Research On Zhu Xi's View Of University

We usually insist that universities were founded in Europe in the middle ages.However,as one of the four original cultures,Chinese civilization also contains a set of culture and institution of higher education.Zhu Xi’s view of university and his educational practice are the most representative.However,it is deeply regrettable that the concept of higher education,which embodies the essence of Chinese traditional culture,has been hidden for a long time.Based on this problem consciousness,this research deeply explores the concept,content and institution of university education implied in Zhuism.Zhu Xi’s eternal educational wisdom can provide useful reference for the contemporary Chinese higher education and promote the construction of "Double First-Class" initiative.Zhu Xi is the only great master who can be compared with Confucius.His view of university is very profound and comprehensive.It has rich contents from the concept of university to educational practice,and then to the educational institution.Zhu Xi’s views of University can be studied from six aspects: the theory of concept of the university,the theory of curriculum,the theory of cognition,the theory of teaching,the theory of university’s value and the modern theory of classical university’s view.The first chapter is about the origin of the University,which discusses two kinds of historical views of the University in the field of pedagogy.This chapter points out the original characteristics of Chinese culture and education.Zhu Xi’s great contribution in the development of classical education is explained in detail.He reiterated the argumentation of the "golden mean" and continued the Confucian orthodoxy which had been broken for a long time.He integrated all works of the former Daoists and finally constructed a system of Four Book to replace the system of "Six Classics".Among the four books,Zhu Xi attached great importance to the book "The Great Learning ".He wrote “Variorum of The Great Learning” with his whole life’s energy.In the preface,he explained the contents and the sequence of the study of Chinese classical university,which deserves the high attention of today’s educators.It can be seen that Zhu Xi’s view of university is closely related to his Neo Confucianism theory.The Neo Confucianism tendency of education is the most distinctive feature.The second chapter is about the theory of university idea,which means what is the University in Zhu Xi’s mind.Zhu Xi always compared the concept of university with that of primary school.We can explain the meaning of University in Zhu Xi’s mind from the aspects of contents,age,rules,teaching materials and curriculum system.College students are those who study for the fundamental cause of everything.They are over 15-6 years old who have the foundation of primary school.Of course,a more profound connotation of the university should be explained in more detail from the perspective of Zhuism.The ontological significance of university can be seen in the Variorum of “The Great Learning” and “The Doctrine of the Mean”.Zhu Xi elaborated the union of heaven and human,which is "following the heaven and establishing the pole".He had made a comprehensive meeting for the two opposite directions of the study path: from heaven to man and from man to heaven.On the one hand,Zhu Xi promoted the heavenly principles to enlighten the people,on the other he urged students to study hard to obtain the heavenly principles.The education is prosperous in the meeting between heaven and man.Zhu Xi completed the important work of "establishing the human pole" in the promotion of the natural principles.He gave the University ontology based on Zhou Dunyi’s Taiji ontology and helped the students to reach the summum bonum with a simple way.He created a rational "Taiji education view" and opened a brilliant path of seeking knowledge.The third chapter is about the university curriculum theory.Zhu Xi’s most iconic contribution to education is to replace the Six Classics with Four books,thus creating a new curriculum system.His new curriculum lays more emphasis on the principles and clarifies the new order of study,thus opening a new era of education and continuously influencing Chinese education for 700 years.Although the education of yuan,Ming and Qing Dynasties paid attention to classic learning as well as that of Han and Tang Dynasties,the teaching materials,paths and emphases of learning were quite different.Zhu Xi set up a new understanding standard for"Four Books"by his Variorum of the Four Books(《四书章句集注》)and guided students to focus on the study of Fate,Nature,Tao and morality.He supervised his students to pay attention to moral practice and social care.The fourth chapter is about epistemology.Zhu Xi’s most creative contribution is to establish a new epistemology based on "Gewuzhizhi".He creatively made a supplementary biography of the book of The Great Learning,reinterpreted the meaning of "Gewuzhizhi".In practice,he made himself serve as an example to others through studying astrogeography tirelessly.This kind of works had greatly promoted the development of ancient Chinese science,also brought natural physics into the scope of university learning,and reshaped the classical university education.Zhu Xi provided a new Archimedes Fulcrum for the university with his epistemology of “Gewuzhizhi”.However,under the influence of Confucian "Mingdao" and "Mingde",Zhu Xi had been wandering between natural physics and social ethics,and failed to reach the height of Western procedural modern science.But the study of Gezhi has indeed opened up the scientific view and educational view to ancient China.The