The idea of human dignity in classical Chinese philosophy: A reconstruction of confucianism

Journal of Chinese Philosophy

Volumn 27, Issue 3, 2000, Pages 299-330

  Zhang, Qianfan ^a  

^a NANJING UNIVERSITY   (China)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 33845404293     PISSN: 03018121     EISSN: 15406253     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/0301-8121.00019     Document Type: Article

References (114)

1. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, preamble
2. Grundgesetz, Art. I
3. "Everyone who works has the right to just and favorable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection" (Art. 23, sec. 3)
4. Similar statements are also contained in the preamble of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1966. See the collection of documents in Basic Documents on Human Rights, 2nd ed., edited by Ian Brownlie (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1981). On all occasions the phrase "human dignity" is left undefined
5. See, e.g., Alan Gewirth, "Human Dignity as the Basis of Rights," in The Constitution of Rights: Human Dignity and American Values, edited by Michael J. Meyer and William A. Parent (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992), pp. 10-28
6. J. William Brennan, "The Constitution of the United States: Contemporary Ratification," University of California at Davis Law Review, 19 (1985): 8
7. see also Jordan Paust, "Human Dignity as Constitutional Right: A Jurisprudentially Based Inquiry into Criteria and Content," Howard Law Journal 27 (1984): 150-158
8. See contributions in Confucianism and Human Rights, edited by William Theodore de Bary and Tu Weiming (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998)
9. Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978), p. 198
10. Peter L. Berger, Brigitte Berger, and Hansfriend Kellner, The Homeless Mind: Modernization and Consciousness (New York: Random House, 1973), p. 89, hereafter cited as Homeless Mind
11. Gewirth, "Human Dignity," p. 12
12. A. I. Melden, "Dignity, Worth, and Rights," in The Constitution of Rights: Human Dignity and American Values, pp. 29-46
13. See, respectively, Joel Feinberg, "The Nature and Value of Rights," Journal of Value Inquiry 4 (1970): 257
14. and Michael J. Meyer, "Dignity, Rights, and Self-control," Ethics 99 (1989): 527
15. Meyer and Parent, The Constitution of Rights, pp. 47-72
16. Charles Murray, In Pursuit of Happiness and Good Government (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988), pp. 112-129
17. Louis Henkin, "Human Dignity and Constitutional Rights," in Constitution of Rights, p. 210
18. Myres S. McDougal's notion in W. Michael Reisman and Burns H. Weston, Toward World Order and Human Dignity (New York: Free Press, 1976), pp. 48-51
19. Heidegger's reply to Sartre; see H. Spiegelberg, "Human Dignity: A Challenge to Contemporary Philosophy," in Human Dignity: This Century and the Next, edited by Rubin Gotesky and Ervin Laszlo (New York: Gordon & Breach Science Publishers, 1970), p. 53
20. See, respectively, Jurgen Moltmann, On Human Dignity: Political Theology and Ethics (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), p. x
21. hereafter cited as Political Theology, and Brad Stetson, Human Dignity and Contemporary Liberalism (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1998), pp. 15-17
22. Tu Weiming, "Epilogue: Human Rights as a Confucian Moral Discourse," in Confucianism and Human Rights, p. 302
23. In the same collection of works, see also Irene Bloom, "Fundamental Intuition and Consensus Statement: Mencian Confucianism and Human Dignity," p. 96
24. and compare with Cheng Chung-ying, "Transforming Confucian Virtues into Human Rights: A Study of Human Agency and Potency," p. 146
25. See, e.g., Li Chenyang, "Confucian Value and Democratic Value," Journal of Value Inquiry 31 (1997): 183-192
26. For how the center of natural law doctrine in the West shifted from duty to rights around the resurgence of natural law theories in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, see John Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1980), pp. 205-210
27. For example, Herschel Baker's The Dignity of Man: Studies of the Persistence of an Idea (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1947), bears "dignity" in the title, but refers to it only sparingly in the entire book; the same is true with Ernest Bloch's Natural Law and Human Dignity, trans. Dennis J. Schmidt (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1986), which does not even have the word in the index
28. The French book by Thomas de Koninck, De la dignité humaine (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1995), has a general title, but is in fact limited only to the treatment of children
29. (see Hugo Meynell's book review, "Politics of Human Dignity," in The Literary Review of Canada [February 1996]: 6-7)
30. Spiegelberg, "Human Dignity: A Challenge to Contemporary Philosophy," pp. 39-62
31. For a more detailed review, see J. Prescott Johnson, "Human Dignity and Nature of Society," in Human Dignity This Century and the Next, pp. 317-349
32. See Baker, The Dignity of Man: Studies of the Persistence of An Idea, pp. 100-105
33. Vernon J. Bourke, The Essential Augustine, 2nd ed. (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1974), pp. 19-32
