First, oppose the alienation reality of "artificial material service"
Zhuangzi lived in the Warring States Period, which was a changeable and turbulent time in the history of China. The gradual disintegration of the clan system and the collapse of the early slave society did not bring the stability and happiness that people expected. On the contrary, with the relentless advance of the wheel of history and the rapid growth of social wealth, various social contradictions and crises have become more acute. "Fighting to kill people; Fight for the city, fight for the city. " (Mencius on Li Lou) "There is fat in the stables, and there are fat horses in the stables, hungry people and hungry wild people", (Mencius on Hui Liang) "The princes are not sick, and Shu Ren is better than the barren land" (On Xunzi). There are wars and smoke everywhere, tears and blood, extortion, conspiracy and killing, power and repression, hypocrisy and cruelty. "In this life, desperate people sleep together, eager people push each other, and punished people face to face." ("Zhuangzi Zaiqi"), the following quotes Zhuangzi, only the title of the article) "At this time, only rabbits are punished." The life in troubled times made Zhuangzi depressed, doubted, wavered and even disillusioned with traditional values and beliefs. Living in troubled times and dragging out an ignoble existence in the shadow of swords made him deeply think and explore the status and value of human life.
Zhuangzi thinks that man is insignificant in the universe;
"I am between heaven and earth, and Xiao Mu is among the mountains; I almost see less square inches, and I laugh at myself! All over the world, unlike the empty base in osawa? China is at home, isn't he? Brother he? Is the rice in big warehouse? Tens of thousands of things, people are at a loss; People die in Kyushu, grains are born, boats and cars are connected, and people are there; This is more important than anything else, unlike the last horse? " (autumn water)
The sea between heaven and earth is just an ant nest in osawa; China is just a grain of rice in the big warehouse within the four seas; Compared with all things, the individual is just a hair on the horse. Zhuangzi put the limited individual life into the infinite universe time and space to know it, so that the individual life of man is only an appendage of heaven and earth:
"You are not you, ... what is this? Yue: it is the shape of heaven and earth; Life is not yours, it is the commission of heaven and earth; Life is not yours, it is entrusted by heaven and earth; Children and grandchildren are not yours, but the Committee of heaven and earth. " Man is just an accidental parasite between heaven and earth. Life and death, like the changes of the four seasons and the changes of day and night, are beyond the reach of human beings. "Life and death, life also, is often night denier, day also. People have objections and everything has feelings. " (Great Master) When a person is born, he faces the fate of death. This is a natural law and human resources cannot be changed. This fatigue of life and death made Zhuangzi feel that a powerful natural alien force was dominating mankind. "People are born with worries", and how to get rid of the mental pressure of life and death (happiness) is a serious problem put forward by Zhuangzi's philosophy of life, an eternal problem of "the worries of biology and the worries of people". ("Know the North Tour")
People are not only suppressed by natural alien forces, but also by social alien forces.
