Language, Discourse, and Praxis in Ancient China

176 Pages·2014·2.526 MB·

by  Zhenbin Sun

Zhenbin Sun
Language,
Discourse,
and Praxis in
Ancient China
Language, Discourse, and Praxis in Ancient China
Zhenbin Sun
Language, Discourse, and
Praxis in Ancient China
123
ZhenbinSun
School ofArt andMedia Studies
Fairleigh DickinsonUniversity
Teaneck, NJ
USA
ISBN 978-3-642-54864-2 ISBN 978-3-642-54865-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-54865-9
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2014946195
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Acknowledgments
IamindebtedtotheJournalofChinesePhilosophy,thejournalAmericanReviewof
China Studies, and ShongwuYinshu Guan toallow metoincludeinthis bookthe
followingarticles:“Yan:ADimensionofPraxisandItsPhilosophicalImplications”
(in the Journal of Chinese philosophy, 1997, Vol. 24, No. 2); “Bian: The Concept
ofArgumentinAncient China”(inthejournalAmerican Review ofChinaStudies,
2002, Vol. 3, No. 2); “Discourse as a Method of Philosophy” (in Chinese Phi-
losophy and the Trends of21st Century Civilization, ed. Fang Keli, 2003, Beijing:
Shongwu Yinshu Guan); “The Discourse on Language and Reality in Pre-Qin
China”(inthejournalAmericanReviewofChinaStudies,2003,Vol.4,No.2);and
“ReasoninAncientChinesePhilosophy”(inthejournalAmericanReviewofChina
Studies, 2005, Vol. 6, No. 2).
Iwanttothanktheanonymousreviewersofmywork.Mysinceregratitudegoes
tomyeditorLeanaLiforherenthusiasmaswellashertimelyhelp.Iwouldliketo
offer my thanks to the excellent creative, production, and marketing teams at
Springer.
vii
Contents
Introduction ............................................... xi
1 Methodological and Historical Inquiry. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Discourse as a Method of Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Context of the Discourse on Ming and Shi. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2 Four Notions of Names. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.1 Rectification of Names (Zheng Ming) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.2 Abandonment of Names (Wu Ming) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.3 Analysis of Names (Bian Ming) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
2.4 Examination of Names (Shen Ming) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
3 Synthesis of Language and Reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.1 Shi as a Practical Issue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.2 Ming as a Theoretical Issue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3.3 Ming-Shi as a Synthetic Issue. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3.4 Practice and Praxis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4 Moral Practice and Language. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.1 Humanity (Ren) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.2 Rightness (Yi). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
4.3 Propriety (Li). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
4.4 Truthfulness (Xin) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
5 Sociopolitical Practice and Language. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
5.1 Government (Zheng). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
5.2 Benefit (Li) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
5.3 Law (Fa). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
5.4 The Ming-Shi Issue and Sociopolitical Practice. . . . . . . . . . . . 71
ix
x Contents
6 Linguistic Practice and Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
6.1 Pragmatic Orientation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
6.2 Semantic Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
6.3 The Paradigm of Ming-Shi. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
6.4 Chinese Language and Chinese Thinking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
7 Speech. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
7.1 Confucian Perspective on Yan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
7.2 Daoist Perspective on Yan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
7.3 Moist Perspective on Yan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
8 Argument. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
8.1 The Roots of Argument. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
8.2 Great Argument and Small Argument . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
8.3 Criteria of Argument. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
9 Dao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
9.1 Dao as Way. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
9.2 Dao as Pattern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
9.3 Dao as Saying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
9.4 Dao as Guiding Dialogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
10 Practical Zhi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
10.1 Action and Knowing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
10.2 Discourse and Reason. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
10.3 Dao: Chinese Wisdom and Worldview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Bibliography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Introduction
Sincelanguageisaprimarymediumofcommunicationandevenaformofhuman
life,itsrelationshiptorealityanditsroleintheformationofcultureandthinking-
