The Culture Transition Around Oingli Period:the Historical Creation Of Song-Xue

The Qingli Period in North Song Dynasty is a critical time in the history of Chinese thought and culture. It was the transition period from Han-Tang Culture to Song Culture as well as the developing time of Song-xue. It was a prospering time in the field of thought and culture under the ruling of Song Renzong. It was a time that many rare factors mixed together and helped to bring about the transition:the culture-focus social environment, the lenient political style of Song Renzong, the stimulus of domeistic trouble and foreign invasion, the high spirits and subject sense of literati, the free social environment of opinion and the doubt spirit about classical canon. A new kind of intellectual appeared. They were active in every sphere, not only in politics but also in academic learning.We can divided the transition into three stages:the first stage, from Tiansheng to Kangding, it was the preparing time of Song-xue; from Qingli to Huangyou, it was the developing time of Song-xue, the trends of doubt thought appeared in the sphere of academic field; from Zhihe to Jiayou. it was the further developing time of Song-xue, the trends of probing into the meaning of Tao and Tian-ming became popular, the taking shape of the New Confucianism and the further developing of literature.The culture transition mainly occurred in three fields:the explanation of classical canon, the New Confucianism and literature. The denial of commentaries about canon made by scholars in Han dynasty firstly appeared. They wanted to find the real meaning of those canons. They explained classical Confucian canon in a new viewpoint with their own understanding and creative explanation, which became an academic trend in that time. They cleared out the mysterious factors of canon made by the literati in Han dynasty and returned to the social aspects of classical canon.The New Confucianism, which appeared in Qingli period, represents the outstanding and key achievement of Confucianism in Song dynasty. It is the forming time of the New Confucianism in Qingli period which developed in many sphere such as moral training and human relationship. The focus of Confucianism changed into the domain of Xin and Xing, which probed into the relationship between moral training and the nature of existence. The New Confucianism drew lessons from Budism and Taoism, formed a complicted theory system which included many concepts with new meanings such as Tao, Li. Xin, Xing and Qi. On many theory spheres, such as moral training, ontology and theory of knowlodge, the New Confucianism won the competition with its subtle understanding about moral training and ultimate concern. Xing and Tao became the main subject of New Confucianism. It explored how to explain the connection of cosmos and human being and tried to find the formal standard of human society as well as the way to cultivate one’s moral character. In the meanwhile The academic focus of Confucianism changed from Wujing to Sishu, by which the New Confucianist formed their theory.The style of literature also changed in the period of Qingli and made up the whole culture transition. The movement of ancient Chinese prose, which stimulated by the rejuvenation of Confucianism, made its last success and a new style of prose which emphasized on smoothness and plainness took the place of flowery style, in the meantime, a new kind of poetry style which emphasized on reason, knowledge and smoothness established and replaced the imitating style which was popular in the beginning of Song dynasty.