Social unrest will inevitably lead to a crisis of faith. Zhuangzi witnessed that "those who are shameless are rich, and those who believe more are obvious" ("Stealing Foot"), "Those who steal the hook are punished, and those who steal the country are kings" ("Landing on the Moon"), and questioned Confucianism's benevolence, righteousness, rites and music to maintain society and people's hearts. Zhuangzi borrow stolen plantar mouth said:
"What is appropriate without evil! The husband's false intention is hidden in the room, and it is also holy; Be first, be brave; After leaving, Ye Yi! Know whether, know also; Share equally and be kind. Those who are unprepared can be thieves, and there is nothing in the world. " ("the moon is gone")
It is the saints who rob, the brave who rob, the leaders who rob, and the righteous who walk last. It is wisdom to judge whether the robbery can be carried out, and it is righteousness to divide the dirt equally. Benevolence and wisdom have become a fig leaf for stealing the country and robbing the world, and holy law has become the best excuse for plundering the people. Not only the country was stolen, but also the "law of divine knowledge" was stolen. Therefore, although "there is a thief's name, and in the security of Yao and Shun, small countries dare not judge and big countries dare not punish", ("The Moon is gone") does whatever they want on the heads of the people. However, those who really do benevolence and righteousness will not die a natural death: "The master wants the loyalty of the minister, but loyalty may not be believed, so the soldiers swayed in the river and Changhong died in Shu." ("Foreign Things") "When a dragon encounters a chop, it is better than a dry chop, and Changhong returns to the moon. The son is arrogant, and the sage of the four sons must not die." The reason why the monarch dares to be so unscrupulous is because the "holy law" respects the monarch. Confucianism's benevolence, righteousness, propriety and happiness, on the one hand, have become "tools for greedy birds" (Xu Wugui), tools for the ruling class to bring disaster to the country and the people, on the other hand, they have become "shackles" imposed by the ruling class. The "sages" who believe in it and practice it are not immune. Justice, right and wrong, and conscience have disappeared, and Machiavellian greed and shameless influence the operation of society. Society and "holy law" have become frightening alien forces, which is the alienation of society. In such a society, human nature is distorted:
"The world runs in righteousness, right and wrong and righteousness? Therefore, I try to talk about it. Starting from the following three generations, the world will exchange things for sex. Villains die for profit, scholars die for fame, doctors die for home, and saints die for the world. So several children, with different careers and different reputations, were all injured by martyrs. ..... Boyi died under Shouyang, and the death of stealing feet was beneficial to Dongling. Two people die differently, which is also harmful to their later lives. What Xi Bi Bo is doing is stealing his feet! The world is also martyred, and martyrdom is a gentleman; The goods and wealth he sacrificed were also vulgar people. If he is martyred, there are gentlemen and villains. If he is ruined, he will steal his feet and put the gentleman and villain in the middle! " ("thumb")
How profound the word "martyrdom" is! In Zhuangzi's view, all secular moral beliefs and values are "things". These man-made things alienated people into people, making people sleep in a trance, and when they wake up, they are restless, intrigued and wary of each other; Clever use of chain stratagems, secretly setting traps; Sometimes fear, sometimes pride, sometimes sadness, sometimes arrogance. People are full of jealousy, intrigues, traps, intrigues, injuries and chaos. In order to live like an animal, people "are at loggerheads, but Fukashi. Not sad at all! " Life-long service has not been achieved, fatigue does not know its return, do not mourn its evil! People call it death, Yi Xi! Its shape, its heart and it can't be called great compassion? People's lives, if it is a mountain? "("On the Homology of Things ") What's the point of this ignorant life, even if it is alive!
In Zhuangzi's view, the reason for this kind of "losing oneself to things" and "losing nature to vulgarity" (The Book of Mending Heaven) is precisely the concept and system of human beings themselves:
"And the husband to hook rope gauge and is, to cut its sex; Waiting for the ink rope to be stuck and solidified is a violation of virtue; Those who talk about benevolence and righteousness to comfort the hearts of the world will lose their popularity. " ("thumb")
Rites, music, benevolence and righteousness were originally intended to appease the hearts of the world; It can be the cause of the great decline of the world, the glue that binds and kills people, and the violent tool that makes people "lose Chang Ran". Not only courtesy, joy, benevolence and righteousness, but also the progress of civilization will become a force to alienate people:
"If you are honest and know that you have no way, the world will be in chaos."
Every time there is chaos in the world, the sin lies in knowing.
