Tongbian: A Chinese strand of thought

Journal of Chinese Philosophy

Volumn 27, Issue 4, 2000, Pages 441-468

  Tian, Chenshan ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 60949692309     PISSN: 03018121     EISSN: 15406253     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/0301-8121.00026     Document Type: Article

References (62)

1. David L. Hall and Roger T. Ames, Anticipating China: Thinking Through the Narratives of Chinese and Western Culture (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995), pp. 124-125
2. Tong has che and da as analogical relations and events. See Qingyan Sha, comp., Shuo wen Dictionary (Shuo Wen Da Zidian), vol. 7 (Tianjin: Classics Bookstore [Guji Shudian], 1982) p. 64
3. See also Axel Schessler, A Dictionary of Early Zhou Chinese (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1987), p. 107, s.v. da
4. Bian is explained in terms of yi, hua, and geng. Yi was originally a pictographic character of a home-guarding lizard, meaning "to trade or exchange," or "to avoid by retreating." It was an antonym to "difficult," but could also be a reference to hu, which was further referred to as shu and shu hu, hurry and quick. Hua is jiao xing (jiao), meaning to teach from above and to learn from below, and (xing) - "one makes his steps." Geng is referred to by gai, to correct something overdone. See Shuo wen, vol. 7, p. 31; vol. 4, p. 13, and vol. 2, p. 44
5. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 11
6. For this article, I have used very few existing English translations of Chinese philosophical works; and they have been used only as a reference. Almost all of the English translations I use in this article are my own, based on references to other translations. I have been rather cautious about using existing translations because of problems regarding cultural translation; many translations have been unreliable because of this problem. In his "Kosmos in the Acosmotic Han Dynasty," Ames makes strong points regarding the deep structural differences that can hinder accurate intercultural translation. He points out that our current dictionaries are disastrous. In the Chinese world view, the act of translation is not complete until readers themselves have read the text. See Roger T. Ames, "Mengzi Zhexue yu Zhixu de Weijuexing" (Kosmos in the acosmotic Han dynasty), in Meng Zi Sixiang de Zhexue Tantao, edited by Li Minghui (Taibei: Zhongyang Yanjiuyuan Zhongguo Wenzhe Yanjiusuo Choubei chu, 1995), pp. 39, 42
7. See Yijing, Xici I, chapters 5 and 12
8. See Z. D. Sung, introduction to Zhong Ying Duizhao Yi Jing (The Text of Yi King: Chinese original, with English translation) (New York: Paragon Book Reprint Corp., 1969), pp. x-xi
9. See also Shouqi Huang and Shanwen Zhang, Zhouyl yizhu (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1989), pp. 5-14
10. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 8
11. Yijing, Xugua zhuan II
12. Ames, "Mengzi Zhexue yu Zhixu de Weijuexing," pp. 12-13
13. Laozi, Daode jing, chapter 42
14. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 4
15. Yijing, Shuogua zhuan, chapter 3
16. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 7
17. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 4
18. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 5
19. Yijing, Shuogua zhuan, chapter 6
20. Yijing, chapter 3
21. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 8
22. Hall and Ames, Thinking Through Confucius (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987), p. 18
23. Xici I, chapter 10
24. Yijing, Shuogua zhuan, chapter 1
25. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 2
26. for a translation in Chinese by He Jiebing and Yang Weizeng, see Zhou yi ji chu (Guangzhou: Huacheng chu ban she, 1994), p. 377
27. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 9
28. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 12
29. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 1
30. The analogical association with shen is that the yin qi of the seventh month has come into shape, which stretches but has its own boundary. Shuo wen, vol. 5 (reprint, Tianjin: Gugi Shudian, 1993), pp. 36 and 65
31. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 5
32. Shuo wen, vol. 5, p. 35
33. Shuo wen jie zi (photo print by Zhonghua shuju, 1992), p. 198
34. Liwen Pan, Yijing yao yi wen da (Hong Kong: Zhong xi wen hua chu ban she, 1975), p. 1
35. Yijing, Xici II, chapter 6
36. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 1
37. Hall and Ames, Anticipating China, p. 261
38. Hall and Ames, Thinking Through Confucius, p. 18
39. Youlan Feng, Zhongguo zhexue shi (Hong Kong: Taiping yang tushu gongsi, 1956), p. 638
40. Yijing, Shuogua, chapter 4
41. Feng, p. 854
42. Feng, p. 856
43. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 2
44. Yijing, Shuogua, chapter 6
45. Yijing, Xugua zhuan I
46. Ibid
47. Yijing, Xugua zhuan, sections I and II
48. Laozi, Daode jing, chapter 39
49. trans. D. C. Lau, Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching (London: Penguin Books, 1963), p. 100
50. Yijing, Xici I, chapter 9, 11, and 12
51. "Dong Zhongshu zhuan," in Qian Honshu (Biography of Dong Zhongshu, a pre-Han history), 56:18
52. see Feng Youlan, p. 534
53. Laozi, Daode jing, chapter 25. An example of this assumption is also found in Zhuang Zi, where Dao finds itself a general source from which ten thousand things under the sky have come. This is seen in the following: Tung kuo tzu inquired of Chuang tzu: "Where is it, that which we call the way?" "There is nowhere it is not."' "Unallowable unless you specify." "It is in molecrickets and ants." "What, so low?" "It is in the weeds of the ricefields." "What, still lower?" "It is in tiles and shards." "What, worse than ever!" "It is in shit and piss." Tung kuo tzu did not reply. "Your questions, sir," said Chuang tzu, "miss the whole point. When Director Huo asks the Superintendent of the Market about assessing the pigs, the lower down in the pig he tests with his foot the more likely that if it is fat the whole pig is fat. You deal only 'in no case' and 'necessarily,' you have nowhere into which to escape from things. What is so of the ultimate Way is so too of the most comprehensive words. 'Universal,' 'everywhere; 'all,' these three are different names for the same substance, what they point to is one." (A. C. Graham's translation, Zhuang-Tzu: The Inner Chapters [London: Harper Collins, 1991], p. 161) Here we need to be aware, however, that "universal" (zhou), "everywhere" (bian), "all" (xian), and "the same substance" in Graham's translation should not be understood as their Western conceptual meanings, such as "totality," "wholeness," "the ultimate reality," and so forth. The three Chinese characters rather indicate "continuity," or a field of contextualized and correlative relationships as regards a focus
54. Yishu, vol. 15
55. Hall and Ames, Anticipating China, pp. 234 and 147
56. Wang Bi, Lun yu shi yi
57. Shuo wen, vol. 7, p. 66
58. Xu Shen, Han Dynasty; See Shuo wen jie zi (reprint, Zhonghua shu ju, 1992), p. 42
59. Cheng Chung Ying, "Model of Causality in Chinese Philosophy: A Comparative Study," Philosophy East and West 26, no. 1 (1976): 6
60. This brings to mind Nietzsche's critique: "The whole of teleology is constructed by speaking of the man of the last four millennia as of an eternal man towards whom all things in the world have had a natural relationship from the time he began" (Human, All Too Human [1878], p. 2, in A Nietzsche Reader, London: Penguin Books, 1977)
61. Laozi, Daode jing, chapter 25
62. Nei ye Guanzi, Treasure of Chinese Thought (Beijing: China Broadcasting and TV Press, 1990), p. 54