Aspects of Xunzi's engagement with early Daoism

Philosophy East and West

Volumn 53, Issue 1, 2003, Pages 87-129

  Stalnaker, Aaron ^a  

^a GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 61249581238     PISSN: 00318221     EISSN: 15291898     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/pew.2003.0009     Document Type: Review

References (57)

1. Obviously this debate, about Xunzi's appraisals of early "Daoism," is framed with a highly disputed category that was only applied to Warring States texts and people many years after the fact. I use the term primarily as a way of continuing and broadening an argument already existing in the literature on Xunzi's theories about the mind. For the purposes of this essay I assume that "Daoism" when applied to the fourth and third centuries B.C.E. denotes the practices of a range of people, first, who interpreted and shaped themselves by means of a vocabulary centered on the Dao or "Way" as a cosmic source (i.e., not as a merely human tradition), and, second, who prized and sought to develop, probably by means of various cultivational practices, what they felt was a profound insight into the workings of the cosmos and a tranquil, flexible mode of existence. It does not seem to have been an organized "school," and was likely no more than various masters and their followers, with only the fuzziest of analytical borders separating them from, on the one hand, early practitioners of various physical and mental exercises for purposes of cultivating longevity and/or magical powers and, on the other, especially later in this period, from certain cosmology-oriented administrative and political theorists. For recent assays on these issues, see Isabelle Robinet, Taoism: Growth of a Religion, trans. Phyllis Brooks (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997);
2. Harold Roth, Original Tao: Inward Training (Nei-yeh) and the Foundations of Taoist Mysticism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999);
3. W. Allyn Rickett, Guanzi: Political, Economic and Philosophical Essays from Early China, vol. 2 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998), pp. 15-24.
4. Compare Donald J. Harper, Early Chinese Medical Literature: The Mawangdui Medical Manuscripts (London and New York: Kegan Paul International, 1998), pp. 112-119, who articulates in greater detail distinctions between the attitudes of various groups to "macrobiotic hygiene" and argues that "Neiye" should not be seen as "Daoist," apparently because it includes one moralizing stanza about the Way (I argue below, following Roth, that this is a later addition to the text).
5. The classic statement of worries about the slipperiness of "Daoist" as an analytical category is Nathan Sivin, "On the Word Taoist' as a Source of Perplexity, with Special Reference to the Relations of Science and Religion in Traditional China," History of Religions, 1978, pp. 303-330.
6. Lee Yearley, "Hsün Tzu on the Mind," Journal of Asian Studies 39 (3) (1980): 465-480.
7. David Nivison, "Hsun Tzu and Chuang Tzu," in Chinese Texts and Philosophical Contexts: Essays Dedicated to Angus C. Graham, ed. Henry Rosemont, Jr. (La Salle, Illinois: Open Court, 1991), pp. 129-142; quotes from pp. 136, 137.
8. John Knoblock, Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works, 3 vols. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988-1994) vol. 1, pp. 3-35.
9. Also see Knoblock's earlier but more carefully argued account, "The Chronology of Xunzi's Works," Early China 8 (1982-1983): 28-52.
10. Knoblock, Xunzi, 1: 145-147; 3: 90-92.
11. Edward Machle, "Hsün Tzu as a Religious Philosopher," Philosophy East and West 26 (1976): 443-461;
12. "The Mind and the 'Shen-ming' in Xunzi," Journal of Chinese Philosophy 19 (1992): 361-386.
13. See also Machle's Nature and Heaven in the Xunzi: A Study of the Tian Lun (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993).
14. Paul Rakita Goldin, Rituals of the Way: The Philosophy of Xunzi (Chicago and La Salle: Open Court, 1999), esp. chap. 1. Goldin's book appeared after the first two drafts of the present essay were finished. While his account is excellent in several respects, more still needs to be said. There are four basic differences between the interpretation I develop here and Goldin's. First, I argue that the disagreements between Xunzi and his Daoist sources were not only about ideas but about the proper methods of self-cultivation, and I say much more about such practices of personal development than Goldin does. Second, we do not interpret Xunzi's three capacities of the mind, discussed more fully below, in the same way: I represent unity differently, not as a unified consciousness coupled to an enduring personal identity, but as concentration on the Way and the development of a comprehensive and unified understanding of the world; I also argue for a much more robust sense of jing, tranquility, in Xunzi than Goldin does. (I attempt to justify these interpretations by looking at the whole of the Xunzi to illuminate the passages in "Dispelling Obsession" that Goldin focuses on.) Third, our account of the influences Xunzi felt, and what they consisted of, diverge. I give slightly different readings of both Zhuangzi and the "Neiye" than Goldin does, and highlight different elements of these texts. I attribute Xunzi's sense of unity as concentration to "Neiye" influence, and also discuss how his technical psychological terminology owes much to the "Neiye." I agree with Goldin that the mystical meanings of oneness in Daoistic texts are not what Xunzi has in mind, but describe these meanings somewhat differently. Goldin discerns greater influence from the Heguanzi on Xunzi than I am able to. Fourth, on the basis of these divergent accounts, I am able to give a new interpretation and explanation for Xunzi's repeated use of the terms shen and shenming, which Goldin does not. Nevertheless, in broad terms I certainly agree with Goldin: Xunzi appropriates Daoist ideas and terms for his own use, changes them to solve his own philosophical problems, and uses them to highlight his differences with these rivals to his Confucian project.