"If there is a machine, there will be organic matter, and people with organic matter will have the heart of organic matter. If the machine is in the chest, then pure white is not prepared, and if pure white is not prepared, then god is uncertain; God is uncertain, and the Tao is not loaded. " (heaven and earth)
The progress of civilization and technology has not only failed to make people happy, on the contrary, it has caused chaos in the world, damaged people's inner bodies, destroyed their spirits and made people "lose their sex". Of course, due to historical limitations, Zhuangzi did not understand that historical disasters are often made up by historical progress. Compared with primitive clan society, the society in the stage of ignorance is indeed "a kind of depravity, a kind of depravity that left the peak of simple morality in ancient clan society" The most humble interests-vulgar greed, rude lust, humble material desire and selfish plunder of public property-have opened a new civilized class society. The most despicable means-theft, violence, fraud and breach of trust-destroyed the ancient classless clan system and led to its collapse. (The Origin of Family, Private Ownership and State, Selected Works of Marx and Engels, Vol.4, p.94) However, Zhuangzi saw the phenomenon of "the next three generations", that is, after the disintegration of primitive clan society, the phenomenon of "artificial slavery" became more and more serious, thus realizing the contradiction and conflict between human existence as an individual and society, and put forward that "chaos must be born between Yao and Shun, and its end must exist after a thousand years. "After a thousand years, there will be people who eat with others." This has its own progressive role in history. Zhuangzi's angry words "are probably the earliest anti-alienation voice in the history of world thought." (See Selected Works of Li Zehou's Philosophy and Aesthetics for Li Zehou's "Talking about Zhuang Zen", page 73)
How to find a way out?
Second, the road beyond suffering-"being in harmony with the Tao"
In order to find a kind of liberation and transcendence, Zhuangzi put forward the concept of "Tao":
"The husband loves and believes, but does nothing but see; Transmissible but unacceptable, accessible but invisible; Since its roots, there is no heaven and earth, and it has existed since ancient times; Ghosts were born; Above Tai Chi, it is not high, but below the six poles, it is not deep, born, not long, longer than ancient, not old. " (Grand Master)
This pre-existing and eternal Tao does exist, but it is invisible and intangible. It produces all kinds of ghosts and gods, transcending time and space. "If you are unconscious, you will exist, but you will be invisible. Everything is unknown to animals." In Zhuangzi's view, matter and spirit, tangible and intangible, are all produced by Tao, and everything runs and develops according to its own characteristics. This is Tao. Tao is endless, endless and exists in all things. Therefore, Zhuangzi's Tao is neither a personality god nor an absolute idea, but an infinite entity and the origin of the universe. All concrete things are knowable, limited, partial, birth and death, and only Tao is unknowable, infinite, chaotic and eternal. It is precisely because everything is produced by Tao and is a different embodiment of Tao that "from the perspective of Tao, nothing is noble and nothing is cheap". There is no difference between poverty, wealth, wealth, gain and loss, life and death, and fame. In Zhuangzi's eyes, the value difference between heaven and earth is artificial. With the difference, there is competition and trouble. Therefore, if we want to transcend the reality and the suffering of life, we can only "be of the same mind", and those who are ignorant of the same mind will be self-indulgent and "do nothing without doing anything". If everything is left to itself, we can get rid of the shackles of reality and gain "absolute freedom." "Unfavorable goods and wealth are not close to your wealth; Do not like life, do not mourn; Not compatible, not ugly or poor. " (Heaven and Earth) "I don't know how to be happy, I don't know how to die." (Master) "Call me a cow, call me a horse." (Heaven) "Heaven and earth coexist with me, and everything is one with me." (On the Homology of Things) Things, life and death, interests, good and evil, beauty and ugliness have all disappeared, and fame and power have also been seen through. Man and Tao become one, and things change from the power of dissidents to harmony with people. "Things are spring" ("De Chong Fu") and "Things are not things" ("Mountain Tree")
Third, the brilliance of ideal personality-"independence and spiritual communication between heaven and earth"
"Fellowship" means that people are freed from man-made and self-made restrictions, constraints and domination, and the opposition between subject and object is annihilated, thus achieving an ideal personality-"Zhiren" (sometimes called "real person", "divine person" and "saint").
Zhuangzi described the image of a free-flying Dapeng in "Happy Travel", which means "taking advantage of the righteousness of heaven and earth, resisting the debate of six qi, and swimming endlessly". This ideal "people-oriented" personality conforms to the laws of the natural universe, grasps the ups and downs of Yin and Yang, swims freely in infinite and eternal time and space, and is not restricted and bound by any external force ("things"), except for the self-centered prejudice and the bondage of fame and fortune, and reaches the realm of spiritual communication with heaven and earth. People are not free because of subjective and objective restrictions. Once they are free from subjective and objective restrictions, they will be completely liberated and completely free.
