Xunzi

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Xunzi bigraphy, stories - Chinese philosopher

Xunzi : biography

Xunzi ( ca. 312–230 BC) was a Chinese Confucian philosopher who lived during the Warring States Period and contributed to one of the Hundred Schools of Thought. Xunzi believed man’s inborn tendencies need to be curbed through education and ritual, counter to Mencius’s view that man is innately good. He believed that ethical norms had been invented to rectify mankind.

Educated in the state of Qi, Xunzi was associated with the Confucian school, but his philosophy has a pragmatic flavour compared to Confucian optimism. Some scholars attribute it to the divisive times.

Xunzi was one of the most sophisticated thinkers of his time, and was the teacher of Li Si and Han Fei Zi.

Life

Xunzi was born Xun Kuang (荀況), courtesy name Qing (卿). Some texts recorded his surname as Sun (孫) instead of Xun, either because the two surnames were homophones in antiquity or because Xun was a naming taboo at some point in history. Herbert Giles says the name was changed to Sun during the reign of Emperor Xuan of Han (73–48 BC) because Xun was the personal name of the Emperor himself.

The name "Xunzi" is an honorary title that means "Master Xun".

The early years of Xunzi’s life are enshrouded in mystery. He was first known at the age of fifty, around 264 BC, when he went to the state of Qi to study and teach at the Jixia Academy. Xunzi was well respected in Qi; the King Xiang of Qi (齊襄王) honoured him as a teacher and a libationer. It was around this time that Xunzi visited the state of Qin and praised its governance, and debated military affairs with Lord Linwu (臨武君) in the court of King Xiaocheng of Zhao (趙孝成王). Later, Xunzi was slandered in the Qi court, and he retreated south to the state of Chu, where Lord Chunshen of Chu (春申君), the prime minister, gave him a position as Magistrate of Lanling (蘭陵令). In 238 BC, Lord Chunshen was assassinated by a court rival and Xun Zi subsequently lost his position. Xunzi remained in Lanling, a region in what is today’s southern Shandong province, for the rest of his life and was buried there. The year of his death is unknown.

Of his disciples, the most notable are Li Si (prime minister to the first Qin emperor) and the Han state royal Han Feizi, who developed the quasi-authoritarian aspects of his thought into the doctrine called the School of Law, or Legalism. Because of Li Si and Han Feizi’s staunch anti-Confucian stances, Xunzi’s reputation as a Confucian philosopher has often come into question.

While Xunzi’s doctrines were influential in forming the official state doctrine of the Han Dynasty, during the Tang Dynasty his influence waned compared to that of Mencius.

The Xunzi

Unlike the aphoristic style of the Analects and Mencius, Xunzi was a more rigorous thinker and wrote elaborately argued essays, which were collected into the book called Xunzi. He distinguishes what is born in man and what must be learned through rigorous education. These essays are often critical of competing schools, such as Daoism and Mohism, as well as rival schools within Confucianism. Some of the more significant chapters are

  • "Discussion of heaven (天 tian)" rejects the Mencian notion that heaven has a moral will. Instead, Xun Zi asserts that heaven is simply the natural world; thus people should focus on the human, social realm, rather than dealing with heavenly ideas.
  • "Discussion of Ritual Propriety (li)," discusses rules of individual and social conduct (decorum).
  • "Dispelling Obsessions," being too focused on only one aspect of a situation, one often loses sight of the larger purpose.
  • "Proper Use of Terms" (正名 zhengming): A name becomes proper for a situation through conventional usage, but once this is fixed, it is improper to deviate from these norms. Thus he adopts a conventional view for the origin of the sound-to-meaning mapping, although the objects signified by the term remain real.