by Ying-shih Yü
(Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1987), 182.
78. Rong Zhaozu, ed., He Xinyin ji
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1981), 53–54.
318 r e or i e n tat ion of c on f uc i a n so c i a l t hou gh t
79. I have discussed the emergence of this new conception of simin in detail in my Zhong-
guo jinshi zongjiao lunli yu shangren jingshen
(hereafter
Shangren jingshen) (Taipei: Lianjing, 1987), esp. pp. 106–114. However, this point must
not be mistaken to mean that the long- established idiomatic expression shi nong gong
shang
had ceased to circulate in written or spoken language since the six-
teenth century. As a matter of fact, He Xinyin himself continued to use it. See He Xin-
yin ji, 29.
80. Gu Xiancheng
, Xiaoxinzhai zhaji
(Taipei: Guangwen, [1877] 1975),
juan 14: 2b–3a.
81. Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, trans. Talcott Parsons
(London: George Allen and Unwin, 1930), 68.
82. On the merchant background of Gu’s family, see my Xiandai ruxue lun, 82–83.
83. Li Zhi
, Fenshu
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1961), 47. See de Bary, Self and Society in
Ming Thought, 206.
84. Mingshi, juan 81: 7.1978–1979.
85. Ming shilu
(Taipei: Institute of History & Philology, Academia Sinica, 1966),
119.9927.
86. Quoted and discussed in my Xiandai ruxue lun, 94–95.
87. Dai Tingming
, Cheng Shangkuan
, and Zhu Wanshu
, eds., Xin-an
mingzu zhi
(Hefei: Huangshan, 2004), 154.
88. Ibid., 231 (Wang Gen); p. 530 (Zou Shouyi).
89. MRXA, juan 16: 3b.
90. Wu Weiye
, Meicun jiacang gao
, SBCK suoben, juan 50: 222.
91. See my Shangren jingshen, 124–136.
92. For the origin of the term xingwo
in relation to salt merchants, see Chaoying Fang,
“Chan Jo- shui,” in DMB, 1:38, and Wang Zhenzhong
, Ming- Qing Huishang yu
Huaiyang shehui bianqian
(Beijing: Sanlian, 1996), 1–11.
93. Tang Shunzhi, Jingchuan xiansheng wenji, juan 16: 337.
94. Xin-an mingzu zhi, 124; 231; 325–326; 431; 481; 537. The last two, Bazi
and Xu Shi-
run
, seem to have been from merchant families.
95. MRXA, juan 37: 1a. For En glish translation, see The Rec ords of Ming Scholars, 202.
96. Xin-an minzu zhi, 217; 223; 516; 530.
97. MRXA, juan 37: 2b. En glish translation adapted from The Rec ords of Ming Scholars, 203.
98. For a modern analy sis, see Julia Ching, “A Contribution on Chan’s Thought,” in DMB,
1:41–42.
99. See Ye Tan
, Fuguo fumin lun
(Beijing: Beijing, 1991), 85–92.
100. Qiu Jun
, Daxue Yanyi bu
(Taipei: Shangwu, [1605] 1972), 174. For a
comprehensive study of Qiu Jun’s thought, see Hung- lam Chu, Ch’ iu Chün (1421–1495)
and the “Ta hsüeh yen i pu”: Statecraft Thought in Fifteenth- Century China (Ann Arbor,
Mich.: University Microfi lms International, 1983).
101. Huang Wan
, Mingdao bian
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1959), 45. For a compre-
hensive study of Huang Wan, see Rong Zhaozu ji, 247–316.
r e or i e n tat ion of c on f uc i a n so c i a l t hou gh t 319
102. This expression, fumin guo zhi yuanqi
, was quoted by Li Yuheng
in his Tuipeng wuyu
as a common saying of the day (Lishi sijingtang
, 1571), juan 8: 18b.
103. Qi Biaojia ji
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1960), 96.
