Tasan on Virtue: : Analysis through ‘Theory of Unaroused Mind’ and ‘Nature of Humans and Things’

Abstract

The project of defining the philosophy of Tasan Chŏng Yagyong (茶山 丁若鏞, 1762~1836) has consisted mainly of efforts to bring to light the individuality of his thought, through either comparison with other schools of philosophy such as Chosŏn Neo-Confucianism (朝鮮性理學) or Western Learning called Sŏhak (西學), or through analysis in conjunction with same. However, scholars have also raised the need for a comprehensive examination of the internal logic and structure of Tasan’s body of thought itself, Tasanism if you will (茶山思想), in order to establish its uniqueness. This study purposes to address the latter issue by contemplating how Tasan’s unique understanding of virtue (德) is developed with self-consistency within his theory of the nature and the mind-heart (心性論). Previous studies have significance in that they established the basic interpretations of Tasan’s concept of virtue, its relation to his theory of nature as preference (性嗜好說), and that the new interpretation of virtue has its philosophical aim in securing moral action. But there was little examination of how Tasan’s concept of virtue interrelates with not only his theory of nature as preference, but with other major discussions within his body of thought. Accordingly, this study aims to examine closely those themes within the theory of the nature of humans and things (人性物性論), and the theory of the unaroused (未發論), which relate to the concept of virtue. More specifically, this study will focus on the discussion of “differences between individuals (人人異)” from the theory of the nature of humans and things (人性物性論) and from the theory of the unaroused (未發論), on the discussion of understanding the “unaroused mind-heart (未發心),” and the resulting debate on whether the mind-heart of sages and ordinary persons are identical or otherwise (聖凡心同‧不同). Through this examination, this study aims to demonstrate how the aforementioned themes are developed in relation to Tasan’s concept of virtue, and how the philosophical aim of achieving moral action is realized in detail through the reinterpretation of virtue.