fifth chapter is about the university teaching theory,which mainly discusses the way of teaching.Zhu Xi paid attention to the construction of "heaven and earth" in education from the perspective of heavenly principle,and insisted that the teacher’s teaching was based on the guidance of "positive life" of students.He had lectured for more than 50 years in his life,pushing the tradition of lecturing from Confucius to its peak.Even in the historical background of the western modern educational institution gradually becoming the mainstream,Liang Shuming and other people moved against the trend,hoping to revive Zhu Xi’s style of lectures.The spirit of Zhu Xi’s lecture is more beneficial to the western learning and its education system under the regulation of rationalism.Its advantages had been rejuvenated by the efforts of Liang Shuming and others.So,this kind of educational spirit could help to create a group of democratic and tolerant,steadfast,and good-natured scholars to complete the education task of "building virtue and cultivating people".The sixth chapter is about the theory of university’s value.Zhu Xi had always insisted on criticizing the imperial examination but vigorously advocated "studying for oneself"."Learning for oneself" reveals Zhu Xi’s basic attitude towards education and learning.Although the idea of "Learning for oneself" was founded on Confucius,it was made manifest by Zhu Xi.Yongjia school was a typical representative of "learning for others".It had always been committed to the teaching of literatures in the imperial examination.It provided far more convenience than Neo Confucianism in helping scholars to obtain scholarly honour and official rank.However,it had the defects of vagueness,distortion,narrowness and self-deception.As the most practical science of imperial examination,Yongjia school was finally eliminated by history.Zhu Xi’s educational idea was not concerned with the current literatures,but only paid attention to the theories of righteousness and principles which were practical and beyond the secular utilities.Finally Zhuism became the guiding principle of the imperial examination.The decline of Yongjia school and the rise of Zhuism set a good example of the history of culture and education,in which the historical wisdom revealed reminds today’s university managers to stay away from the misleading of utilitarian,not to follow the market and capital to become the servant girl of utilitarianism.The university must be independent,profound and farreaching in the secular world.She should transcend and lead the reality with superb insight rather than stay at the level of conforming and catering to the reality.Only by getting rid of the position of stepping stone or some other instrumentals,the university can avoid the fate of collapse.The seventh chapter focuses on the modern significance of the classical view of university and its enlightenment to today’s higher education.First of all,in the process of modernization,the university gradually lost the horizon of heaven and earth,resulting in a certain loss of the spirit of education.It caused many symptoms of educational modernity.However,Zhu Xi’s educational thought inspires us to reintroduce the idea of "the unity of heaven and man",to open up the horizon of heaven and earth that existed in ancient times.So Zhuism can help us to expand the understanding space of "man",take "heaven and earth" as the broad context of university education,transcend all kinds of narrowness and deviation of education modernity,continue the broad,profound classical education tradition,and relocate the University between heaven and earth to resist all kinds of dwarfism and degradation brought by educational modernity.Secondly,Zhu Xi’s educational spirit was a cooling agent of utilitarianism.He advocated "self-work" to help students to build themselves,encouraged young people to avert their eyes from the glittering and attractive things to their hearts so as to get a kind of expansion and transformation of vision.Thirdly,Zhu Xi’s theory of oneness emphasized learning from the trivial knowledge as to understand the natural principle as a whole.Today’s university education seems to have been staying at detail things,focusing on the collection and analysis of information rather than reaching up the big principle.It reminds us that we can not be satisfied with scattered information and narrow disciplines,but also strive to raise all kinds of knowledge to the heavenly principles.In a word,based on the philosophy of Neo Confucianism,Zhu Xi innovated the new concept of university,compiled new textbooks,developed a new curriculum system,and adopted a new epistemology to revitalize new schools(academies).Although he had not published independent and systematic works on pedagogy,he had already clarified his educational views in his variorum,anthologies and categories.Therefore,we can say fairly: in addition to the modern university institution in the west,there is another lost "university" in the ancient east,which is based on the educational tradition of the unity of man and nature,and this view of university is also excluded from the overall vision of modern education.This kind of ancient view of university does not loss its vitality,but modern university lost a broad vision and magnificent imagination.The modernization of education should keep surpassing modernity.One of the ways to accomplish this task is to embark on the road of classical education.Therefore,in order to effectively get rid of the shadow of educational modernity,Chinese universities need to return to classical and try to be creative so as to open a new chapter of education in the new era.