"Fan" Of Ancient Political Civilization

This thesis places Hong-Fan under the general environment of the ancient Chinese political civilization, investigates its influence and impact upon social politics, culture foundation and the post-impact and influence after it starts into effect. The focus of this thesis is to strive to sort out the original reasons why, in the long river of ancient history development, Hong Fang has always been stressed, promoted and utilized by the rulers.The 1st chapter — a summary, summarizing all the concerns Hong Fang has received and those related researches. This chapter also gives a brief introduction to the significance of researches concerned about Hong Fan, the starting point about the research to be conducted in this thesis and the original viewpoints of the writer.The 2~nd chapter is a re-consideration about the written ages of Hong-Fan. In history, there has been quite a long record of discussions related with the written ages of this book, and generally, there are a couple of opinions which are quite popular. This chapter tries to figure out the written ages of this book, not just taking the conversation record between King Zhou Wu and Ji Zi and the once very spreading conventional knowledge as the main clues to make the judgment. Here, Hong-Fan being placed under the general environment of society development, and with the light of the newly-found Jin-wen data and the epochal character of the Hong-Fan original text, the author comes to her conclusion, a new one, that Hong-Fan comes into being in the vigorous period of Western-Zhou dynasty, namely around the mid-age of the Western-Zhou Dynasty.The 3rd chapter is about the epochal character of the political civilization reflected in and read from Hong-Fan. Through summarizing and classifying the thought streams of Xiang, Shang dynasties and the beginning of the Zhou dynasty, this chapter tries to find out the political and philosophical foundation of the achievements of Hong-Fan. Though a second reading of the connotations of Hong Fan, the author tries to dig up the epochal character reflected by Hong Fan. The epochal character reflected by Hong Fan if as the following: as a "politics book, Hong Fan not only carries out the obvious ethical politics features of the ancient political civilization, but also it has a feature of consolidating the king's authority and privilege. It is of multi political function. The most radical change is that Hong Fan makes the clan ethics more political, abstract and systematical, and upgrades it to the stage political ethics. In the government Gao-book orders of Xia, Shang and the early Zhou dynasties, there are more ethical principles which are mostly focused on the specific religious benefits; Hong-Fan makes a systematical study of politics such as the common natural phenomena, society research and the man-god relation. Although there is still a strong sense of ethical politics, compared with books before it Hong Fan stresses the political principles and notions more.The 4th chapter is about the historical choices of Hong-Fan. After being released, Hong-Fan experienced different choices in different historical phases because of the political ethics of "the royal way". From the angles of various concerns and studies, the options can be divided into three main stages: the 1st stage is that of the Qin, Spring-autumn Warring States , the 2nd is that of the Han and Tung dynasties , and the option of the Song dynasty is the last stage. In the period of Spring-autumn Warring States, owing to its multi-political features, the different philosophers and authors in the time of the Warring States period was competitively involved in taking excerpts from Hong Fan for their different needs. However, in political practice, spreading "the kingly way " of the perfect ethics , and the clear and bright political is much more neglected; The neglected scholars change their enthusiasm to the philosophical culture realm, and they upgrade " virtuous", the essence of the religious ethics into mercy, justice, courtesy, wisdom and loyalty, which creates the earliest mature human philosophy in human civilization history. Following that, here appears the temporary silence of the "kingly political ethics " resulted by the enforced power politics of Qin.The 5th chapter is that in the Han-Tang period, out of their own practical needs, and with the study of the Confucian classics being deified, the "Wuxing" in Hong Fan is transformed, deducted into " the disastrous doctrine of Wuxing"; under the environment of, the political ethical concepts of Hong Fan was ,once again, attracting the attention of the rulers then. Hong-Fan, following that, becomes the model of the former kings as well as being a mysterious tool to predict the political trends. After Sung dynasty, there came various opinions about Hong Fan , with the further separation of the ancient Chinese social structures. The skepticism and the rejections of" the disasters doctrine of Wu-xing " of Hong Fan , during this period, shakes the foundation of the tight unity of the ancient politics and theology, and has had a significant impact upon the introductory theory, originated from Hong, that the ancient political civilization gradually develops beyond the between nature and mankind.Conclusion: After having been printed as a book, and coming along with the advancement of the ancient political civilization, Hong-Fan is developed, utilized and promoted as a very efficient royal means to achieving the ancient emperors' political soverign. At the same time, the political ethics reflected in Hong Fan produces an influence upon the ancient political civilization for thousands of years, with its specially wide-accepted and observed foundation. Thus, it sets ethics and moral as the dominant tendency for the ancient political civilization.