Han Yu's Classics Test

HanYu is a famous scholar in Tang Dynasty in China. HanYu not only had a great many ofworks in Chinese literature history, but also made outstanding contribution in the development ofancient Confucianism and classics in China. HanYu was a thoughtful scholar with literature,philosophy and politics. The writer mainly discussed HanYu’s ideas with Confucian classicswhich was little concerned before. HanYu’s contribution mainly included these items such as thecreation of Confucian viewpoints, summary of Buddhism and Maohism, the invention of themeans for classics, and the establishment of the supreme of The Great Learning and Mencius. Allthose provided the basis of the production and development of Confucian school of idealistphilosophy of the Song and Ming Dynasty. HanYu tried to find resources of development fromthe history and works of the classics, revealed the direction of development of the study, whichhad a great influence on later generations. Therefore, HanYu played an indispensable role, andoccupied an important position in the history of Chinese classics and Confucianism.Therefore, the study of Han Yu thought is very important and necessary. This paperdiscussed this subject with eleven chapters. In Chapter1, the writer mainly introduces the lifeand works of HanYu. In this chapter, the writer first introduced HanYu’s ancestors, and discussedHanYu’s history of struggle for official rank, which showed the ups and downs of his life to theworld. And then the writer discussed Confucian thought and works of Han Yu from a transverseangle.In the chapter2-8, the writer conducted a longitudinal analysis of the collected works of HanYu. According to the classification of Han Yu, the writer based on the Confucian classics andmade the quotations and detailed arrangement in order to analyze the works of Han Yu againstthe use of traditional Confucian classics, which more clearly showed in its article of Confucianthought. The writer firstly analyzed the cited books of HanYu, and then summarized thequotations of Confucian thought in each chapter. In other words, Classics of Changes wasanalyzed in Chapter2; Classics of Documents was analyzed in Chapter3; Classics of Songs wasanalyzed in Chapter4; Classics of Rituals was analyzed in Chapter5; Classics of Spring andAutumn was analyzed in Chapter6; The Analects of Confucius was analyzed in Chapter7;Mencius was analyzed in Chapter8.In Chapter9-10, the writer made careful study on “Dao” and “The Study to Analects ofConfucius” in the Collections of HanYu." Dao " and " the Analects of Confucius " were twovery representative works of HanYu, which embodied the thought of HanYu. So, the writerrecorded these works in full text, and then analyzed one by one in order to highlight the implied meaning of them.In chapter9, the writer made a study to “Dao”.“Dao” ranked the first of the works "Wuyuan " written by HanYu, which had been considered to be the required book for the study ofHanYu’s thought. In this article, HanYu delivered his philosophical ideas while he put forwardthe Confucian ideas thought. In addition, HanYu also discussed other ideas including thesupreme of Mengzi, self-cultivation and so on in this article. Therefore, all those ideas were thebreakthrough to traditional Confucianism, and embodiment of the promotion and transformationof Confucianism theory, which played an important role in HanYu thought.In chapter10, the writer discussed “The Study to Analects of Confucius”.“The Study toAnalects of Confucius” was written by HanYu and Li‘ao altogether, which embodied aconcentrated reflection of the new method of HanYu, and classical thoughts of HanYu. HanYumade the suspicion of Confucianism and its old note, and re-interpreted the classics with hisunderstanding, which was admired by scholars of Song Dynasty and had great influence on latergenerations.In Chapter11, the writer discussed the classical thoughts of HanYu and its historicalposition, which was comprehensive interpretation of Han Yu’s Confucian thought, and summaryto HanYu’ s status in the history.Through this paper, the writer hoped that she could show HanYu’s thought to the worldcomprehensively and deeply, so that more scholars could understand its peculiar contribution inthe history of the classics, and its important role in the development of Confucianism in the lateperiod. Of course, the writer also hoped this paper could help the study of HanYu’s thought.