Chinese Studies Public Lecture

February 25, 12:00pm - 1:30pm
Mānoa Campus, Tokioka Room (Moore Hall 319)

Wednesday, February 25, 12:00 noon

Tokioka Room (Moore Hall 319)

“Confucian Statecraft and Arcane Leaning (玄學, xuanxue)”

Richard John Lynn, University of Toronto

Arcane leaning (xuanxue), which developed during the period of disunity after the collapse of the Han in 220 A.D., shifted attention from external and formulaic rules of social and individual thought, applied “wisdom” associated with Confucian sagehood, to spontaneous and unselfconscious behavior associated with “original human nature” and the great, natural Dao. The proponents of arcane learning, principally Wang Bi (226–249) and Guo Xiang (253–312), though Wang’s commentaries on the Classic of Changes and the Daode jing (Classic of the Way and Virtue) and Guo’s on the Zhuangzi (Sayings of Master Zhuang), fostered this new trend by redefining the concept of the sage-ruler in Daoist terms, a move they hoped would serve as catalyst for the regeneration of self and society and the foundation of a worldly utopia. Daoist foundational texts were thus read as treatises of statecraft, “advice to the prince,” blurring the Confucian-Daoist sectarian divide insisted on by so many later Chinese thinkers.

Richard John Lynn received his A.B. in Art and Archaeology from Princeton University in 1962, his Ph.D. in Asian Languages from Stanford University in 1971, and has held positions at several universities in New Zealand, Australia, the U.S.A. and Canada, finally serving as Professor of Chinese thought and literature at the University of Toronto in the Department of East Asian Studies, in which he is now Professor Emeritus. His publications include Kuan Yün-shih [1286–1324] (Twayne, 1980), Chinese Literature: A Draft Bibliography in Western European Languages (Australian National University Press, 1980), Guide to Chinese Poetry and Drama (G. K. Hall, 1984), The Classic of Changes: A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi (Columbia University Press, 1994; CD-ROM, 1996), The Classic of the Way and Virtue: A New Translation of the Tao-te ching of Laozi as Interpreted by Wang Bi (Columbia University Press, 1999). He is the editor of James J. Y. Liu, Language—Paradox—Poetics: A Chinese Perspective (Princeton University Press, 1988). Current works in progress include a new translation and study of the Daoist classic, the Zhuangzi, with the complete commentary of Guo Xiang (for Columbia University Press), and a book-length study of Huang Zunxian’s literary experiences in Japan (1877–82). He has published more than 100 book sections, journal articles and reviews.


Event Sponsor
Center for Chinese Studies and Confucius Institute at UHM, Mānoa Campus

More Information
(808) 956-8891, china@hawaii.edu

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