15. The best account so far of Xunzi's engagement with the "Techniques of the Mind" tradition, including the "Neiye," is Du Guoxiang, "Xunzi cong Song Yin Huang-Lao xuepai jieshoule shenme?" Du Guoxiang wenji (Beijing: Renmin, 1962), pp. 134-157.
16. Du argues that this tradition should be seen as "Daoist," although he subscribes to the now widely rejected theory of Guo Moruo that "Neiye" and the later texts were products of Song Xing and Yin Wen and their school, which skews his analysis somewhat (on these issues see Roth, Original Tao, pp. 27-28 and notes). I agree with Du that Xunzi borrows important technical terminology from this tradition but uses it to argue for a very different, Confucian vision; however, we differ on a number of details and judgments about relative importance (Du is much more interested in epistemological issues, for example), and I think I have a better explanation of why Xunzi would be moved to borrow their terminology when and where he does, because of his own theoretical needs. Du is so intent on showing that Xunzi and the "Techniques of the Mind" tradition disagree, which they certainly do, that he ends up making it mysterious why Xunzi was moved to adapt their terms and ideas at all.
17. Janet A. H. Kuller has also published two important articles on Xunzi and early Daoism, "Anti-Taoist Elements in Hsün Tzu's Thought and Their Social Relevance," Asian Thought and Society 3 (7) (1978): 53-67
18. and "The 'Fu' of the Hsün Tzu as an Anti-Taoist Polemic," Monumenta Serica 31 (1974-1975): 205-218. The first is the more general, reading Xunzi's philosophy as thoroughly anti-Daoist (with a basically Lao-Zhuang view of "Daoism"), despite its occasional apparent similarity to Daoist thought, especially with regard to tian, "Heaven," and the mind. The second is a fascinating analysis of chapter 26 of the received Xunzi, as a whole, in terms of these contentions. I would argue that Xunzi learned more from Zhuangzi (and the "Neiye" tradition) than Kuller seems to allow, and this helps to explain why he was moved to use their non-Confucian ideas as much as he did, although of course she, and Du, are right to stress his ultimate disagreements with these rival traditions.
19. As Knoblock correctly points out (Knoblock, Xunzi 3: 88-90), it seems clear as well that Xunzi's account of "obsession" was very much influenced by Song Xing's conception of "pens" for thought, which prejudice observation and judgment; by Confucius' account of how uneven development of the virtues can lead to destructive obsession with one (Lunyu 17.8); and by Mencius' discussion of obsession as a danger for perception, if not for the whole mind (Mengzi 6A15).
20. Xunzi yinde, Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Supplement 22 (1950; reprint, Shanghai: Shanghai Guji Chubanshe, 1986), p. 80, chap. 21, lines 44-46 (hereafter Xunzi, HYIS, page/chapter/line);
21. For an alternative reading of the first sentence, see Machle, "The Mind and the 'Shenming' in Xunzi," esp. pp. 376-383.
22. For a much fuller discussion of the relation of "approval" or "assent" to Xunzi's conception of human development, see Aaron Stalnaker, "Overcoming Our Evil: Spiritual Exercises and Personhood in Xunzi and Augustine" (Ph.D. diss., Brown University, 2001), chaps. 3 and 5.
23. For a powerful and subtle reading that sees xu, yi, and jing as intellectual virtues that must be cultivated, and are not present as natural powers in human beings generally, see Eric Hutton, "Virtue and Reason in Xunzi" (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 2001), pp. 102-130. I cannot deal here with all the issues raised by Hutton's excellent and penetrating analysis, which appeared after this essay had been accepted. Briefly, I certainly agree that these are powers that must be cultivated and are not fully functioning (as the "great pure awareness" of the sages) from birth in human beings; however, some weak, initial versions of these abilities must be present to explain how self-cultivation may ever begin, and how the sages were ever able to begin the cultural traditions that grew into the Confucian Way in all its fullness.
