Wang Chong’s philosophical thoughts can be summarized as follows:
1. Nature is naturally inactive
Wang Chong believes that heaven and earth are natural substances without will. Entity, the movement and change of all things in the universe and the generation of things are the results of natural inaction. He believes that all things are generated due to the natural movement of material "qi". "The heaven and earth combine Qi, and all things are self-generated." The competition among living things is due to the strength of various living creatures' muscles, the quality of their momentum, and the skill of their movements. But it is different. It is not an intentional arrangement by God. God is not a personal god with a will that can bring disaster and blessing.
2. Heaven cannot give birth to humans
Wang Chong believes that heaven is nature, and humans are also products of nature. "Humans are things; things are also things." In this way, The connection between heaven and man. He carried forward Xunzi's materialist thought of "clearly distinguishing between heaven and man". He said: "Man cannot touch heaven with his actions, and heaven cannot respond to man's actions." He believed that social politics and morality have nothing to do with disasters and anomalies in nature. The so-called The saying of "response between heaven and man" is just the result of people comparing their own ideas to heaven.
3. When gods are destroyed, there are no ghosts.
Wang Chong believes that people are born and die. He can live because he has essence and blood, and "when a person dies and his blood is exhausted, the essence is extinguished, and the body decays when it dies, and it becomes ashes when it decays, so what is the use of being a ghost?" He believes that death is like the extinction of fire, why is it still alive when fire is extinguished? Can there be light? He gave a materialistic explanation of human spiritual phenomena, thereby denying the existence of ghosts and breaking the superstition of "retribution for good and evil"
4. The present is better than the past
Wang Chong opposed the idea of ??"respecting the ancients" and believed that modern people are "similar" to the ancients. Modern people have the same temperament as ancient people, and they are the same as ancient and modern people. There is no basis to say that ancient people are always better than modern people, and there is no reason to praise the ancients. Today. He believes that the Han Dynasty is more advanced than the past, and the Han Dynasty is "above a hundred generations", because the Han Dynasty is after a "hundred generations". This view is completely opposite to the idea that "the heaven does not change and the way does not change"
Historical significance:
Wang Chong takes the natural inaction of Taoism as the purpose of his argument, and takes "Heaven" as the highest category of the Taoism of Heaven, taking "Qi" as the core category, consisting of natural Qi, essence, and harmony. Qi transformation constitutes a huge cosmic generation model, which is in opposition to the theory of the induction of heaven and man. He demonstrates the characteristics of Taoism in advocating natural life and death, advocating thin burial, and rebelling against deified Confucianism. He makes up for it by verifying his statements with facts. The shortcomings of Taoism's empty talk. He is an important inheritor and developer of Taoist thought in the Han Dynasty.
Although Wang Chong's thought belongs to Taoism, it is strictly different from the pre-Qin Lao and Zhuang thought. However, its advocates are different from the "Huang Lao School" promoted by the early Han Dynasty and the popular Taoism in the late Western Han Dynasty. "Lunheng" is Wang Chong's representative work and an immortal atheistic work in Chinese history. p>
Character introduction:
Wang Chong (27-about 97), named Ren Ren, was from Shangyu in Kuaiji. His ancestors migrated from Yuancheng, Wei County to Yuancheng. Wang Chong became an orphan when he was young. People in the village praised him for his filial piety. Later, he went to the capital to study at Taixue (the highest institution of higher learning in the central government) and became a disciple of Ban Biao, a native of Fufeng. He visited the bookstore in Luoyang market and read the books sold there. He could recite the words while reading them, so he became proficient in the dialects of hundreds of schools of thought. Later, he returned to his hometown and lived at home to teach. Kuaiji County recruited him as a meritorious official. , he resigned because of many disagreements with his superiors.