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Sixth Century BCE to Seventeenth Century

Page 65

by Ying-shih Yü


  the compartmentalizing rhe toric of his syncretic pre de ces sors” (120). However,

  the author obviously does not consider such diffi

  culties to be so insurmount-

  able as to prevent him from arguing for the “originality” and “systematicity” of

  Jiao Hong’s “Neo- Confucian synthesis.”

  It is true that the syncretist movement of Sanjiao heyi reached its peak during

  the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries at all levels of Chinese philosophi-

  cal and religious imagination.21 There is no evidence, however, that suggests a

  discernible trend from “compartmentalization” to “noncompartmentalization.”

  At the level of popu lar religion, millenarian sects continued to follow the age- old

  logic of compartmentalization. The Hongyang jiao

  , for example, re-

  garded Confucius, Buddha, and Laozi as the three sons of the Nonultimate

  Progenitor ( Wuji Laozu

  ) and the Eternal Mother ( Wusheng Laomu

  ), each having established a reputation in his own area. This is clearly

  a vulgarized version of the traditional idea of “Three Teachings— One Source”

  ( Sanjiao yiyuan

  ).22 In the case of Luo jiao

  , an early text entitled

  Wuwei zhengzong liaoyi baojuan

  distinguishes the Three

  Teachings from one another in two diff er ent compartmentalized ways. The fi rst

  one is to see each teaching being based on a princi ple uniquely its own. Thus,

  Confucianism is identifi ed with the princi ple of “uprightness” ( zheng

  ), Dao-

  ism with that of “honor” ( zun ), and Buddhism with that of “greatness” ( da ).

  Here it is clear that the text follows the distinction fi rst suggested by the Yuan

  syncretist Liu Mi.23 With regard to the second one, the text says: “Buddhism can

  be compared to the sun, Confucianism to the moon, and Daoism to the fi ve

  stars. Like the three lights in heaven, the world cannot aff ord to dispense with

  any [of the Three Teachings].”24 As anyone familiar with the history of Chinese

  syncretism knows, this is the famous compartmentalizing meta phor of Li Shiq-

  ian

  (523–588) with the positions of Confucianism versus Daoism in the

  original formulation reversed. Thus, we see that at the popu lar level, the princi-

  ple of compartmentalization continued to reign supreme in late Ming religious

  syncretism.

  Since the author deals with the prob lem of Sanjiao heyi primarily at the phil-

  osophical level, we must now turn to Neo- Confucianism in the late Ming to see

  330 t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed

  whether Jiao Hong’s syncretism was something signifi cantly new. To begin

  with, it may be noted that the author’s lack of interest in historical reconstruc-

  tion is nowhere more clearly shown than in his treatment of this prob lem. He

  has cited several pre- Ming religious syncretists, including the above- mentioned

  Li Shiqian and Liu Mi (5–14). His sole purpose, however, seems to be to estab-

  lish a case of “compartmentalization” as a sharp contrast to what he takes to be

  Jiao Hong’s new syncretic logic of “noncompartmentalization.” He has made

  no attempt to trace Jiao Hong’s syncretism to its Ming Neo- Confucian origins.

  Thus, Wang Yangming

  is lightly dismissed as still being on the oppo-

  site side of “the left- wing Neo- Confucians of the late Ming who tried, rather

  self- consciously, to unite The Three Teachings into one doctrine,” (17) and the

  tremendous impact of Wang Ji’s

  (1498–1583) philosophical views of Sanjiao

  heyi on the so- called “left- wing Neo- Confucians of the late Ming” is nowhere

  even mentioned. It is common knowledge that the prob lem of Sanjiao heyi in

  Ming Neo- Confucianism began with Wang Yangming and received its most

  systematic, elaborate treatment in the hands of Wang Ji. When left- wing Neo-

  Confucians of the Taizhou school such as Li Zhi and Jiao Hong argued for the

  oneness of the Three Teachings at the philosophical level, they all followed

  Wang Yangming and, particularly, Wang Ji, in one way or another.