104. Wang Fuzhi
, Huang shu
(Beijing: Guji, 1956), 28–29.
105. For examples, see Xu Zhenming
(d. 1590), Lushui ketan
(Taipei:
Shangwu, 1966), 8; Tang Zhen
(1630–1704), Qianshu
(Beijing: Zhonghua,
1963), 105–107 and 114.
106. Lu Ji
, Jianjiatang zazhu zhechao
, in Shen Jiefu
(1533–1601),
Guochao jilu huibian
(Taipei: Yiwen, 1971 [reprint]), juan 24: 214. For an
En glish translation of Lu’s essay, see Lien- sheng Yang, “A Sixteenth- Century Essay in
Favor of Spending,” appendix to “Economic Justifi cation for Spending: An Uncommon
Idea in Traditional China,” in his Studies in Chinese Institutional History (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1961), 72–74.
107. Li Yuheng, Tuipeng wuyu, juan 8: 18a.
108. Fa Shishan
, Taolu zalu
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1959), 161.
109. Gu Gongxie
, Xiaoxia xianji zhechao
(Shanghai: Shangwu, 1917
[Hanfenlou miji
edition]), juan shang
, 27.
110. Zhang Shihuan
, Chongxiu Yangzhoufu zhi
(1810 edition), juan
3: 2b.
111. See the following impor tant studies by Mizoguchi Yūzō
, “Chūgoku ni okeru
ko- shi gainen no tenkai”
, Shisô
669 (March 1980):
19–38, and “Chūgoku no ko- shi”
, Bungaku 56 (September 1988): 88–102
and 56 (October 1988): 73–84.
112. See my Shangren jingshen, 102–104, and Xiandai ruxue lun, 20–25.
113. Li Zhi, Cangshu
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1959), 3:544.
114. Li Weizhen, “Nanzhou gaoshi Yugong mubiao”
, Dabishanfang ji,
juan 105: 28a.
115. Gu Yanwu
, “Jun- xian lun, 5”
, Gu Tinglin shiwen ji
(Beijing:
Zhonghua, 1959), 15.
116. Gu Yanwu, Yuanchaoben Rizhilu
(Taipei: Minglun
, 1970), 68.
117. Han Bangqi, Yuanluo ji, juan 7: 6a– b.
118. Gu Xiancheng, Jinggao canggao
, SKQS, juan 17: 11a.
119. Li Hua
, comp., Ming- Qing yilai Beijing gongshang huiguan beike xuanbian
(Beijing: Wenwu, 1980), 16.
120. See Xiandai ruxuelun, 1–57.
121. Tan Sitong, “Renxue”
, in Tan Sitong quanji
(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1981),
2:338–342; Liang Qichao
, “Lun zhuanzhi zhengti you baihai yu junzhu er wu
yili”
, Yinbingshi heji
9
(1989):
90–101. For Huang Zongxi’s Mingyi daifang lu
, see the annotated transla-
tion of Wm. Theodore de Bary, Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1993).
320 r e or i e n tat ion of c on f uc i a n so c i a l t hou gh t
122. For the case of Sun Yat- sen, see Ying- shih Yü, “Democracy, Human Rights and Confu-
cian Culture,” in The Fifth Huang Hsing Foundation Hsueh Chun-tu Distinguished Lec-
ture in Asian Studies (Oxford: Asian Studies Centre, St. Antony’s College, University of
Oxford, 2000), 12.
123. See Zhu Jiazhen
, “Zhongguo fumin sixiang de lishi kaocha”
, Pingzhun Xuekan (Beijing: Zhongguo shangye, 1986), 3rd collection, 2:403.
124. Tan Sitong quanji, 2:326–327.
12
5. Ibid., 1:250.
126. Liang Qichao, “Shiji huozhi liezhuan jinyi”
, Yinbingshi heji 2
(1989): 39–40.