34. St. Augustine, City of God, trans. Henry Bettenson (London: Penguin Books, 1984), pp. 190-196
35. Johnson, "Human Dignity and Nature of Society," pp. 330-338
36. Discourse of Methods, Book IV
37. Augustine, City of God, pp. 458-463
38. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Oration on the Dignity of Man, trans. A. Robert Caponigri (Washington, DC: Regnery Gateway, 1956)
39. See Yu Ying-Shih, Zhongguo sixiang chuantong de xiandai quanshi (The modern interpretation of traditional Chinese thought) (Nanjing: Jiangsu Renmin Chubanshe, 1989), pp. 24-48, hereafter cited as Modern Interpretation
40. For an argument that human dignity is saved by redemption through Jesus Christ, see John Warwick Montgomery, Human Rights and Human Dignity (Dallas, TX: Zondervan, 1986), p. 208
41. Immanuel Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, 3rd. ed., trans. J. W. Ellington (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Co., 1993), sec. 411
42. See also Thomas E. Hill, Dignity and Practical Reason in Kant's Moral Theory (Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press, 1992), pp. 76-96
43. and Leslie Arthur Mulholland, Kant's System of Rights (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), pp. 102-139
44. Kant, Grounding for Metaphysics, sec. 421-423, 452-453. As Kant himself acknowledges, he is indebted to Rousseau on at least two key points: that everyone, however low in social rank, has intrinsic worth and that freedom means self-legislation (which is, for Rousseau, to make the general will one's own will)
45. See H. J. Paton, The Categorical Imperative: A Study in Kant's Moral Philosophy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948), pp. 185-198
46. For Kant's connection between human dignity and treating man as the end, see Yang Zuhan, Ruxue yu Kangde daode zhexue (Confucianism and Kantian moral philosophy) (Taipei: Wenjing, 1987), pp. 40-41
47. This notion of human beings is widely accepted among Continental philosophers after Kant. Hegel states, for example, that "Man is only an end in himself (or final end) through what is divine in him - by what has from the beginning been called reason and . .. freedom." (The Philosophy of Hegel, edited by Carl J. Friedrich [New York: Random House, 1954], p. 19)
48. See, e.g., Constitution of Rights, p. 53
49. See Donald P. Kommers, The Constitutional Jurisprudence of the Federal Republic of Germany (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1989), pp. 308-309
50. Sartre never devoted systematic attention to the question of human dignity. His relevant concern is mostly reflected in his Existentialism and Humanism, on which my discussion here is focused. For a book by an existentialist author bearing the title of human dignity, see Gabriel Marcel, The Existential Background of Human Dignity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963), pp. 128-135, 158. The discussion on human dignity there is only sporadic, however, and does little to clarify the meaning of the concept
51. Jean-Paul Sartre, "Existentialism and Humanism," in Existentialism: From Dostoevsky to Sartre, edited by Walter Kaufman (Cleveland/New York: World Publishing Co., 1956), pp. 291, 306
52. For a thorough discussion on the existentialist view of human existence and freedom, which leads to a peculiar notion of responsibility, see Sartre's Being and Nothingness: A Phenomenological Essay on Ontology, trans. Hazel E. Barnes (New York: Washington Square Press, 1956), pp. 76, 565, 598, 603, 797
53. Spiegelberg, "Human Dignity: A Challenge," pp. 51-53
54. For a critique of Heidegger and Sartre in comparison with Confucianism, see Yu Ying-shih, Modern Interpretation, pp. 24-48
55. for a comparison between Western and Chinese philosophy on moral personality, see Xu Fuguan, Rujia jingshen zhi jiben xingge ji qi xianding yu xin sheng (The basic characters of the Confucian spirit, its limitations and rebirth) (Hong Kong: Minzhu pinlunshe, 1951), pp. 1-10
56. Moltmann, Political Theology, pp. 15-31
57. Montgomery, Human Rights and Human Dignity, pp. 208-217
58. compare with Melden, "Dignity, Worth, and Rights," p. 31
59. Montgomery, Human Rights and Human Dignity, p. 192
60. See Zhu Yilu, Rujia lixiang renge yu Zhongguo wenhua (Confucian ideal personality and Chinese culture) (Shenyang: Liaoning Education Press, 1991), pp. 1-18
61. The earliest source I can find that explicitly attempts to connect the Western concept of human dignity with Chinese renge is Zhang Dongsun, Lixing yu minzhu (Rationality and democracy) (Hong Kong: Longmen shudian, 1946), pp. 47-82
62. See Zhang Dainian, "Zhongguo gudian zhexue zhong de renge zunyan sixiang" (The concept of human dignity in the classical Chinese philosophy), Guoji ruxue yanjiu 2 (1997): 18
63. R. M. Hare, Freedom and Reason (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), pp. 10-27
64. and Stetson, Human Dignity and Contemporary Liberalism, pp. 15-17
65. For confining the notion of virtues to socially beneficial human abilities and propensities, see Cheng, "Transforming Confucian Virtues," pp. 145-146
66. Analects, 7:22
67. see Wing-tsit Chan, A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 32
68. Mencius 6A:6
69. Liang Qichao, Xian Qin zhengzhi sixiang shi (History of political thought in the pre-qin period) (Taipei: Zhonghua shuju, 1972), p. 381