For this ideal personality, there are many descriptions in Zhuangzi:
"Leave the mountain of ancient shooting, live in god, if the skin is ice and snow, graceful as a virgin, not eating grains, sucking wind and drinking dew; Ride the clouds, descend the dragons and travel around the world. Its spirit is condensed, so that things are not incomplete and immature in the years. ..... People, virtue, everything is one, the world is in chaos, what's the harm in the world! Things are also, things don't hurt, and they don't drown in the sky. Drought, stone flow, earth mountain scorched but not hot. Because dirt is not as good as chaff, even people who dare to follow Tao Zhu are willing to treat things as things. " ("Xiaoyao Tour")
Zhuangzi just wants to show that the ideal personality is far away from the secular-he lives in a "reserved mountain"; It is pure-"skin is like ice and snow, graceful as a virgin"; It is free-"travel around the world by flying clouds and dragons"; It is eternal-"the injury of things"; Great-"Its soil and fire are not as good as chaff, and it still makes Tao Zhu Yao and Shun".
This ideal personality has got rid of worldly "things", transcended the dirty world, coexisted with light, with the universe, and integrated with everything, giving up chaos and ignoring it, and maintaining simplicity and purity in the "servile" crowd. Take a detached attitude towards everything. They are carefree and unrestrained, forget life and death, return to nature, and become one with "Heaven" and "Tao".
In a word, Zhuangzi advocated "taking heaven as teaching and morality as foundation", which was willful and natural, and opposed anyone's human behavior. I believe that once you don't serve things, transcend all the fetters of life and death, secularity and self, and wander in infinity, your spirit will be as free and broad as the universe. Such people are no longer slaves and tools of things. Pain can be eliminated, and the mind can be stable.
It is not difficult to see that the ideal personality image held high by Zhuangzi is in sharp contrast with the abnormal personality distorted by social system, morality, ethics, values and personal prejudice in real life, which shines with the brilliance of anti-authority, anti-idol and anti-traditional values, and embodies the human desire for spiritual liberation and personality liberation.
Fourth, the crime of meritorious deeds for thousands of years —— Historical reflection on Zhuangzi's philosophy of life
Zhuangzi's philosophy of life is a profound ideological system with rich connotation and extension. It is a mixture of mud and sand, jade and jade, wisdom and stupidity, reality and fantasy, practice and fantasy, essence and dross, which has a negative and positive impact on the cultural and psychological structure of the Chinese nation.
The negative side is:
Seeing the tragic reality of "man-made material servitude" in class society, Zhuangzi destroyed benevolence and sanctified, mocked Confucianism and Mohism, and attacked ceremony with joy. He was furious, turned to civilized pessimism, denied and abandoned culture, technology and wisdom, and demanded to return to the muddled ancient times and live a life of "being indifferent". It's like throwing dirty water on children. It's too much. The denial of civilization, material interests and human desires makes people live in a state of ignorance and no desire, which is exactly what feudal absolutism needs. At this point, Zhuangzi's philosophy of life coincides with Confucian asceticism, but one is to go back to the primitive to destroy people's desires, and the other is to imprison people's desires with courtesy. The feudal rulers of past dynasties advocated "poverty leads to life, pleasure leads to morality" and "keeping justice and eliminating human desires". In modern times, some people denounced the western civilization for its "strange skills and cunning", and in the Cultural Revolution, "I would rather fight for private words than capitalist seedlings", which made people vaguely feel the terrible shadow cast by this historical ghost on the national cultural psychology. The philosophy of saving lives has become a folk creed of "living a good life and not knowing what is bad". This historical accumulation has cultivated a human nature of resignation, retreat and degeneration, enduring heavy oppression, bullying and humiliation, tyranny and lies, endless disasters, ignorance and poverty in order to survive in desperation. Anti-civilization, anti-human despotism, plant-like living conditions that are neither dead nor alive, and insensitive social psychology have hindered the development of China history. Zhuangzi is eager to get rid of the slavery of the flesh, but his theory has also become a "shackle" of the ruling class, which should be unexpected.
