An Innovative Spirit From Eight Centuries Ago

Last September, Taipei Bureau of Cultural Affairs director Lung Ying-tai took office and at the same time published an article in which she expressed hope that Taipei would become a showplace of Taiwan's native culture and take its place among other global cultural centers.

"Liao Tianding is more incredible than Robin Hood, Yu Yonghe is more romantic than Robinson Crusoe, Zhou Mengdie is more of a rebel than the Beatles, the worship of the goddess Matsu is no less beautiful and pious than mass in the Vatican, the 800th anniversary of the birth of Zhu Xi is a more important occasion than the 250th anniversary of the birth of Goethe. . . ."

Matsu, Liao Tianding, Zhou Mengdie. . . . but Zhu Xi? The inclusion of Zhu Xi in Lung's list left a few Taipei City Councilors feeling confused. And there was even more consternation when Lung said that in the millennial year, the Bureau of Cultural Affairs would sponsor commemorative activities coinciding with the 800th anniversary of Zhu's death. City councilors asked Lung: What is the connection between Zhu Xi and Taiwan? Is it really so important as to warrant spending money on commemorative events?

An international star

To be sure, the Fujian-born Zhu Xi does not command nearly the affection among Taiwanese as does his "co-provincial" Matsu. Yet, at the Lungshan Temple in Taipei's Wanhua district, which is dedicated to Matsu, there is a statue of a semi-deified Zhu nestled behind the main hall, where it receives crowds of young students and hopeful parents seeking help and presenting offerings.

Moreover, in the Temple of Confucius in Taipei, Zhu Xi is honored in the main hall with the same respect given to the Sage himself. The temple includes ranks of memorial tablets to many Confucianist scholars in history, but Zhu's status-marked by the location of his tablet-is higher than even that of Confucius's own students. In addition, at the private academies established by our forefathers in Taiwan-some, such as the Wen Kai Academy in Lukang and the Xue Hai Academy on Tihua Street in Taipei, still preserved as historic sites-there were tablets specially dedicated to the veneration of Zhu. In days gone by, students had to bow and light incense before these icons before starting their day of schoolwork.

And it is not only Chinese who have admired the spirit of Zhu Xi. America's Life magazine listed Zhu as one of the people who made the greatest contributions to mankind in the last millennium.

You can find as succinct a description of Zhu Xi's importance as any in the Taiwan middle-school textbook History of Chinese Culture, which notes that Zhu Xi spent a lifetime annotating the Confucian classics, and established his own academies to teach others. It declaims: "You could say that, prior to the ascendance of Western power, Zhu Xi had the greatest influence on East Asian civilization of any one individual. His spirit permeated the daily lives, outlooks, and spiritual inclinations of Chinese people." Kung Peng-cheng, president of Fokuang University, who is organizing Zhu Xi commemorative activities on behalf of the Taipei City Bureau of Cultural Affairs, says that Zhu's impact on modern East Asian culture is the best starting point for these activities.

The Chinese Bible

A discussion of the relationship between this "millennial figure" and modern people perhaps best starts with the work that has been called "the Chinese Bible"--Zhu's annotated version of the collected Four Books.

The year is 1190. The Song dynasty has already retreated to southern China. In his own workshop, Zhu Xi prints the first ever edition of his collected Four Books (The Analects of Confucius, Mencius, The Great Learning, and The Golden Mean, plus Zhu's commentaries on these works). Later, the Southern Song is overrun by the Mongols, and the Yuan dynasty adopts Zhu's Four Books as a required subject in the imperial exams. The exam system makes the Four Books required reading for Chinese intellectuals, and thereafter mainstream thinking centers around Zhu's interpretations of these texts. The spirit of the Four Books also percolates into Japan and Korea.

This system lasted for centuries, until, in the late Qing dynasty, reformers finally abandoned the imperial exam system. But the Four Books remained for many Chinese families a handbook for personal and family life. In Taiwan, even in the Japanese occupation era, education based on the Four Books was never wholly interrupted. And today, in basic textbooks on Chinese culture for middle-school students, not only is a great deal of the material drawn from the Four Books, but the interpretation basically follows that of Zhu Xi.

Were there no Zhu Xi, Confucius would not have had such a far-reaching impact on the Chinese people. The great sinologist Chien Mu wrote that Confucius may have been the fount of Confucian culture, but Zhu Xi was the pivotal figure who carried the tradition forward. He refined Confucian thought, and gave people a deeper understanding of Confucius.

