荀子 禮論 硏究 : 天人觀에 비추어 본 禮의 敎育的 含意

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to elucidate the proper meaning of Xunzi's "rule by rite(禮治)." The reason why Xunzi's view on the rule by rite did not have great influence on people in northeastern Asia for many centuries is that they did not understand Xunzi's thought very well because of misleading about human's nature and Heaven. Most researchers clearly believe in that there are many inconsistencies and discrepancies among Xunzi's theories and the representative proposition "human nature is evil" is irrelevant to his original idea. Nevertheless they also believe that Xunzi is one of the prominent figures in confucian camp. Naturally a question arises as follows. : can we usually regard Xunzi as confucian in spite of many misunderstandings? Those who believe that the proposition is irrelevant to others insist that rather Xunzi explained human nature affirmatively in his theories and that the first editor, liu xiang(劉向), intentionally arranged 332 pieces of his monograph into 32 pieces. If it is true, it would be impossible for us to understand Xunzi because of a distorted system. Thus we focus on verifying Xunzi's theories and his feature as confucian by establishing Xunzi's idea rightly. First, the one thing that we must search to solve our doubts is the reason why Xunzi raised his unique viewpoint about Heaven. Since the Warring-states period, Heaven had been losing its dignity and status in the paradigm of those days. For example, Hanfeizi(韓非子) weakened the absoluteness of Heaven scientifically, while Daoists such as Laozi(老子) and Chuangzi(莊子) replaced it with Nature as not a abstractive but a physical object. Confucian school, in comparison with them, tried to defend its traditional viewpoint for Heaven and overcome many difficulties for doubts about it in those days. This is the quite same as human. In addition to his view on Heaven, The proposition "human nature is evil" is also a puzzling question to those who want to solve it. Especially, the term "evil"that Xunzi once brought up is difficult to explain it. In Today's studies, this means the concept relative to the good, or connected with society as the alternative to solve its difficulties. Nevertheless, most researchers can't make clear this term yet, and even some of them suggest that above proposition is irrelevant to Xunzi's ideas. Thus if we will assent to approach his idea through this way, we should commit an error to understand Xunzi's original purpose. The term "mind(心)" and "the posteriori criterion(僞)", the concept Xunzi raised, is philosophical requirements to overcome this difficulties. Above two terms are relative to education and politics. At first, with the respect of education, the "mind" is acquired by forming the posteriori criterion. A sage(聖人)is a man who can embody his acquired "mind" perfectly and put into practice by rite(禮). On the other hands, with the respect of politics, the required "mind"means that it can transform into good and be the quite same as the rite. Therefore it shows that education, in Xunzi's view, is inevitable to politics because of the same effect on society. In conclusion, Xunzi's "rule by rite" can elucidate in relation to Heaven and Human, and means that it expect the same effect on society being inevitable to gain "mind" and "posteriori criterion." Xunzi believes that "rule by rite" is superior to Legalism in the respect of the trust in "mind." Especially, Xunzi bring out that education and politics mean different respects of the same action each other because of focusing on "mind" according to Heaven and human. Above all,This shows that Xunzi becomes one of the most prominent philosophers in Ancient china, and that he contributed to develop confucian theories variously.