조선시대의 순자 이해와 수용

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the way the Xunzi (荀子) was read and understood in pre-modern Korea, focusing on the Chosŏn period (1392-1910). The Chosŏn Dynasty was characterized by the dominance of Sŏngnihak (性理學). By following the doctrine of the daotong (道統, the true lineage of the Way), Chosŏn thinkers advocated Mencius’ view, xingshan (性善, that human nature is good), while regarding Xunzi’s opposed view, xing’e (性惡, that human nature is bad), as heretical. This was one of the factors that made open discussion of the Xunzi in that period difficult. Moreover, not a single commentary on the Xunzi was produced throughout the Chosŏn era. Those two facts may easily lead one to believe that the study of the Xunzi was absent from the Chosŏn period. In fact, various records in literary collections and even in the authentic history of the Chosŏn period show familiarity with the Xunzi. Not only do the dates of those records span the whole Chosŏn period, but their contents are also diverse. Although it is a “fact” that Xunzi was dismissed as a “heretical” thinker in the early Chosŏn period, it is also worth noting that aspects of Xunzi’s philosophy were actively adopted by reformist thinkers of the later Chosŏn period, who were advocators of “silrak” (實學). This paper takes up the main issues in these discussions and explores the way Chosŏn scholars read the Xunzi, and which parts they evaluated positively or negatively.