Looking back to the pre-Qin era, Confucius collated the Six Classics, putting pre-Qin thought into a format that was conducive to learning and to passing the tradition along, and thereby created a cultural tradition. But at the time that Zhu Xi lived, during the Song dynasty, society was changing; the system of powerful noble families that Confucius lived under was giving way to an increasingly urbanized social structure in which ordinary people had much higher status. In addition, in the course of the dynasties that preceded the Song-the Wei, Jin, Tang, and the Earlier and Later Five Dynasties-Confucian thinking had been challenged by Buddhist and Taoist ideas.

Practical solutions

Moreover, the Song found itself in a weak position in the face of external enemies, social mores were in decline, and the governing system was seen as inadequate. Buddhism and Taoism seemed less useful than Confucianism in resolving worldly problems. Confucianism thus entered a period of creative transformation in order to meet external challenges to the state.

Zhu Xi's influence proved greater than that of other philosophers because of his work integrating various schools of thought, doing textual research, and annotating the classics. For example, prior to the Song dynasty, The Great Learning was not a very influential work in China. Zhu Xi made a point of extolling the interlinked elements of that work's philosophy: correct identification of objects; knowledge of underlying truths; cultivation of individual character; sound regulation of the family; correct governance of the nation; tranquility under Heaven. This philosophy became a lifetime pursuit for scholars who followed him.

Kung Peng-cheng says that many of the values Chinese people have internalized were given form by Zhu Xi and other philosophers of that time. "These are the very things many people mean when they say they think of themselves as Chinese."

The influence of Zhu and his contemporaries extends to personal moral awareness, individual-group relations, and norms of public life, as well as to many longstanding cultural commonalities that have colored the basic outlook of Chinese people-such as how to strengthen the nation, how to bring action in line with beliefs, and how to reconcile man's rational and animal natures. Kung suggests that all of these themes came to be considered important by Chinese only because Zhu Xi deliberately marked them out for detailed attention.

How far-reaching has Zhu's influence been? At the end of the Qing dynasty, at the turn of the 20th century, a full 700 years after Zhu's demise, as intellectuals sought solutions to China's problems, an effort was made to bridge the gap between Eastern and Western philosophy. When the philosopher Yan Fu introduced Western scientific ideas like evolution to China, he made the links to these ideas through the themes of "correct identification of objects" and "knowledge of underlying truths" introduced in Zhu Xi's interpretation of The Great Learning.

Even Dr. Sun Yat-sen, who led the 1911 revolution that overturned the imperial system and founded Republican China, owed a debt to Zhu Xi. He once said that his own ideas came from three sources: the great tradition of the sages, the West, and his own inspirations. Importantly, his access to the "great tradition" came through Zhu.

"In the pre-Qin era and the Han dynasty, people read Confucius, but from the Southern Song to the May Fourth [1919] era, what people read were the writings of Zhu Xi," says Ko Ching-ming, a professor in the Department of Chinese at National Taiwan University. These days, moreover, it has become fashionable even to ascribe the economic success of the Four Little Tigers to the superiority of traditional East Asian culture.

Not just for the emperor

Zhu Xi lived in an era of changing value systems, when the old system was dissolving. His understanding of and reflections on society generated innovations from the highest levels of abstract thought to the most common aspects of daily life.

In society after the Tang dynasty, the role and status of the great noble clans was changing. The old rites of the Confucian school were not suited to use in the homes of the common people. Since it was impossible to sustain the old customs, Zhu organized new systems of rules for passage to adulthood, marriage, funerals, and worship that were suited to general use.

Central elements of Chinese life-halls of worship (where family memorial tablets are displayed), forms for venerating the ancestors, marriage rituals, funeral customs-were influenced by Zhu's work Wen Gong Jia Li [Family Rites of Duke Wen]. For example, in Zhou dynasty regulations governing clan ancestral worship, only the emperor could worship ancestors back to the fourth generation. Zhu Xi extended this rule to all families, and today, the altars that can be found in many rural homes can be traced back to Zhu Xi's ruling.

Today, many Taiwanese are unfamiliar with the old rituals, and for weddings or funerals they have to buy a copy of Compilation of Family Rituals and follow the directions step by step. Professor Li Hsin-lin of the Taipei University of Technology says that because Zhu Xi lived in Fujian for 40 years, the Family Rites of Duke Wen had a great influence on Fujian and, consequently, on the many Fujianese who emigrated to Taiwan. "If you want to understand rituals in modern Taiwan, you cannot fail to look at Zhu Xi."

