Copyright © 2000, Glenn Mason-Riseborough - where what I mean by "copyright" is spelled out eloquently by Peter Suber on his Copyright page (and taking it as read, in the context, that where Suber refers to his documents, pages, and site I am referring to my documents, pages, and site).

However, whereas Suber is a professional academic, I am not. Before reading any further, read my disclaimer and warning on my My Writings page.

Back to My Home Page | Back to What is Philosophy? (in a nutshell) | Back to My Writings

The Metaphysics of Xunzi: On the Concept of Tian

Glenn Mason-Riseborough (27/10/2000)

 

1.0 Introduction

As is no doubt clear from the title, my intention in this essay is to investigate Xunzi’s metaphysical understanding of reality, especially in the context of the concept (or concepts) expressed by the term “Tian.”  Since what we are working with is the writings of a historical figure who flourished some two and a quarter millennia ago, a large percentage of this debate centres around interpretative issues rather than strictly philosophical issues.  That is, many of the disagreements, first and foremost, are disagreements amongst interpreters and commentators as to what was really meant by Xunzi and his contemporaries.  It is only once this problem is resolved, or at least clarified, that we can secondly address the issue of whether it is reasonable to hold such views.  Hence, my focus will be primarily to clear the ground (so to speak[1]) and attempt to draw a picture of the main themes that were being expressed by Xunzi, and by others of his day of whom he had interactions.  As a consequence, to some extent this involves delving into the biographical details of Xunzi and also some of the general historical details of his time.  It is only by getting a feel for the intellectual environment that we can start to appreciate how Xunzi was reacting against or agreeing with the ideas of his day, and the types of conceptual oppositions that were being expressed.  This I will do first (in Section 2).  I will then turn (in Section 3) more specifically to the texts we have that are attributed to Xunzi, looking at them in the context of trying to understand his metaphysical views.  Especially relevant to this aim is pian (book) 17 of the Xunzi, which is entitled Tian lun (Burton Watson translates this title into English as A Discussion of Heaven[2], John Knoblock as Discourse on Nature[3], Eric L. Hutton as Discourse on Heaven[4], and Edward J. Machle also identifies Essay on Nature as a possible translation[5]).  In particular I will be examining the contemporary debate that centres on whether or not Xunzi should be seen as expressing a naturalistic account of reality.  Machle[6] tells us that the “consensus view,” exemplified by Robert Eno and Knoblock amongst others, is more inclined to the affirmative, whereas he (Machle) questions this orthodoxy.  One theme that Machle expresses is scepticism over translating “Tian” as “nature.”  He thinks that this mistranslation results in a systematic misunderstanding of Xunzi’s view.  Also in this section I will also address the issue of whether Paul Rakita Goldin[7] is correct to apply the label of deist to Xunzi, and since deism and naturalism are incompatible[8], I will be contrasting Knoblock with Goldin to analyse which of the two has the better interpretation of Xunzi.  In addition, I will also raise the question of whether we might accurately (or even approximately) apply the label of non-realist to Xunzi.

One final note: Throughout this essay I will use the now-standard pinyin transliteration of the Chinese characters rather than the older Wade-Giles or Yale styles.  Thus, for example, I will refer to the person under discussion as Xunzi rather than Hsün Tzu or Hsuntze.

 

2.0 Historical Background

Without a doubt, Xunzi lived at a pivotal time in Chinese history.  He lived in the last decades of a tradition that had produced some truly profound thinkers over a period of a few hundred years.  What is more, he had the advantage of being taught by a number of these people at a prestigious learning academy that had access to the doctrines of numerous schools of thought.  Xunzi was in a position in which he was able to build on and integrate the ideas of numerous thinkers, adopting their strengths and adapting or discarding their weaknesses.  More than likely, as an old man he also witnessed the birth of a united China under the first emperor in 221 BCE.  It was at this point that the old tradition could be said to have died, as the new leaders, in consolidating their power, embarked on a programme of burning the books of rivals and suppressing contrary thought.  I will expand on this in more detail in the remainder of this section, firstly looking at the general history of China and then turning to the life and time of Xunzi.