127. For textual details, see my Xiandai ruxue lun, 5–6.
128. Liang Qichao, “Xinmin shuo”
, Yinbingshi heji 4
(1989): 36. En glish trans-
lation by Hao Chang, Liang Ch’ i- ch’ ao and the Intellectual Transition in China, 1890–
1907 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), 195.
13. The Intellectual World of Jiao Hong Revisited
Jiao Hong (1540–1620) was an impor tant fi gure in late Ming intellectual
history. In his own day, he was praised for his accomplishments in prose
writing as much as for his active interest in Neo- Confucian and Buddhist meta-
physics. Since the eigh teenth century, however, he has been remembered as a
bibliophile and as a pioneer of “evidential research” ( kaozheng
) . He lived
in an age of transition that witnessed many new developments in Chinese soci-
ety, religion, and in elite as well as popu lar culture, but he was by no means
merely a passive product of this transition. On the contrary, through his many-
sided intellectual activities, he contributed signifi cantly to the transition. On
the one hand, his active participation in the movement known as “Oneness of
the Three Teachings” ( Sanjiao heyi
) precipitated the decline, if not
demise, of Ming Neo- Confucianism as a philosophical enterprise. On the other
hand, his promotion of a philological approach to ancient texts paved the way
for the rise of classical and historical scholarship that dominated Qing intellec-
tual history. There can be no question that a man holding such a strategic posi-
tion in the Ming- Qing intellectual transition deserves to be studied thoroughly.
Edward T. Ch’ien’s Chiao Hung and the Restructuring of Neo- Confucianism in the
Late Ming (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986) is therefore a welcome
addition to the growing lit er a ture on Ming thought in the West.1
In this study, Ch’ien (hereafter “the author”) has set for himself a goal far
more ambitious than intellectual biography in the ordinary sense. As a matter
322 t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed
of fact, the individual case of Jiao Hong merely provides the author with a con ve-
nient focus to play his own “game,” to use the author’s favorite expression, not
only with Ming Neo- Confucianism but with the entire Chinese philosophical
tradition. In this essay, however, I have confi ned myself to Ming- Qing intellec-
tual history, focusing on the period in which Jiao Hong lived and wrote.
To read through this book requires a high degree of patience and concentra-
tion. This is the case primarily because most of its arguments, often tortuously
labored, fl y so high in metaphysical outer space that it is not always clear how to
relate them to the realities of the intellectual world of late Ming China. To deter-
mine their precise meanings, I was compelled to examine, ever increasingly, the
textual ground of these high- fl ying arguments. One thing led to another, and
before I knew it, I found myself already deeply involved in a research proj ect of
my own. As a result, I have restudied practically all of Jiao Hong’s basic writ-
ings as well as other related texts of the late Ming Period. The end product, as it
now stands, is as much a revisit of the intellectual world of Jiao Hong as a re-
view of the book about him. In my considered opinion, the subject matter itself
alone merits this comprehensive reexamination. Moreover, the book also de-
serves to be taken most seriously and critically on account of, if nothing else, the
author’s seriousness of purpose in his heroic eff orts to reconceptualize some of
the central prob lems in Chinese intellectual history.
I N T E L L E C T U A L H I S T O R Y A S D I A L O G U E
W I T H T H E P A S T
To be fair to the author, we must begin with a clear recognition of the nature and
purpose of his new game. The name of this game is German phenomenology
merged with French structuralism (and, of course, also poststructuralism). “Sub-
jectivity,” “objectivity,” “discursive formation,” “textuality,” “restructuring,” etc.,
are among the main conceptual pillars that support the structure of the castle
built in this book. The author’s basic building materials are, of course, Chinese
ideas of the Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist va ri e ties. His Chinese materials
are also of a par tic u lar brand, however, for he understands many of the pivotal
ideas in the Chinese tradition as they have been interpreted by a few con tem-
porary Chinese phi los o phers, notably the Kantian- oriented Mou Zongsan and
the Hegelian- oriented Tang Junyi. Hence, in a general sense, his building mate-
rials are well suited to his structure, for, as is generally known, while seeking to
transcend the limitations of the Kantian- Hegelian tradition, the con temporary
phenomenological movement in the West with all of its ramifi cations is nonethe-
less continuous with it.