The clan rituals that evolved in China after the Song dynasty were by no means the single-handed creation of Zhu Xi. As early as the Northern Song dynasty, scholars like Ouyang Xiu and Fan Zhongyan already recognized the need for new norms. But what made Zhu Xi different from these other thinkers is that he did not limit himself to academic theories, but established a workable system that could be applied in practice.

"He had the ability to think in a structured, systematic way. He also understood how to give shape to a new system and put a new structure into place without a complete disruption of the old system," says Kung Peng-cheng. In a time of change it is important that people are able to hang on to what was good in tradition.

As Kung Peng-cheng sees it, modern Taiwan society is changing even more dramatically than was society in Zhu Xi's time. It has inherited the problem of ascendant Western culture and declining Eastern culture that arose in the late Qing, and has added to this the disruptions of industrial and commercial development and rapid modernization.

Yet, though Chinese have been arguing for a century about how best to cope with such changes, no very concrete systems have taken shape. Kung, who regrets the apparent fact that "Zhu Xi could do it, but we can't," notes that the modern family differs from that of the past in terms of size and ideology, yet, he wonders: Who will create a new set of norms for ancestor worship? Where will the norms governing the rituals of daily life come from? "Zhu Xi and the others of his era came up with such things. That is the spirit that we should be the heirs to."

Reform the exam system!

In the realm most connected to reforming the way people think-education-Zhu Xi was a driving force behind private academies, a spirit that today still wins accolades from education reformers in Taiwan. "As I strolled in the Yelu Academy [a school founded by Zhu in Hunan], I saw the shadows of many of the educators who taught in that school flit by. And the one I saw most clearly was that of Zhu Xi, despite the fact that he had been gone from that place for 800 years." So wrote the famous mainland author Yu Qiuyu in his Notebooks of a Mountain Residence.

The Song court inherited the long-established examination system. Given that education was run by and for government bureaucrats, those who studied did so only in order to further their ambitions and become officials. They cared little for knowledge or morality, or for the intrinsic value of learning. Philosophers realized that education and teaching materials lacked vitality and in fact limited people's development in various ways. In order to escape the rigid and lifeless official education system, private education began to flourish.

Under Zhu Xi, who had a knack for "management," private academies grew in size and became increasingly widespread. Especially worthy of note was the Bailudong Academy in Jiangxi. The latter, a famous institution nestled amidst mountains and rivers as idyllic as a painting, had fallen into decline in the Northern Song period. In 1178, Zhu Xi was posted as an official to Jiangxi, and the following year he sent a memorial to the emperor asking to have the school renovated.

Zhu personally took charge of reinvigorating the institution. Pedagogy was thereafter based on free-form lecturing and discussion that was not focused on official advancement. In his book of rules for the operations of the Bailudong Academy, Zhu emphasized that learning begins with discussion; moreover, besides exchanges of ideas between students and teachers, it was also necessary to rely on the students' own doubts and judgements.

Not long after Zhu engaged in a famous debate with philosopher Lu Xiangshan, he invited Lu to be an instructor at Bailudong. "This was a dramatic turn-that Zhu Xi would open wide the doors of Bailudong and invite a teacher who had diametrically opposed views on education. Zhu's overall ideas on pedagogy and school management-reflected in his willingness to expose students to different philosophies-drove the great debates over education in the Ming dynasty. Though countless renowned scholars taught at Bailudong over the years, none surpassed Zhu," wrote the late scholar Wing-tsit Chan in the Chinese edition of the book Zhu Xi Xin Tan (New Explorations of Zhu Xi).

The academies of the Song dynasty established the tradition of students and teachers reading, questioning, interpreting, and debating the classics, and were cradles for collective reflection among literati. The rules established by Zhu Xi for Bailudong became the standard for generations to follow.

Zhu Xi and Taiwan culture

Formal Chinese culture began to take root in Taiwan in the middle of the Qing dynasty. This early Taiwan culture drew on the tradition of Zhu Xi pedagogy. Chen Chao-ying, a professor in the Department of Chinese at NTU, says that an exploration of the relationship between Zhu Xi and Taiwan can profitably start from the position of education in early Taiwan.

