four. Mind is what functions. There are only these four principles. There is nothing else" (Zhu, 1.30). In this way, the human mind, which is purified through praxis (as discussed below), can ultimately be made to align perfectly with the supreme principle (li) of existence.
For all of these reasons, Zhu Xi considered the earlier philosopher Xun Zi to be a heretic for departing from Confucius's beliefs about innate human goodness. As such, Zhu Xi's synthetic work (and his involved program of textual annotation and commentary) virtually ignored all the contributions made by Xun Zi.
Praxis Orientation
In addition to his contributions to Confucian metaphysics and ethics, Zhu Xi was similarly influential in his emphasis on praxis - an emphasis that had been present in early Confucianism but that had fallen out of favour during the scholastic Han and Tang periods. Specifically, he argued for the necessity of two related
Zhu Xi practiced a form of daily meditation similar to, but not the same as, Buddhist dhyana or chan ding (wg ch'an-ting). His meditation did not require the cessation of all thinking as in Buddhism, but was characterised by quiet introspection that helped to balance various aspects of one's personality and allowed for focused thought and concentration. His form of meditation was by nature Confucian in the sense that it was concerned with morality. His meditation attempted to reason and feel in harmony with the universe. He believed that this type of meditation brought humanity closer together and more into harmony.
- book about ritual
- redux of confucian classics (touch again in "impact" section)
- investigating things!
Sociocultural Impact
During the Song Dynasty, Zhu Xi's teachings were considered to be unorthodox. Zhu Xi and his fellow scholars codified what is now considered the Confucian canon of classics: the Four Books, consisting of the Analects of Confucius, the Mencius, the Great Learning, and the Doctrine of the Mean; and the Five Classics: the Classic of Poetry, the Classic of History, the Book of Changes (I Ching), the Classic of Rites and the Spring and Autumn Annals. Zhu Xi also wrote extensive commentaries for all of these classics. The writings were not widely recognised in Zhu Xi's time; however, they later became accepted as standard commentaries on the Confucian classics.
Critiques of Zhuxi
The teachings of Zhu Xi were to dominate Confucianism, though dissenters would later emerge, such as Wang Yangming two and a half centuries later.
See also
References and External links
- Adler, Joseph A. Chu Hsi and Divination.
- Adler, Joseph A. Stillness & Activity.
- Ames, Roger T. The Art of Rulership: A Study in Ancient Chinese Political Thought. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1983.
- Berthrong, John H. Transformations of the Confucian Way. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1998.
- Chan, Wing-tsit. Chu Hsi: New Studies. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989.
- Chan, Wing-tsit. "The Great Synthesis in Chu Hsi" in A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton, NJ: Prineceton University Press, 1963. 588-653.
- Kim, Yung Sik. The Natural Philosophy of Chu Hsi (1130-1200). Philadelphia, PA: American Philosophical Society Press, 2000. Volume 235 of the Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society.
- Works by Zhu Xi. Project Gutenberg
- Zhu Xi. In Britannica Student Encyclopedia. 2006.
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