Ego-Leib and the Harmonious Integration of the Body and Subject (xing-shenzhonghe, 形神中和) ——A Comparative and Interpretative Analysis of Husserl’s Phenomenology of the Body and Yi Fu (fu, 輔) Ju’s Studies
CHEN Yuan
(Department of Philosophy, School of Humanities / Institute of Philosophy, Nanchang University, Nanchang 330031, Jiangxi, China)
Abstract: This article argues that one of the central insights of Husserl’s phenomenology of the body lies in his theory of the Ego-Leib: the constitutive activity of the body as subject is structurally homologous to the constitutive activity of time-consciousness. In constituting the body, the subject simultaneously constitutes the world. At the same time, however, a fundamental difficulty arises. Since the constitutive function of kinesthesia, as the source of the constitution of the body, must, from the standpoint of Husserl’s transcendental philosophy, precede the body itself, we are compelled to inquire further into the origin of constitution. Such an inquiry ultimately leads us back to the constitution of the primal stream (Urstrom) of time-consciousness, where the origin of intentionality and its relation to the body must be reconsidered. This inquiry, in turn, reveals a plurality of presuppositions within Husserlian phenomenology.From the perspective of Yi Fu (fu, 輔 ) Ju’s Studies ( 易 輔 鞠 氏 學 , Ju Xi’s Yijing studies), as developed through the interpretive framework of the Yijing, Husserl, despite having disclosed the dimension of the body proper (Leib) belonging to the subject, remains constrained by his concern with the objective validity of experience and is therefore unable to enter the zhong he (中和) of consciousness and being. Consequently, the Ego- Leib remains, in this perspective, a form of inquiry confined to the xing er xia (形而下).By contrast, Yi Fu (fu, 輔)Ju’s Studies maintains that Confucius, through the composition of the Yijing and its system of hexagrams and lines, achieved a harmonious integration of the body and the subject (xing-shen zhonghe, 形神中和). This can be illustrated through the two hexagrams Xian (咸) and Gen (艮), both of which take the body as xiang (象). In particular, the hexagram Gen realizes the integration of the body and the subject through the unity of time and space embodied in its six lines: one “stops when it is time to stop”, “moves when it is time to move”, and comes to rest at the proper “place” of Gen. Through this harmonious integration of the body and the subject, thought may proceed from the xing er xia (形而下) to the xing er shang (形而上), thereby fulfilling the normative commitment expressed in the formula qiong li jin xing yi zhi yu ming (窮理盡性以至於命).Finally, this article suggests that, if Husserlian phenomenology were to remain faithful to its fundamental imperative of “returning to the things themselves”, and were to bracket both material and formal apriorities in order to reconstruct the relation between world and embodied subjectivity on the basis of kinesthesia and the unity of the kinesthetic system, it might open a new path for phenomenology. At the same time, however, such a phenomenological-Yijing path is fraught with considerable difficulties. Conversely, might a Yijing-phenomenology be possible? From its very inception, such a Yijing-phenomenology would have to undertake a fundamental rectification of the basic concepts of Yijing studies and, on the basis of conceptually clarified and properly grounded terms, respond to a series of historical misunderstandings. Its task is therefore no less formidable.
Key words: Husserl; Ego-Leib; kinesthesia; Yi Fu (fu, 輔) Ju’s Studies; harmonious integration of the body and subject; qiong li jin xing yi zhi yu ming
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