When Zheng Jing began to develop Taiwan in the late Ming era, he argued that because Taiwan was an untamed land with very few residents, there was no urgent need to promote education or culture. But his assistant Chen Yonghua, who had been influenced by the ideas of Zhu Xi, accepted the Confucian dogma that education was an essential part of an official's responsibilities to the people. From that point on Confucian temples, academies, and study societies sprang up one after another.

Chen Chao-ying notes: "In the years from the construction of the first Temple of Confucius in 1666 to the Treaty of Shimonoseki [which ceded Taiwan to Japan in 1895], Confucian studies set down deep roots in Taiwan." There is today plenty of physical evidence testifying to those 200 years of uninterrupted vitality for Confucian education. Virtually all of the inscriptions that marked important educational institutions in Taiwan reflect the spirit of Zhu Xi.

Take for example the engraving in stone done on commission by Cai Shiyuan for the construction of a school in Zhuluo County (modern Chiayi). Cai, who came from Zhangpu in Fujian, was a student of the Zhu Xi scholar Zhang Bohang. The more than 1,000-character inscription describes the essence of Zhu Xi's spirit in terms like "orderly reasoning," "inexhaustible dedication," "meticulous care in grasping the meaning of each and every sentence," and "applying what is learned to daily life." It concludes that if Zhu's habits are not followed, study will prove useless, however copious it may be.

Zhu Zi's academic spirit has been applauded by many generations who have come after him. He once instructed his student Guo Youren in the proper way to approach study: "If a person could just cut back on idle chatter by a few sentences a day, and drop in on one or two less people a day, this would save a lot of time and effort. If you spend all day hanging around in bustling public places, how can you study?"

His comments are still applicable today. Just consider his poem "Thoughts on Study": "A small pond, yet its waters glint like a mirror/ How can the water, which sits in one place, remain so clear?/ Because there is always fresh water flowing in." This poem is a metaphor for Zhu's belief that one should never stop reading, because a person could learn something new each time he opened a book. Zhu encouraged people to read widely and deeply, because only with profound and precise knowledge could one think clearly and act with the greatest effect.

The Joy of Study

Later generations of scholars were infected by Zhu's love of knowledge. Everywhere literati built gardens and studies with names like "Mirror Pond Studio" and "Pavilion of Flowing Water," and even today, the publication of the Council for Cultural Affairs is called Flowing Water. This admiration for Zhu's spirit also explains why he is venerated at the Wenchang Shrine. Chen Chao-ying explains that Chinese folk beliefs tend to be instrumental, and the main deity of the Wenchang Shrine, Lord Wenchang, is believed to have the ability to choose the top scorers on exams. But Zhu Xi is there to remind students that the purpose of study is to improve oneself and to benefit the group, not to gain fame and fortune.

Though busy with politics, philosophical discourse, and writing, Zhu Xi still found time to produce a large amount of material for the education of children. In various works he systematically laid out his theories on all aspects of family education. It was Zhu's idea-universally followed prior to the Republican era (which began in 1911)-that all schoolchildren memorize the Three Character Classic. Even today primary school texts discuss the idea of "starting off with daily chores," another of Zhu's principles for instructing children.

"Beginning at age eight, from the emperor on down to the sons of commoners, boys should enter school. Teaching should begin with basic things, like household chores, and basic knowledge of rites, music, archery, reading, numeracy and so on." Zhu Xi repeatedly argued that small children do not need high-sounding principles: "Children do not need to have their sights set at the pinnacle; it is best to start from everyday life."

Zhu offered a step-by-step educational formula-and also a spirit in which the formula was to be applied-covering everything from beginning to advanced education. He advocated holistic education that would cultivate a person's character. His ideas have shaped Chinese education, and thereby Chinese people, for centuries. Ko Ching-ming says that the spirit of Zhu Xi raised the overall quality of Chinese society.

Window on oneself

Zhu Xi was the most important Chinese figure after Confucius in creating a new tradition in a time of uncertainty and change. Entering the 21st century, Taiwan also is at a time of transformation. Just as philosophers in the Song engaged in a "rethink" of Confucian thought, and engaged in creative interpretation, today the problem of reassessment of the past reappears.