  In 1524, when Wang Yangming was asked whether there was something to

  be learned from Daoism and Buddhism since each of the two teachings also

  enunciated the Dao in terms of xing

  (Nature) and ming

  (Destiny), he re-

  plied that both the Daoist and the Buddhist teachings in this par tic u lar re spect

  originally had been integral parts of the Confucian learning. It was due to the

  fact that latter- day Confucians had failed to see the sagely learning holistically

  that both teachings were misunderstood as diff er ent from Confucianism. At

  the same time, however, Wang Yangming also admitted that since the primor-

  dial unity had been lost, the Dao was split into three parts, very much like a

  great hall partitioned into three chambers. Latter- day Confucians, he observed,

  vacated the right and left chambers to accommodate the Daoists and the Bud-

  dhists, respectively, while being content with reserving the central chamber for

  themselves.25 Wang Yangming’s emphasis on the original oneness of the Three

  Teachings with regard to the ultimate real ity of the Dao was undoubtedly an

  impor tant source of inspiration for the left- wing Neo- Confucians’ advocacy of

  the idea of Sanjiao heyi. On the other hand, however, this new meta phor of the

  Three Chambers also exerted a lasting infl uence on the thinking of Neo-

  Confucian syncretists in the next one and a half centuries. In Lin Zhao- en’s

  temple, we even see the Three- Chamber meta phor translated into real ity.26

  Hence, compartmentalization and noncompartmentalization, if we are to use

  such terms at all, can only be understood as a pair of Siamese twins grown out

  of Ming Neo- Confucian syncretism from the very outset.

  The most impor tant single philosophical infl uence on Sanjiao heyi in the

  sixteenth century was, undoubtedly, Wang Ji, who developed his teacher’s idea

  t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed 331

  to its logical extremes. His famous essay written in commemoration of the

  founding of the Hall of Three Teachings begins by saying that Confucian learn-

  ing cannot be clearly distinguished from Daoism or from Buddhism because

  it also speaks of the Dao in terms of “vacuity” ( xu

  ) or “stillness” ( ji

  ) . The

  essay further questions the validity of the conventional view taking Daoism and

  Buddhism as “heresies” ( yiduan

  ) . As long as students of Daoism and Bud-

  dhism set the “restoration of nature” ( fuxing

  ) as their central purpose, it

  argues, they ought to be regarded as “Daoist- or Buddhist- oriented Confucians”

  ( Dao- Shi zhi Ru

  ) . According to Wang Ji, with liangzhi

  (original-

  good- knowing) as the “axis,” integration of the Three Teachings at the philo-

  sophical level is rather a matter of course.27 By grounding his syncretism

  squarely in the doctrine of liangzhi, Wang Ji actually introduced a new strategy

  into the late Ming Sanjiao heyi movement, which was to be known as the “Three

  Teachin
gs returning to Confucianism” ( Sanjiao gui Ru

  ). Lin Zhao-en

  and Li Zhi, for example, each used this strategy to promote a syncretism uniquely

  his own.28

  Wang Ji was more responsible than anyone else for the wide circulation of

  Wang Yangming’s three- chamber meta phor in late Ming syncretist circles. He

  made constant references to it in his writings, as well as public lectures. What

  is even more signifi cant is his translation of his teacher’s meta phorical lan-

  guage into a kind of pseudo- historical language. He argued that “vacuity,” “still-

  ness,” or “emptiness” constituted the “essence” of Confucian learning from the

  very beginning. It was unfortunate that in later ages, the Confucians ceded this

  “essence” to the Buddhists. In the time of Yao and Shun, when Buddhism no-

  where existed, there were sages such as Chao Fu

  and Xu You

  who

  held the type of otherworldly teaching comparable to Buddhism. Thus, in high

  antiquity, it was the likes of Chao Fu and Xu You who guarded the left and right

  chambers for sagely learning. He deplored very much that, as sagely learning

  declined over the centuries, the Confucians not only lost the two side chambers

  to Buddhism and Daoism but could not even hold their position fi rmly in the

  central chamber.29

  Wang Ji also developed a “stage- of- life” argument for Sanjiao heyi. The Three

  Teachings are all centrally concerned with the “Mind” ( xin ), but each looks

  at the same “mind” from a diff er ent stage of life. Buddhism refers to the “mind”