Zhuangzi annihilated good and evil, right and wrong, beauty and ugliness, life and death, dignity and misfortune with "Tao" and "fellow". The so-called "he is also a right and wrong, and this is also a right and wrong", (in all things), "don't blame right and wrong for being in harmony with the secular", (the world), "who knows that bad karma can't be peaceful", (the world), "call me Niu Jiao and my horse" and (Heaven) have become an erosion of human nature. Don't ask right and wrong, protect yourself, pretend to be deaf and dumb, swallow your words, and correct your mistakes. It's better to talk less, the wind blows with the wind, the rain follows the rain, muddy water breeds fish in troubled waters, etc., which provides a suitable social soil for tyranny and cruelty. Respecting and safeguarding truth, goodness and beauty is injustice and conscience, and it is a symbol of social progress and civilization. On the contrary, beauty and ugliness are indistinguishable, even ugliness is regarded as beauty, and the transvestite is reversed, resulting in historical tragedy. How many absurd and ugly dramas in ancient and modern times are staged by using the numbness of human nature. In this sense, Zhuangzi's philosophy of life is a passive and weak philosophy of life, and it is a smokescreen to cover up the losers' retreat on the battlefield of life. It masks the extreme pain in its heart with a seemingly detached smile.
On the positive side:
Zhuangzi saw "man-made material service" and issued "the earliest anti-alienation voice in the history of world thought", which severely criticized the development of civilization and the resulting restriction, imprisonment, distortion and oppression of people; Hold high the banner of Tao and deeply reflect on traditional values; It has shaped the ideal personality of "saints" and expressed human's desire for spiritual liberation and individual freedom, which has its own progressive role in history.
Zhuangzi saw that human suffering and human suffering were all caused by man-made, so he opposed "promising" with "inaction", opposed etiquette with nature, and opposed authority and idols with "extreme people" in order to change people from "exchanging things for themselves", "valuing virtual things" and "losing me in things" (a revision of nature). Zhuangzi said: "Man can't destroy the sky, man can't destroy reason, and man can't kill. It is against keeping it. " When Hebo asked, "What is heaven? What is a person? " At that time, he replied in the words of Beihai Ruo: "Four-legged cattle and horses point to the sky, and they point to people through the nose of cattle." Cattle and horses were originally free, but once bound, the natural situation was destroyed. Therefore, he opposes all man-made behaviors and advocates that everything should return to its naive nature. Let nature take its course, which means carefree and happy. Dapeng is like this, birds are like this, cattle and horses are like this, and people are like this, so Zhuangzi advocates "returning to nature".
"I don't know if my husband is the best in the world ... when it is, people use it, eat it, fit it beautifully, enjoy its customs and live on the ground. Neighboring countries confront each other, chickens and dogs hear each other, and people die of old age. If this is the time, it will be cured. " ("the moon is gone")
Seeing the disasters caused by the development of civilization in history and the "things" created by human labor, Zhuangzi advocated "abandoning wisdom", returning to nature and conforming to nature. The fatal weakness and limitation of Zhuangzi's philosophy of life lies in his failure to see the progressive role of civilization in history, and his failure to advocate that people actively transform nature and realize necessity, so as to obtain human liberation and freedom. However, we should also see that the role and significance of Zhuangzi Thought in history is probably more because it reveals the distortion of human nature by class society and the suppression of human nature by patriarchal ethics. Zhuangzi's simple social ideal of "weaving clothes, plowing and eating" is in sharp contrast with the dirty and dark real society where people eat people and fool people. It is not an imaginary heaven in religion, nor is it an illusory world on the other side. It is based on the world, so it can arouse people's longing for a better life and hatred of dark reality. From Zhuangzi's Virtue in the World to Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Garden, this is not a hope for those who are eager for liberation in a class society that is "in a dark, scarce, poor, dirty, lonely and closed situation" (Lenin's Two Utopias and Selected Works of Lenin, Volume 2, Page 43/kloc-0).