Tseng Chun-hai, a professor of philosophy at Chengchih University, argues: "Cultural identification is universal; all people feel an attachment to their common cultural resources." In imperial China, 26 dynasties rose and fell, but the Four Books and Five Classics never disappeared. Zhu Xi defined the memories and values of the common cultural heritage of the Chinese people, providing a focus for the identification of Chinese with their ancestors, history, and culture. This sense of identification, says Tseng, is a natural need felt by all human beings, a need that cannot be changed by politics. "Every society needs cultural values of final appeal, and the Four Books still has many advantages for providing the basic cultural concepts of society."

"People today should emulate Zhu Xi's comprehensive understanding of his own culture," avers Kung Peng-cheng. Modern people don't have to be Zhu Xi "loyalists," and it is not important to bolster Zhu Xi's historical status. Rather, what is important is to use him as a window, to examine what Eastern and Western civilization really are, and from there to find the answers to questions like: Who are we? What are we made of?

Fresh flowing water

Since the September 21 earthquake, the Lin Family Gardens in Panchiao have been undergoing reconstruction. On a weekend afternoon, though, you can still see a few people strolling about the "Mirror Pond Studio" in one corner of the gardens, admiring the play of light on the pond, sitting along the pathways or in pavilions reading, or chatting with friends.

The Mirror Pond Studio was where Lin Wei-yuan, the builder of the Lin Family Gardens, used to meet his literati friends. Besides drawing its name from a poem by Zhu Xi, engraved on the back wall is Zhu's "The Joy of Study." The characters, whose paint is chipping off, read: "Don't spend your time in idle pursuits/ In life there is nothing as good as studying/ How happy is one when studying?/ So happy that the grass can grow high outside his window without him even noticing. . . ."

Lin Wei-yuan created a corner in northern Taiwan that is deeply steeped in the spirit of Zhu Xi. Today, visitors who pass through and read the inscription can, it seems, hear the quiet rippling of pages as Zhu Xi, following his own advice to resist the temptations of noisome public entertainments, turns over another page in his book.l

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Who is that "Man from Ziyang Mountain" whose image is venerated in the Wenchang Shrine in the Lungshan Temple in Taipei? It is the man who made such an important contribution to Chinese culture, Zhu Xi. Since his death he has not only been deified, but many legends have become attached to his name. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)

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Zhu Xi's book Hui An Wenji, published in the Song dynasty, records many of his poems and essays for posterity. (courtesy of the National Palace Museum) Zhu's annotated edition of the Four Books (at right in the picture) provided the blueprint for questions for imperial examinations in the Ming and Qing dynasties.

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Did Zhu Xi have something against women? Why was he such a stickler about virtue and chastity? In fact, Zhu Xi gave more attention to the education of women than any pedagogue before him. He demanded even more of himself, and to the end of his life continually studied in pursuit of the correct path and a better character.

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On the altar table at the Wenchang Shrine are not only the "three vegetable offerings" of spring onion, turnip, and celery-used because their names in Chinese sound like the words for "intelligent," "an auspicious start," and "diligent"-but also students' exam IDs, placed there to ask Lord Wenchang and Zhu Xi to help them in their studies and assure them a place on the honor roll. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)

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In the painting Zhu Xi Writing, the philospher looks as if he is just about to put brush to paper. On the wall is a qin stringed instrument; behind him is a screen decorated with pine and heron, while in front are narcissi and peonies. Surrounded by such comfort, no wonder Zhu advised others to forsake bustling public places and spend more time behind closed doors reading.

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One of the works on display in the current National Palace Museum exhibition on the Song dynasty is Zhu Xi's calligraphy of extracts from the I Ching. The brushwork is robust and powerful. (courtesy of the National Palace Museum)

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The Mirror Pond Studio in the Lin Family Gardens in Panchiao was where the family forebears studied. There is a small pond, and on clear days sunlight and white clouds drift in and out. Zhu Xi's poem "The Joy of Study" is inscribed on the back wall. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)

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After the Zheng family began to develop Taiwan in the late Ming dynasty, the study of Zhu Xi's works also was taken up on the island, and became a key element in Taiwan's early culture. A couplet in front of the gate to the Lord Zhu Xi Temple in Chiayi, with references to Bailudong and Ziyang Mountain (site of another Zhu Xi academy), records the aspirations of early scholars in Taiwan to follow Zhu's example. (photo by Hsueh Chi-kuang)

Zhu Xi's book Hui An Wenji, published in the Song dynasty, records many of his poems and essays for posterity. （courtesy of the National Palace Museum） Zhu's annotated edition of the Four Books （at right in the picture） provided the blueprint for questions for imperial examinations in the Ming and Qing dynasties.