​Rectifying the origin and Opening the New of the “Daotong” An Introduction to the Study of Civilization (I)

Rectifying the Origin and Opening the New of the “Daotong” An Introduction to the Study of Civilization (I)

JU Xi

(Changbaishan Academy; Xiuyun Academy)

Abstract: The “decline” of Chinese civilization in modern times is rooted in the loss of philosophical rationality. Unless the contemporary revival of Chinese traditional culture reconstructs a philosophy capable of resolving the fundamental problems of humankind and rectifies and renews the daotong together with its civilizational content, that revival will remain empty. Taking the “logic of existence” as its method, this study reflects on the inner predicament of the Confucian theory of the daotong. The genealogy initiated by Han Yu and completed by Zhu Xi rests upon the “transmission of the mind” and is therefore groundless: it reduces the Yi to a book of divination and shelves it, departs from the core of Confucius’ thought of “running through all with one thread”, deprives Confucianism of its ontological and noumenal support, and finally reduces it to an instrument for defending imperial autocracy, so that it withdraws from the stage of history. The core of Confucius’ thought is the Yi: the “norm” in “at seventy I followed what my heart desired without transgressing the norm” is precisely the Yi. Later Confucians, “doubting Qiu because of the Yi”, did not understand the Yi and went so far as to “blame Qiu”, which is a fundamental misreading of Confucius. On this basis, relying on the philosophical systems of the “theory of xing er zhong” and the “theory of the unity of time and space”, and taking “the existence of the de-beingized of the beingized of existence” as the philosophical support of the study of civilization, the commitment and inference of the daotong and of civilization are unified, and a theoretical path for rectifying and renewing the “Chinese daotong” is proposed: taking the Yi as its cardinal principle and the “civilization of Dayou” as its aim, so that the Chinese daotong may become an important intellectual resource guiding the direction of Chinese and indeed human civilization. 

Key words: the Chinese daotong; taking the Yi as the cardinal principle; the theory of xing er zhong; the theory of the unity of time and space; the civilization of Dayou

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