To return to nature, we must oppose affectation, imprisonment, bondage, bondage and interference, so that people can get their places. People pin their hopes for a peaceful world on saints, but Zhuangzi believes that the reason why the world is "unhappy" and "obsessed with things" is precisely the result of the wisdom, ignorance and "ruling the world" of saints. In Zhuangzi's view, the ruling class's system of rites and music, intrigue and reward and punishment are the main reasons for the chaos in the world. Yao and Jie are all too "promising" when they "rule the world". "Promising" makes people lose their nature. Therefore, in Zhuangzi's view, "the Yellow Emperor killed his heart with benevolence and righteousness" and "Yao and Shun praised his qi and blood", which caused "the world's spine chaos". ("Reconsideration") Renyi, propriety and righteousness have become the instruments of torture for rulers and disabled people: "Since Yao ridiculed your benevolence and righteousness, and you are right and wrong, why do you still wander and migrate?" ("The Great Master") thus issued "The saints will not die, and thieves will not stop." "Absolute saints go to know, and the world rules" and "saints are beaten, thieves are abandoned, and the world begins to rule" (Moon Walk). The cause of social and personal pain is that "saints" impose their subjective will on society and everyone, formulate certain rules and standards, and force others to obey. In this way, Zhuangzi pointed the edge of criticism at the idols and authorities in the world. Therefore, he put forward that "the world is full without desire, and it changes without doing anything, and the people will decide when it is quiet." (Heaven and Earth) The benevolence, righteousness, propriety and law of "saints", as well as all the anti-humanity ethics and social systems of human society, were violently shocked and criticized by Zhuangzi and Wang Yang in their wanton acts. In China's long feudal society, the suppression of human nature is second to none in the world. Sensitive intellectuals feel this pain the most, so when they are suppressed, bound, hit and distorted in real life, they always like to rely on Zhuangzi. Ji Kang from "Not Tang Wu but Thin Kong Zhou"; Go to Tao Qian, where "talk and carry things through to the end"; From Su Shi, who "rides the flying fairy", to "breaking the peach and ruining its scenery; Ying Ge ripe, help me "Zheng Banqiao, all the same. In Zhuangzi's philosophy of life, the thought of opposing "material servitude" and asking for a return to simplicity and truth, the values of "Harmony and Tao" being in harmony with all things, living and dying together, and distinguishing right from wrong, the personality ideal of "governing by doing nothing" and "the spirit of heaven and earth being alone", and the thought of governing by doing nothing and getting rid of fetters advocated by him have a rebellious role in breaking the trap under specific historical conditions. It opens up the spiritual space of human beings, enriches their spiritual life, and provides a means of self-comfort for human beings in adversity. Zhuangzi's thought of noble birth, disdaining the humble pursuit of power, wealth, fame and wealth, and material desires is undoubtedly a refreshing agent in the fiery world, and may play a sober role in the rolling greed, intrigue and intrigue in the world. Protesting against alienation, attaching importance to the individual existence of human beings, attaching importance to the free development of human essential strength, attaching importance to the value of human life, attaching importance to the harmonious unity of people and things, denying authority and idols, and yearning for freedom, it should be said that it still has historical reference significance in the world where alienation still exists. Marx once called "the real solution of the contradiction between man and nature, between man and man", "the real solution of existence and essence, objectification and self-confirmation, freedom and necessity, and the struggle between individual and class" the solution of "historical mystery". (1844 Economics-Philosophy Manuscript, People's Publishing House, 1979 Edition, p. 73) With the rapid development of technology-society structure today, Zhuangzi's poetic philosophy of life and his broad-minded mind of "taking things as spring" (Dechong Fu) may have its own significance for human beings to solve this "historical mystery".