  at the very moment of conception, and therefore speaks of “knowing the Mind and

  seeing the Nature” ( mingxin jianxing

  ) . Daoism refers to the Mind of

  the child, and therefore speaks of “preserving the Mind and Nurturing the

  Nature” ( cunxin yangxing

  ) . As a disciple of Wang Yangming, however,

  he identifi ed the Mind with liangzhi, which, he argues, provides a focus of inte-

  gration for all of the three stages.30 This “stage- of- life” theory of Sanjiao heyi

  proved to be very infl uential. For example, Li Zhi’s view on the fundamental

  oneness of the Three Teachings is established entirely on the basis of the stage-

  of- life argument.31

  332 t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed

  Scholars today generally associate late Ming Sanjiao heyi at the philosophical

  level with the Taizhou school. As the author rightly points out, however, Wang

  Gen, the founder of the school, “was not an advocate” of this syncretism (79).32

  In this connection, we must examine briefl y Wang Ji’s relationship with some

  of the leading members of the Taizhou school. Wang Bi

  (1511–1187), Wang

  Gen’s second son and Li Zhi’s teacher, studied with Wang Ji for two de cades

  beginning when he was a child.33 According to Li Zhi, Wang Bi’s thought was

  shaped more by Wang Ji than by his father.34 Geng Dingxiang

  (1524–

  1596), Jiao Hong’s teacher, was also intellectually indebted to Wang Ji.35 For

  example, one of his basic views that liangzhi is always “pres ent” ( xianzai

  )

  and “already realized” ( xiancheng

  ) was obviously taken from Wang Ji.36

  Thus, in the debate between Wang Ji and the Jiangyou school concerning

  whether liangzhi is universally pres ent in all men, therefore requiring no special

  eff ort of “cultivation,” Geng Dingxiang clearly sided with the former.37

  There can be no question that the rise of Sanjiao heyi as a type of syncretism

  within the Taizhou school was due largely to the infl uence of Wang Ji. In sev-

  eral of his essays and letters, Li Zhi expressed his unbounded admiration for

  Wang Ji on the one hand, and was critical of Wang Gen and Luo Rufang

  (1515–1588) on the other.38 He was particularly overwhelmed by Wang Ji’s philo-

  sophical synthesis of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism and referred to

  him by the honorifi c title of “The Venerable Master of The Three Teachings”

  ( Sanjiao zongshi

  ).39 There is also evidence that Jiao Hong shared Li

  Zhi’s enthusiasm for Wang Ji. It was Jiao Hong who provided Li Zhi with the

  original edition of the Complete Works of Wang Ji.40 Gu Yanwu

  (1613–

  1682) is certainly well grounded when he identifi ed Li Zhi as a “second-

  generation disciple” of Wang Ji instead of Wang Gen.41

  Once it is established that Wang Ji was a major source for Sanjiao heyi at the

  philosophical level in the late Ming, we can readily see that there is nothing origi-

  nal in Jiao Hong’s syncretism. The author’s theory of an “altered structure of

  the syncretic logic” in Jiao Hong’s “noncompartmentalization” is nowhere sup-

  ported by evidence. When both Wang Yangming and Wang Ji spoke of the one-

  ness of the Three Teachings, they referred only to that part in each of the Three

  Teachings that deals with the Dao as ultimate real ity defi nable in terms of Nature,

  Mind, or Destiny. However, they continued to regard the Three Teachings in

  their totalities as diff er ent and, therefore, proposed that each be accommodated

  in a separate “chamber.”

