Reading the Historical Draft of Scholar-officials' Political Achievements
Since social differentiation is a universal historical process, it certainly triggered corresponding consciousness in ancient China. It is not that the ancients could not see the differentiation and standardization of human activities and the differentiation of roles, but they had their own unique expressions and attitudes here and formulated unique principles to deal with the relationship between them.
The principle of the ancients in dealing with the phenomenon of differentiation can be summarized as "harmony" or "harmony without difference". On the metaphysical level, it means acknowledging the differentiation of things and taking it as the basis; But it is more important not to stop there, but to seek something that runs through it and establish a harmonious, balanced, interpenetrating and complementary relationship between differentiated heterogeneous elements.
Harmony means harmony and harmony. On the metaphysical level, we can see that the ancients paid special attention to the differences between heaven and earth in five elements, five tones, five colors, five flavors and even thousands of products, ten thousand squares, hundreds of millions of events and signs, and expounded the relationship between them as different and mutually beneficial in its unique way. "Make others equal to the sum" is a very profound and exquisite concept.
It not only recognizes that differentiation is necessary and necessary, but also seeks something enough to control it. Recognize the differentiation of things and strive for the connection between things. Isn't this "harmony but difference"?
When "people don't do one thing" and all kinds of specialized roles have been divided, the ancients thought that there were higher-level leading roles.
Legalists have the ideas of "separation" and "combination", but they are different from Confucianism and Taoism. Legalists focus on the secular world, seek change, and emphasize "striving for strength today" and "respecting officials in the future". On the basis of political unity and respect, they deliberately promoted the division of the political system in order to establish a pure political "rule of law" order.
"Jun" is the most expensive for political unification, "Father" is the most expensive for pro-unification, and "Teacher" is the most expensive for orthodoxy.
As mentioned above, when the ancients put this idea into practice at the level of social role, they put the person who "argued a word, kept a word and attacked one thing" in a secondary position, and then praised the personality of "not being an official, but bypassing". The "gentleman" who pursues propriety and righteousness is precisely considered to have this nature. "The Analects of Confucius is Politics": A gentleman is not a tool.
Conceptually, "harmony" comes from the subtle relationship between heaven and earth, including five elements, five colors, five tones and five flavors. At the same time, people also use this relationship to explain "ceremony".
The spirit of people or "courtesy" is to distinguish between the noble and the humble, which is only the tip of the iceberg. "Li" can be further divided into two aspects: Li and Le, and advocates "don't" and "harmony".
The realm of "Xuan Tong" advocated by Taoism has no distinction between nobility and inferiority. These things are the products of the ritual law born in the "declining world". Legalists' "rule of law" only emphasizes "respect", "respect for monarch" and "respect for officials", which is only the tip of the "courtesy". The general term for "Li" from the two aspects of "Li" and "Le" includes "Le" and "He". It is precisely because of this aspect of "harmony" that "ceremony" and "law" are very different, and they are very different.
"Harmony without difference" has crystallized into an exquisite metaphysical concept, but it is also embodied in a very specific system design in a deep sense.
The late rise of "legal system" and the dominance of "rule by courtesy" really correspond to the low degree of social differentiation in some aspects; In some modern social science writers, "social differentiation" has a strong meaning of "evolution". Then, in the logical conclusion, it may be concluded that "rule by courtesy" is the product of underdeveloped political culture.
The ancient Chinese nation did not lack cultural creativity or political wisdom. In ancient China, social differentiation was slow, and a large number of primitive things were mixed with differentiated things. However, due to this creativity and wisdom, they have been sublimated, and a unique political and cultural form-"rule by courtesy" has been born, which has also developed quite richly and exquisitely. It has left behind a political and cultural order with a degree of differentiation between vulgarity and law, a social integration model of political unity, pro-unity and orthodoxy to achieve mutual economic development in a harmonious but different way, a dual social structure concept in which the relationship between the ruler and the ruled is characterized by the relationship between "gentleman" and "villain", and a "four lives" born of "ceremony". As a "cultural gene", this tradition will have a great influence on the later historical process, which is inevitable and inevitable.
