The Study Of Xunzi’s Gentleman Thought

As a master of the pre-Qin Confucianism, Xunzi was faced with the social crisis that the moral degeneration of society is getting worse, the prices govern principalities by different measures and the schools advocate various theories. In order to cultivate the personnel who not only has Confucian style, but also the responsibility of governing the country, and re-establish the social and moral order,Xunzi presents rich contents and distinctive gentleman thought. Xunzi regards the "evil human nature" as the thought’s theoretical foundation, highlighting the central role of "ritual", achieving humanity by courtesy, to learn over ceremony. With "righteousness" as the gentleman’s fundamental, he systematically expounded the "full, pure, beautiful" gentleman.According to Xunzi, the "gentleman" is not only the beginning of the original etiquette, law and imitation, but also the fundamental guarantee to maintain the normal operation of society. So he emphatically discusses the standard and the concrete characteristics of gentleman personality. Based on inheriting the Confucian "righteousness quality", he proposed gentleman’s viewpoint on justice and interests that "righteousness and interest are the two features of human being, restricting benefit by means of justice".And according to people’s attitude between justice and interests, Xunzi divided honor and disgrace and elaborated gentleman’s outlook on honor and dishonor which is that "who choose the righteousness before benefit is honorable, otherwise shameful". In addition, Xunzi further pointed out ways to achieve the ideal gentleman, stressed the later approach impact such as "the environment mechanism", "erudite and exercise" and "edutainment".Though the way that "train themselves out of human nature" and "accumulates good deeds to the perfect virtue", people can achieve the realm of scholar, gentleman and sage.At present, our country is in a period of social transformation. With the rapid development of economy, moral decline issues are also increasingly prominent. To solve this problem, strengthen civic morality, it is necessary to fully understand the gentleman thought of Xunzi, reasonably draw its beneficial ingredients to achieve its modern value of the conversion. Throughout Xunzi’s gentleman thought, it is not difficult to find that the proposition such as "ritual law Gentleman", "restricting benefit by means of justice", "accumulates good deeds to the perfect virtue"and many other flash point for us today to improve democracy, standardize the market economy, strengthen the moral construction, building the socialist harmonious society has important referential significance.Through a deep analysis of the background and theoretical foundation of Xunzi’s gentleman thought, as well as the main content and ways, this thesis expands in a detailed systematic comb, trying to open up new prospects for the study of the Confucian gentleman concept. In further studies, it analyzes the impact on future generations of Xunzi’s gentleman though. Finally, we discussed it to enhance our personal accomplishment, strengthen the moral construction of modern revelation, in order to re-evoke people inherit and promote the traditional Chinese culture.