24. Edwin Pulleyblank, Outline of Classical Chinese Grammar (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1995), pp. 44-46; quotes from p. 45.
25. Machle argues for this same point in relation to Xunzi's statement quoted above about the mind and the shenming in his "The Mind and the 'Shenming' in Xunzi," pp. 378-380.
26. Zhuangzi Yinde, Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Supplement 20 (Beijing: Yanjing Daxue Yinshua Suoyin, 1947), pp. 20-21, chap. 7, lines 28-29 (hereafter Zhuangzi, HYIS, page/chapter/line);
27. A. C. Graham, Chuang-Tzu: The Inner Chapters (1981; reprint, London: HarperCollins, 1986), pp. 97-98.
28. compare Graham, Chuang-Tzu, p. 98.
29. With Wang Shumin, Zhuangzi Jiaoquan, 3 vols. (Taibei: Zhongyang Yanjiuyuan Lishi Yuyan Yanjiusuo, 1988), vol. 1, p. 131 n. 7, I think these characters may be scrambled, although I would suspect it originally read - instead of, as Wang supposes.
30. The following account owes much to Roth's "Bimodal Mystical Experience in the 'Qiwulun' Chapter of the Zhuangzi" (paper presented at the 49th Annual Meeting of the Association for Asian Studies, 15 March 1997, Chicago, Illinois).
31. The basic distinctions Roth uses were first interpreted in this way by A. C. Graham in "Chuang-Tzu's Essay on Seeing Things as Equal," History of Religions 9 (1969/1970): 137-159.
32. adapted from Roth, "Bimodal Mystical Experience," pp. 9-10
33. For a survey of the uses of shen in the Confucian classics and a few other Warring States texts, see Machle, "Hsün Tzu as a Religious Philosopher."
34. For an analysis of this term in Daoist contexts, see Roth, "The Early Taoist Concept of Shen: A Ghost in the Machine?" in Sagehood and Systematizing Thought in Warring States and Han China, ed. Kidder Smith (Brunswick, Maine: Breckinridge Public Affairs Center and Bowdoin College Asian Studies Program, 1990), pp. 11-32.
35. Ma Feibai goes so far as to identify dao and jing in the "Neiye" in his article "Guanzi Neiye pian jizhu," Guanzi xuekan 11 (1) (1990): 9 n. 1.
36. Jeffrey Riegel and Roth emend this passage, partly to avoid having such an early text mention shenming, and partly to follow the later parallel in Xinshu, Xia. I think my reading makes good sense of the "Neiye" text as it stands, and might also help explain where the Daoist version of the idea of shenming originated. (Shenming occurs several times in essays within the Guanzi collection; see Machle, "The Mind and the 'Shen-ming' in Xunzi.") As Roth has shown, much of Xinshu, Xia consists of material that is borrowed and reworked from the "Neiye," and having a parallel in this case seems less than decisive. I think both readings are plausible.
37. I follow Wang Xianqian in reading xing as a graphical error for sheng, which makes more sense and doesn't saddle the normally precise Xunzi with defining a word in terms of itself in his chapter on "Rectifying Terms"; see Wang, Xunzi jijiao (Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju, 1987), p. 412.
38. On this issue, see Charles Le Blanc, Huai-Nan Tzu: Philosophical Synthesis in Early Han Thought (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1985).
39. For a pithy summary and accurate assessment of the textual problems in this paragraph, see Knoblock, Xunzi, 2: 289-290 nn. 104-106.
40. For a partial discussion of shenming's occurrences in the early literature, see Machle, "The Mind and the 'Shen-Ming' in Xunzi," p. 363.
41. The word is quite rare until at least the third century B.C.E. There are no uses in the Shijing, one in the received Shujing (Gu Jiegang, ed., Shangshu tongjian [1936; reprint, Beijing: Shumu Wenxian Chubanshe, 1982], p. 21, Junchen 41, characters 0070-0071 - this is in one of the forged "old text" sections)
42. and three in the Zuozhuan (Chunqiu jingzhuan yinde, Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Supplement 11 [1937; reprint, Taibei: Chinese Materials and Research Aids Service Center, 1966], p. 280, Xiang gong 14, fu 3; p. 306, Xiang gong 25, fu 2; p. 365, Zhao gong 7, fu 6). Legge renders it most often as "spiritual beings," and the term in these texts does seem to denote some sort of dignified spirits high in the celestial hierarchy who are fond of virtue. The one exception, and the most interesting of these passages, is the last one in the Zuozhuan. Here Zichan describes to Zhao Jingzi, in response to a question about someone becoming a ghost, the development at and after birth of a human being's hun and po souls, and the increase in jing (vital essence? or a general mental refinement?) as the child handles things, which gradually becomes more open and clear, until it reaches "numinous clarity." This seemingly psychological application of the term to individuals is similar in significant respects to its uses in the "Neiye" and Xinshu texts, and in the Xunzi.
