Remarks On FangDongmei's Philosophy Of Life

In the ancient Chinese philosophy history, the life question also was one of its major issues. As early as philosophy in the ancient Qin Dynasty, concepts like"propagates""turns""changes" and so on have all become important categories. China's first performance in the awareness of traditional philosophy of life, is taking the basis natural law, the metaphysical foundation of all theory, as a creative life course.The natural law is not isolated, but realizes its own in the myriad things nurtures and propagations, just as Confucius said:"Does Heaven speak? The four seasons pursue their courses, and all things are continually being produced, but does Heaven say anything?""The Doctrine of the Mean"also formulates the purpose of existence and activities in the"natural law"as containing and fostering all things on earth, and suggests that the ideal active state of this creative mechanism is"Neutralization": "Achieving neutralization, heaven and earth posit, and all things on earth grow". The Taoism also has similar understanding to the creative essence of natural law. Moreover, Taoist advocates the instinct state of natural life more. The Buddhism and Zen thought in the afterwards, pays the core attention to the immediate experience of life and the Buddhism realm extricating self being worried.Therefore, one can say that the traditional Chinese philosophy is essentially a form of life philosophy. We just lack the ability to reflect the self form of philosophy. Hence, the spirit of life philosophy is always being a kind of non-conscious form. It was not until after the May 4th Movement, with the large-scale introduction of Western philosophy, the Chinese and Western Philosophies made a direct collision when exchanging and the issue has become more and more prominent. Therefore, while the modern well-known thinkers introduced the western thought into China, they also have carried on the excavation and the reconstruction to the traditional Chinese philosophy of life. In their efforts, the subsequent scholars gradually pay more and more attention to the philosophy of life.In particular, the philosophical thought of life of Fang Dongmei, a Taiwan scholar, is broad and extremely unrestrained. In the course of communicating with the Western philosophy, he summarized and abstracted all the traditional life spirit of the Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, to form a philosophical structure with the mainstay of life philosophy. It can be said that Fang Dongmei reached a peak in exerting the inherent life spirit of the Chinese philosophy. In his views, the Chinese philosophy had been focused on one centralizing for life philosophy since the Spring and Autumn Period. This life involves not only the plants, animals, and all human beings, but also the so-called primary existence. After all, the most healthful mood of life is exhibited by the "full and harmonious" spirit of Chinese philosophy. This means China's ontology is one that concentrates on life. Using the dual-return logical approach of Hua-yen Sect, Fang Dongmei devoted his lifelong efforts to draw the blueprint of person and world in the ideal culture.The upward return is to give full play to one's great creativity, making his personality rising from the material realm to the religious and moral realm, and eventually into the total religion that never said all habitats; After reaching the highest realm, the downward return is to exhibit the immense power that God hides in the highest realm of the universe, and make it flow over all areas, eventually arrive at the lowest material world. So everything in the universe has a sacred force, and reaches the sacred realm. It can be described as: the upward return focus on becoming oneself, and the downward return focus on objects. This concept is a precursor as a mode of thinking with both realization and practice that all mingle and interact with each other. The great value of Fang Dongmei's ontology on life spirit is enriching and substantiating the vision of all things, not fall to abstract and nothingness.Fang Dongmei deepened his understanding to the Western philosophy of life during the long-term research and teaching in Western Philosophy, and found links with the Western philosophy of life in the "Book of Changes". What's particularly important is that he had a strong tendency to seek common ground but reserve differences while evaluating the Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism. In expatiating on Chinese philosophy, he always set out from life philosophy with the Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism together, independent without a ruling. His complicated system of life philosophy links and unifies broadly, which deeply agrees with the core of life, and reveals the essence of life in many respects. To some extent, it summarizes the characteristics and common natures in Chinese philosophy, becoming one of the important initial outcomes in the process of reconstructing modern Chinese philosophy.As requested by the philosophy of life, a new form of Chinese philosophy should concern about the situation of human existence and the reality, and propose relevant issues and solutions. Although the traditional Chinese philosophy of life has become something of the past, its spirit is not lost. We will continue to review this tradition and obtain a source of inspiration and new ideas. Perhaps it can be like Western that Chinese philosophy of life will flow into many new academic ideas, and promote the development of philosophy. It is very important for the reconstruction of the system of values in modern society. Since the modern industrial civilization and self-alienation has not been eliminated, and is increasingly growing nowadays that materialization of human life and the media become more and more common; therefore, it is no wonder to mention philosophy of life again and hope to have new ideas and motivation, for life is an eternal theme.