modeisalwaysasignificantissueinterestingscholarsindifferentstudyareas.For
example, Piaget illuminates the connection between language and cognitive
development; Sapir explores how grammatical categories shape world views;
Geertz enquiries into the influence of symbolic forms on patterns of culture;
Foucaultrevealshowseriousspeechesgiverisetodisciplineandpower.Thisissue
has also drawn much attention from philosophers in the past 2,500 years.
Parmenides stresses the correspondence among Being, thought, and speech;
Heraclitus interprets reason, truth, and law in light of logos which implies
conversation; Plato thinks of names as the starting point of obtaining knowledge;
Aristotle treats language as the reflection of the structure of logic and existence.
Thelinguisticturnintwentieth-centuryWesternphilosophygoesmuchfurtherby
suggesting philosophical problems being first and foremost linguistic ones. It not
onlycausesrevolutionarychangesinphilosophy,butalsoinspiresreinterpretations
of traditional problems in other disciplines of humanities and social sciences.
To understand the vital impact of the linguistic turn on philosophy and its
influenceonanystudyareathatconcernslanguage,reality,thought,andbehavior,
onemaylookattheworksofNietzsche.ForNietzscheisprobablythefirstthinker
who systematically and thoroughly rejects the Platonic tradition by critically
reviewing the role language plays in basic metaphysical categories (including
universe, subject, object, reason, truth, meaning, logic, and knowledge). Among
hisoriginalandinsightfulpointsonlanguageandphilosophy,thefollowingisvery
thought-provoking: because of the guidance of similar grammatical functions,
Indian,Greek,andGermanphilosophizingexperiencesimilardevelopment.Thus,
“It is highly possible that philosophers within the domain of the Ural-Altaic
languages (where the concept of the subject is least developed) look otherwise
‘into the world,’ and will be found on paths different from those of the
xi
xii Introduction
Indo-Germanic peoples and the Muslims.”1 This point actually raises an issue in
comparative philosophy; moreover, it challenges us to think about such questions
as:Towhatextentorinwhatrespectsdodifferentlanguagesleadthephilosophical
discourseofvariouscountriestodifferentorientations?Canpeoplephilosophizing
indifferentlanguagesreachsimilarorevenuniversalunderstandingsoftheworld?
Is it the structure of language alone or the actual employment of language that
givesmeaningtorealityandmakesitpresenttomankind?Whatarethedifferences
(and similarities) among the ways different philosophical traditions handle the
relationship of language to realty? How do different interpretations of the
language-reality relationship shape different world views and cultural patterns?
This book aims not to give a detailed answer to every one of the above
questions;instead,itfocusesonChineseunderstandingandtreatmentoflanguage
andrealityandsetsforitselfthreetasks:(1)exploringhowChinesethinkersliving
in pre-Qin times (551–221 BCE2) analyze the two concepts: ming3 名 (language)
and shi 實 (reality) as well as their relationship in various settings; (2)
investigating relevant issues in ontology, epistemology, ethics, axiology, and
logicasaddressedanddevelopedinanancientChinesediscourseonlanguageand
reality;(3)discussinghowthisdiscourseshapesacentralcharacteristicofChinese
culture,which Icall “practicalzhi”實踐知智4(practicalknowledge,intelligence,
and wisdom) and distinguishes Chinese culture from Western culture in ancient
times.Furthermore,thisbookisinnaturenotacomparativestudyofChineseand
Western theories of language, although it would be very significant to involve an
equal analysis of Western discourse on words and objects and to reveal the
differences and similarities between the two discourses. Nevertheless, in some
casesitmentionsWesternphilosophers’ideas.Mygoalofdoingsoistwofold:on
the one hand, to display effectively the meaning and significance of certain
Chinese ideas by setting Western ideas as a reference; on the other hand, to help
the reader better comprehend Chinese ideas since he/she might be familiar with
Western theories of language.
By fulfilling the above tasks and goal, I hope, the book will shed light on the
abovequestionsonewayoranother.Specifically,itmakesfivemainpointsamong
1 Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, trans. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage
Books,1966),27–28.
2 In 551BCE Confucius was born and Lao Zi was about 20 years old. In 221 BCE, the Qin
dynasty,thefirstChineseEmpire,wasestablished.Wheneverreferringtothisperiodoftime,Iuse
“Chinainancienttime”or“pre-Qintimes.”
3 Throughoutthisbook,Chinesecharactersarepresentedinthepinyinsystem.Chinesepeople’s
namesarealsospelledintermsofthissystemexceptthosenamesthathavebeenknownpopularly
amongEnglishreaders.Bythesametoken,whenevercitingaChinesepassagedirectly,Iusethe
originalbooktitleplusitschaptertitle.Inaddition,unlessotherwiseindicated,Englishtranslations
ofpassagesquotedfromancientChinesetextsaremyown.ThereasonwhyIdonotuseexisting
English translations is simple: translation is interpretation, and my interpretations of the quoted
ChinesepassagesaresometimesdifferentfromthatofEnglishtranslators.
4 實踐知智 does not sound correct grammatically; but, I delivery use 知 to replace 之 to
emphasizethedifferenceandconnectionbetween知asknowledgeand智aswisdom.