43. Harper explores its meaning in the Mawangdui macrobiotic hygiene texts as a kind of spiritual potency that can be accumulated in the body, and he comments insightfully on how this usage relates to older religious senses of the term and the more psychological uses deriving from the "Neiye," in Early Chinese Medical Literature, pp. 120-121.
44. On rendering shenming as "numinous clarity" see Roth, "The Early Taoist Concept of Shen," p. 18, where he interprets this term in the "Neiye" as referring to a kind of mystical intuition resulting from inner cultivation.
45. See Knoblock, Xunzi, 2: 342 n. 10, on the recurrence in other parts of the text of some of these phrases.
46. For an insightful discussion of the senses in which Xunzi did and did not see these as "inventions," and how he compared to other thinkers of his era on the issue of the creation of culture, see Michael Puett, "Nature and Artifice: Debates in Late Warring States China Concerning the Creation of Culture," Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 57 (2) (1997): 474-480.
47. For an insightful reading of these aspects of Xunzi's vision as constituting a sophisticated theory of tradition, see T. C. Kline, "Ethics and Tradition in the Xunzi" (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1998), pp. 205-250.
48. David Wong, "Xunzi on Moral Motivation," in Chinese Language, Thought, and Culture: Nivison and His Critics, ed. Philip J. Ivanhoe (Chicago and La Salle: Open Court, 1996), pp. 202-223.
49. For a sympathetic critique of Wong similar to what is proposed here (and which came out after this article was initially submitted), see T. C. Kline III, "Moral Agency and Motivation in the Xunzi," in Virtue, Nature, and Moral Agency in the Xunzi, ed. T. C. Kline III and Philip J. Ivanhoe (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2000), pp. 237-249.
50. On the relation of "human nature" to Xunzi's views of xing and other concepts, see Stalnaker, "Overcoming Our Evil," esp. chap. 3.
51. Translations are based on the received Wangbiben text, and are adapted from Robert G. Henricks, Lao-Tzu Te-Tao Ching (Hew York: Ballantine, 1989)
52. and D. C. Lau, Lao Tzu Tao Te Ching (London: Penguin, 1963).
53. On meditative and mystical practices in the Daodejing, see Henricks, Lao-Tzu Te-Tao Ching, pp. xxiv-xxvii.
54. It is very similar in form to 21.4, although it criticizes only Shen Dao, Laozi, Mozi, and Song Xing, whereas 21.4 criticizes Mozi, Song Xing, Shen Dao, Shen Buhai, Hui Shi, and Zhuangzi. The second criticizes more thinkers, and uses the developed terminology of "obsession"; the first shares the basic idea of holding on to only part of the truth, but explains this by means of "stupidity" and "ignorance," a considerably less subtle theory of error. It would seem that the passage criticizing Laozi is earlier than the one in "Dispelling Obsession," written by a less-seasoned Xunzi, and if Knoblock's dating of "Dispelling Obsession" as being written prior to 284 B.C.E. is to be trusted, this is very early indeed. Knoblock's arguments do not really succeed in placing this work in Xunzi's first stay at Jixia, although they do make it likely that it was written in Qi, either in the period 300-284 or 275-265 (Knoblock, "The Chronology of Xunzi's Works," pp. 35-36).
55. Oddly enough, this mysterious quotation shows up almost verbatim in one of the forged Shangshu chapters, "Consultations of the Great Yu" (James Legge, The Shoo King, vol. 3 of The Chinese Classics [1865; reprint, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1960], bk. 2, chap. 2, p. 61, par. 15).
56. On the dating of parts of the text, see Edward L. Shaughnessy, "Shang shu (Shu ching)," in Michael Loewe, ed., Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide (Berkeley: The Society for the Study of Early China, 1993), pp. 376-389. The Shangshu passage reads: "The human heart/mind reflects with anxiety, the heart/mind of the Way reflects with subtlety. If your reflection is concentrated, if it is unified, then you will faithfully hold to the mean." As others have noted, evidently the writer of this passage had the Xunzi close at hand, as well as the interpolated Lunyu 20.1, which includes the last four characters in a Shangshu-like set speech where Yao charges Shun with caring for the empire.
57. On this literary genre, see William H. Baxter, "Situating the Language of the Lao-tzu: The Probable Date of the Tao-te-ching," in Lao-Tzu and the Tao-Te-Ching, ed. Michael La Fargue and Livia Kohn (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998), pp. 231-253.