When people's understanding reaches the metaphysical level, they begin to discuss the authenticity of understanding, the good and evil of morality, the beauty and ugliness of appreciation, and develop a systematic theoretical understanding of people, society, nature and the universe, the "teacher's way" will undergo qualitative change; Cultural activities will also be divided into a special field.
At the same time, another important differentiation process is advancing with each passing day, that is, leaving the official road. Just as the development of culture mastered by feudal scholar-officials produced independent Confucian scholars, the complexity and specialization of political affairs mastered by feudal scholar-officials also contributed to the emergence of bureaucracy. As a result, the group of "officials" as new bureaucrats is also expanding day by day.
Qin Shihuang ruled the four seas in the palm of his hand, but his feet were not sealed, and his descendants were Shu Ren. To achieve the rational administrative goal of wealthy Qiang Bing, we must resist the interference of laws in other fields, but replace the patriarchal identity system with bureaucratic merit system and exclude kinship from the administrative field. As a result, the strict patriarchal clan system (feudalism) gradually gave way to the family system. Clans value sons and families value fathers and sons; Still the same father and brother, and one is the patriarch and the other is the parent. There are similarities and differences between the two, and the political color of the latter has been greatly weakened. It is the official road and the father road that tend to separate.
We can see that since the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, there has indeed been a situation of "ritual collapse and bad music", but people still often explain social politics from the basic perspective of "three unifications". From this point of view, the "ritual collapse and bad music" can be explained as the greater division between political unity, pro-unity and orthodoxy caused by social division, which makes the old form of "ritual system" no longer able to maintain the old society.
Other social fields, such as economic differentiation, are not so evaluated in political and cultural concepts. During the Warring States period, economic development, especially industrial and commercial development, reached a considerable level, and the exchange relationship of market nature was quite active.
The political system differentiation in this period in ancient China took the form of "separation of officials and Taoism". That is to say, among the administrative, judicial and legislative departments, only the administrative department has been fully developed, and the judiciary and legislation are the appendages of authoritarian bureaucratic administration. There is a tradition of judicial independence and developed private law in western history. In modern Britain, law was dominated by relatively independent professional groups, such as "Inns of Courts", which was of course too far away from ancient society. However, in ancient Greek jury courts and legal courts, its 6,000 jurors were drawn by citizens and had considerable autonomy.
The germination of independent legal profession, which was born in the positive social changes in the Warring States period, was finally submerged by autocratic bureaucrats and existed only in the form of civil litigation lawyers in later generations. Zhang Taiyan said, "Listen to things and be an official."
In ancient China, the collective deliberation of primitive clans only stayed in the form of people's time or taking court vows in the Spring and Autumn Period, but disappeared below the Warring States Period. The political struggle channel of the empire is roughly composed of high-level bureaucratic organizations and court circles. There is not much difference between the form of legislation and the form of administrative orders. In principle, "monarch" and "official" have the right to decide all state affairs and social affairs.
In ancient China, "learning from teachers" originated from the educational responsibility of monarchs and government-run teachers and the educational relationship between musicians and bachelors. This tradition has profoundly influenced the emergence of bachelor groups since the Warring States Period. Hundreds of bachelors have their own ways, but as far as the overall pattern of their activities is concerned, there is still a hidden or obvious traditional orientation of "learning from teachers".
The intellectuals in ancient China were in charge of Caesar's affairs from the beginning; The so-called "taking the world as our responsibility", "the rise and fall of the world, every man is responsible" and so on all come from this. "Intellectuals not only represent Tao, but also believe that Tao is more respected than potential. Therefore, it has become the responsibility of China intellectuals to criticize politics and society based on "Tao".
The formation and separation of the bachelor group and the literati group also marks the further separation of the kinship organization of "teacher's morality" and "official morality" and the feudal patriarchal clan system.
In the interpretation of political culture, not all social relations that have been quite divided have been evaluated equally. For example, independent property relations can not achieve the same status as "respecting the virtuous" in the leading interpretation of political elites and cultural elites. As a political and cultural tradition that has been formed for a long time and occupies a dominant position, "rule by courtesy" has shown its profound traditional influence while disintegrating. As will be seen later, this will continue to affect the division and change of two groups, namely, bachelor and literati.