Playing a phenomenological- structuralist game with Chinese philosophical
texts, the author’s approach to intellectual history is predominantly “dialogi-
cal.” In some phenomenological quarters today, a general distinction has been
t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed 323
drawn between intellectual history as a reconstruction of the past and as a dia-
logue with the past, with the emphasis placed on the latter.2 This, of course, does
not imply that the author has taken a dialogical approach to the total exclusion of
reconstruction, which is practically impossible for any intellectual historian to
do. It seems reasonable to assume that each of the two approaches contains an
ele ment of the other.3 Even a strong advocate of the dialogical approach can
only say, “it is a hermeneutical necessity always to go beyond mere reconstruc-
tion,” but not to do without it.4 However, as will become crystal clear later, the
author’s overwhelming enthusiasm in having a dialogue with the past has seri-
ously impaired his reconstructive work.
The author’s dialogical approach may be described in just a few words. He
fi rst poses certain phenomenological- structuralist questions to Jiao Hong’s texts
and then forces the texts to say what he is interested in knowing. Then, to show
what was “new” and “original” in Jiao Hong and late Ming Neo- Confucianism,
he carries his conversations back to pre- Ming times and puts the same kind
of questions to earlier (including ancient) philosophical texts. The author’s
phenomenological- structuralist prejudice practically dominates the whole book.
Prob lems concerning language, mode of discourse, or structure are to be en-
countered everywhere. His repeated discussions of the relationship between
language and the Dao as real ity, for instance, show particularly the profound
concern of con temporary continental phi los o phers such as Gadamer, Derrida,
and Foucault with the Western logocentric tradition.
Some methodological questions arise at this point. First, the idea of “dia-
&nbs
p; logue with the past as intellectual history” can only be understood meta phor-
ically. There is really no exchange of questions and answers, as Paul Ricoeur says,
“between the writer and the reader. The writer does not respond to the reader.”5
Second, even if we can speak analogously of the text as the “partner” in a dia-
logue, it is nevertheless only a silent “partner” who cannot supply the context
when the “dialogue” goes wrong.6 This is a particularly serious prob lem with
Jiao Hong’s philosophical remarks, which, being generally of a fragmentary
nature, are already out of context by themselves. Third, when phenomenologi-
cally oriented historians in the West speak of a “dialogue between the pres ent
and the past,” they naturally assume that it takes place within the same tradi-
tion, i.e., the Western philosophical tradition. The “dialogue” that, in Gadame-
rian terms, culminates in the “fusion of horizons” is pos si ble primarily because
the horizon of the pres ent is being continually formed in its encounter with the
horizon of the past in an ever- changing and ever- continuing tradition.7 Now, in
the case of this book, the “dialogue” obviously takes place between two totally
diff er ent and historically unrelated traditions. The questions posed by the au-
thor to his silent “partner” are framed largely in terms of con temporary West-
ern phenomenology and structuralism. They are generally questions of a for-
mal and linguistic kind. It is of course not wholly impossible to force a silent
“partner” from a diff er ent tradition to answer questions of this kind. After all,
324 t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed
texts of all traditions have language and structure as their basic components.
What is really at issue, however, is that questions central to one tradition at one
historical time may only be peripheral to another tradition at another time. As
far as I can judge, the “dialogue” between the Chinese past and the Western
pres ent in this book is very much dominated by the latter, with the result that
Neo- Confucianism has been transformed into a “language game.”
So much for the dialogical approach. Since this book is a study in intellec-
tual history, it must be judged ultimately on historical grounds. In what fol-
lows, I propose to examine it primarily as a reconstruction of the past.
To begin with, the reader needs to know what sort of intellectual history the
