| Abstract |
Si Ku Quan Shu Zong Mu is the first book using terminologies of “Han-Xue” and “Sung-Xue” to comment previous academics. “Han-Xue” and “Sung-Xue” constitute the academic history of Ching dynasty and each predominated alternatively. During the mid-Ching dynasty the competition became more and more obvious because of the appearance of two books: “Han School Shi Cheng Ji” by Jiang Fan and “Han School Shang Dui” by Fang Dong Shu. This argument resulted from the mid-Tung dynasty intellectualities’ will to defend the pure tradition of Confucianism against heterodoxy. The scholars supporting Han-Xue thought that if intellectualities wanted to correct the impractical Neo-Confucianism during the late Ming and restore Confucianism, they had to explain the words in ancient books anew. However, the scholars supporting Sung-Xue thought extremely focusing on the ancient words would obscure the inner value of Confucianism. How did RuanYuan regarded as an authority on the Han-Xue by intellectualities comment Han-Xue and Sung-Xue? This essay shows that RuanYuan thought explanatory efficacy had active meanings to interpret Confucian thought through discussing his book – Yan-Jing-Shi Corpus.By interpreting the ancient books anew, he emphasized that practicing morality is the only way to restore Confucianism.As Neo-Confucianism became more impractical and profound during the late Ming, Ruan Yuan gave the intellectualities in Ching Dynasty a practical way to revival Confucian spirit. |