70. As to the Confucian distinction between xiaoren and junzi, see Yu Ying-shih, Modern Interpretation, pp. 160-177
71. Principle of the Mean, sec. 3
72. also see sec. 4, 5, 9
73. In addition, "a gentleman follows the path of Mean, and feels no regret even though his virtue is unknown and neglected by the world." (Principle of the Mean, sec. 11, trans. James Legge, The Four Books [Hong Kong: Wei Tung Book Co., 1971], p. 7)
74. Analects 9:29
75. see Legge, The Four Books, p. 126
76. Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue, 2nd ed. (Notre Dame, IN: University of Nortre Dame Press, 1984), pp. 222-223
77. Thus, "a gentleman seeks the Way rather than material support. .. What worries him is not poverty, but that he fails to attain the Way" (Analects 15:32)
78. Mencius 7A:9
79. Shen du. See Great Learning, sec. 6
80. Mencius 2A:2
81. Mencius 3B:2
82. J. L. Mackie, Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong (London: Penguin Books, 1977), pp. 15-49, hereafter cited as Right and Wrong
83. Xunzi, "Kingly Government," chapter 9
84. see Homer H. Dubs, The Works of Hsuntze (Taipei: Cheng-wen Publishing Co., 1966), p. 136
85. That is, the lack of belief in the original human sin and its resulting guilt. See Max Weber, The Religion of China, trans. Hans H. Gerth (New York: Free Press, 1951), p. 235
86. See Bloom, "Fundamental Intuition," pp. 104-108
87. Donald J. Munro, The Concept of Man in Early China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1969), pp. 49-83, hereafter cited as Concept of Man
88. See Mencius 1A:4
89. Analects 10:17. I owe this example to Professor Ni Peimin in response to a question raised by Professor Li Chenyang at the panel discussion at the Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy
90. See Berger, Berger, and Kellner, The Homeless Mind, pp. 89-95, for an argument of similar conceptual understanding in the West and for an illuminating discussion of how the process of modernity and the disintegration of traditional social institutions led to the transition from the particularistic concept of "honor" to the universalistic concept of "human dignity."
91. Analects 12:2
92. For a general argument that "good" is an indefinable, non-natural quality, see G. E. Moore, Principia Ethica (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1902 [1988]), pp. 2-21
93. and further discussion in Mackie, Right and Wrong, pp. 50-63
94. "A gentleman is friendly, but do not follow blindly" (Principle of the Mean, sec. 10
95. Analects 20:2
96. "A gentleman can stay with his poverty; but a poor littleman will do anything [to improve his lot]" (Analects 15:2)
97. For a Greek but similar description of the "great man," see Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics, trans. David Ross (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1980), pp. 89-95
98. See Max Weber, The Religion of China, pp. 228-229, for the contrast between "shame culture" and "guilt culture" in the West, which presupposes the original sin in human nature
99. Analects 13:20
100. Mencius 4B:8
101. Analects 14:27
102. See Mencius 5B:4
103. Analects 11:24
104. See Leo Strauss, Natural Right and History (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1953), pp. 80-85
105. The "difficulties" here are substantive ones. Logical difficulties, such as the "naturalistic fallacy" that Moore identifies in naturalist thought (Principia Ethica, pp. 37-58), seem to be rather minor. If Hobbes can establish that self-preservation is universally desired by every rational animal, then the opposition against defining such desire as a "good" (i.e., the natural right) carries little force. The transition from "is" to "ought" does have the logical problem of violating "Hume's Law." Yet the problem is not so serious if one omits the prescriptive element inherent in the "ought," so that ethics can be identified with factual inquiry
106. For example, the Christian God in Locke's Two Treatises of Government
107. Munroe, Concept of Man, pp. 49-83
108. On defending Confucianism against morally nihilistic freedom without basic values and norms, see Xu Fuguan, Rujia zhengzhi sixiang yu minzhu ziyou renquan (Confucian political thought and democracy, liberty and human rights) (Taipei: Bashi Niandai Press, 1979), pp. 284-293, hereafter cited as Confucian Political Thought
109. See my arguments in "Prescriptions of Dignity: Individual Cultivation and Universal Respect."
110. See Fung Yu-lan, A Short History of Chinese Philosophy, edited by Derk Bodde (New York: The Free Press, 1948), p. 8
111. For an argument for the possible compatibility of Confucianism with the notion of human rights, see Xia Yong, Renquan gainian qiyuan (The origins of the human rights concept) (Beijing: Zhongguo zhengfa daxue chubanshe, 1992), pp. 177-192
112. For the neo-Confucian effort to derive a compatible political mechanism from Confucian ethics, see Xu Fuguan, Confucian Political Thought, chapter 4
113. For a critique on the alleged failure of this effort, see Jiang Qing, Cong xinxing ruxue zou xiang zhengzhi ruxue (From heart-nature Confucianism to political Confucianism), in Dangdai xinruxue junwengi (Collection of papers on contemporary neo-Confucianism), edited by Liu Shuxian et al. (Taipei: Wenjing Press, 1991), pp. 153-178
114. Matthew 22:39