도가사상에서 구속적 정서의 해체 이론

Abstract

Daoist thought is philosophically founded on relativism, which tries to find the protoworld of the non-action state (wuweiziran 無爲自然) by deconstructing absolutism, like Confucian essential morality. Daoist relativism seems to be equivalent to doing nothing but going on dreaming when it disregards the axiological differences between this and that and between death and life. Daoism, however, positively criticizes the oppressive or restrictive biases of life and society, although it cannot arrive at a social uprising or a civil revolution. In this connection, the Daoist deconstruction theory can be understood as the criticism or deconstruction of the established restrictive sentiments. The Daoist deconstruction theory can be thought of as ambivalent. It can extend our level of cognition when we criticize restrictive metacognition, but it can also make us abandon our purposes unless it works on the level of one’s sentiments. We should discern the sentimental level of deconstruction from the cognitive level of deconstruction, although the two are linked to each other. The sentimental level works in our feelings, expressions, and behaviors while the cognitive level works in our cognitive understandings. While the deconstruction of the cognitive level introduces some new words and understandings, the deconstruction of the sentimental level actually transforms our way of life into a new one. Not so that the Daoist deconstruction would end in a kind of escapism, it should reach the deconstruction on the sentimental level, as if Mengzifan and Master Qinzhang actually deconstruct the Confucian moral behaviors and sentiments as well as logically criticize the Confucian metacognition of funeral rites. The Daoist deconstruction theory can introduce the protoworld and the protoself to us if it works on both levels simultaneously.