  This was precisely the view followed by Jiao Hong. Thus, when he was asked

  to compare Confucianism and Buddhism, Jiao Hong said: “As far as the princi-

  ples of Mind and Nature enunciated in the Buddhist sutras are concerned, how

  can Confucius and Mencius add anything to them? Buddhism as a teaching

  ( jiao

  ), however, consists of customs of a foreign land which must not be

  practiced in China.” 42 Elsewhere, he also quoted with approval a con temporary

  statement that “the teachings [of Confucianism and Buddhism] are diff er ent,

  t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed 333

  but their princi ples are the same” ( jiaoyi er litong

  ) . By “princi ples,”

  he again referred to the “princi ples of Nature” ( xingli

  ).43

  The author ascribes the following view to Jiao Hong: “As the Way is always

  one, the Three Teachings must also be always one” (121). This is not only highly

  misleading but also directly contradicted by Jiao Hong’s own words, as quoted

  by the author two pages earlier: “The teachings of the sages are diff er ent, but

  they are one in regard to the cultivation of the Way for the purpose of restoring

  Nature. The sages in ancient times had diff er ent paths [which, however, all

  tended toward] the same ending” (119). Obviously, in adopting this “compart-

  mentalizing logic” of “diff er ent path same ending” here, Jiao Hong must have

  had the “three- chamber” meta phor in mind.

  To explain away the diffi

  culty of Jiao Hong’s continuing use of “the compart-

  mentalizing logic,” the author argues that Jiao Hong developed a new notion of

  “complementarity” of the Three Teachings that was no longer compartmental-

  izing as had been the case prior to Ming times. In his own words, “For [Jiao

  Hong], the Three Teachings were complementary not because they each expli-

  cated a part of the Way as the other two did not, but because they could be under-

 
; stood in terms of one another and were mutually explanatory and illuminating

  the Way as truth” (120). Unfortunately, the idea of “complementarity” so de-

  fi ned was, again, not original with Jiao Hong. When the lay Buddhist Zhang

  Shangying

  (1043–1121) of the Northern Song stated, “I began to under-

  stand Confucianism only after I had studied Buddhism,” 44 what he meant to say

  is exactly that the two teachings “could be understood in terms of each other and

  were mutually explanatory and illuminating.” As a matter of fact, Jiao Hong

  twice quoted Zhang Shangying’s statement to support this syncretism.45 In the

  late Ming, it was Wang Ji who advocated most vigorously this notion of comple-

  mentarity. He emphatically pointed out, “the truths of the other two teachings

  can be fully confi rmed only if Confucianism is clearly understood.” 46 This is

  obviously the other side of the same coin.

  By the twelfth century at the latest, the idea that the Three Teachings, though

  articulated diff erently, nevertheless shared the same Way as a whole, already

  enjoyed considerable popularity among syncretists. According to one Buddhist

  source, Emperor Xiaozong of the Southern Song had a discussion with the

  Chan Master Baoyin

  on the prob lem of the Three Teachings in 1180.

  The Chan Master emphasized the point that Confucius’s Lunyu (Analects) must

  be read, essentially, in the light of Chan Buddhist ideas. The emperor, on the

  other hand, reportedly replied, “This has been my understanding all along.” 47

  Whether this conversation actually took place is beside the point. It is neverthe-

  less true that some Song scholars did begin to understand passages in the Ana-

  lects in Chan Buddhist terms. According to one source, the poet Huang Tingjian

  (1045–1105) failed to grasp the meaning of the sentence “ There is noth-

  ing that I hide from you” ( Analects, 7.24) until he was enlightened by the famous

  monk Huitang

  (1025–1100) in a typical Chan Buddhist way.48 In his Hu-fa

  334 t h e in t e l le c t ua l wor l d of j i ao hong r e v isi t ed

  lun

  (Discourse on protecting the Dharma), Zhang Shangying also inter-

  preted “hearing the way in the morning” ( Analects, 4.8) as “the way of Bodhi.” 49

  It is little won der, then, that Zhu Xi

 

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