 

2.1 A Brief History of Chinese Metaphysical Thought up to the Time of Xunzi

It seems clear that, much like ancient Western and Middle Eastern thought, ancient Chinese thought included belief in a moral anthropomorphic sky god with intentional agency that directly intervened and causally interacted with earthly beings, and human life in particular.  But, unlike in the West, which seems to have been dominated by this thought for much of its history, this line of thinking began to disappear very early on in Chinese writings, replaced with the idea of an impersonal amoral force or nature that was constant and could be predicted.  Of course, this change was a gradual one, and as in all traditions there is no clear consensus of opinion, but rather differing views emphasising different aspects, presented in different contexts by different people at different times.

Philip Ivanhoe and Bryan Van Norden[9] tell us that writings dating back to the end of the Shang dynasty (around the twelfth to mid-eleventh century BCE) record divinations – questions to ancestor and nature spirits – on what are called “oracle bone inscriptions.”  At this early time, specialised people, diviners, attempted to gain knowledge of their world and how they should act by directing questions to specific spirits.  They believed that through worship they could influence the spirits to help them, and through divination they could get a better understanding of the actions and nature of the largely unknown spirit beings who controlled the forces of the world.  At this time divination was a risky business – the spirits were mysterious entities whose actions were hard to predict, and a great effort was made, via oracle bones, to get unambiguous answers from very alien beings.[10]  A key element to Shang thinking, which continued throughout much of Chinese history, was the idea of a hierarchical structure to reality.  Machle emphasises this fact and notes that post-Enlightenment thinkers often miss this essential difference in world-view.  Whereas we might see a hierarchical structure as a social construct, these people saw this structure as a fundamental metaphysical truth.  At the head of the cosmological order was Shangdi, originally a rain and harvest god, who was seen as a distant and mysterious figure, and inaccessible for the most part.  Further down were various other ancestor and nature spirits.  Social structure paralleled cosmological structure, and the parallel of Shangdi in the social order was the Shang king.  It is no coincidence that Shangdi was also considered to be the first ancestor of the royal house.  Social position mattered greatly with respect to which spirits one could worship or question.  Those people lower down the social scale did not have access to those spirits higher up the hierarchy, and they had to appeal to lower spirits to act as intermediaries between themselves and Shangdi.

After the conquest of the Shang dynasty by the Zhou (which tradition dates at 1122 BCE, though Ivanhoe and van Norden suggests it might be closer to one hundred years later[11], and David S. Nivison proposes a date of 1040 BCE[12]) Shangdi began to be identified as Tian.  That is, Tian took over the role that had been occupied by Shangdi.  As with Shangdi, Tian was originally seen as a moral intentional force that might inflict disease, floods, droughts and the like in response to the actions of humans (and rulers in particular).  Tian required respect and reverence, and those who did not give it were punished.  Thus for example the Book of Documents (Shujing) say (Tian here and elsewhere is translated as Heaven):

Heaven hears and sees as our people hear and see.  Heaven brightly terrifies; the people are brightly awed.  [This connection] extends above and below [i.e. between Heaven and Earth].  Be reverent, O owners of the land![13] (comments are Goldin’s)

 

And in the Zuo zhuan, the Zuo commentary to the Springs and Autumns:

In autumn [there were] great floods in Song; Duke [Zhuang of Lu, r. 693-662 BCE], sent his condolences, saying, “Heaven has made excessive rains, damaging the [sacrificial] millet vessels.  How can I not condole with you?  [Duke Min of Song, r. 691-682 BCE] answered: “For this catastrophe sent down [because of] my lack of reverence towards Heaven, and for the grief that it has caused my Lord, I do obeisance to the condescension of your embassy.”  Zang Wenzhong said: “How Song will prosper!  Yu and Tang [semi-legendary founder of the Shang dynasty] blamed themselves, and their prosperity was grand; Jie and Zhou blamed others, and their destruction was sudden.” [14] (comments are Goldin’s)

 

Thus, it was believed that there was a vital connection between Heaven and Earth, especially in the context of one’s moral attitude.  The quote below also indicates this; although it is interesting to see how there is a more mechanistic feel (one might almost be inclined to call it more naturalistic, although this word brings out additional connotations that are slightly misleading).  No longer was Heaven seen as so mysterious that divination was needed to predict its actions, but rather there was certainty about cause and effect.  Perhaps several hundreds of years of divinations had produced some level of certainty of understanding how actions affected Heaven.  That is, it was certain that bad government (and there were complex stories about good and bad government) will result in catastrophes of the sun and moon.  Nonetheless, Heaven still maintained a moral quality; catastrophes happened because of immoral actions.

Marquis [Pin of Jin r. 557-532 BCE] said: “When the Odes say, ‘An eclipse of the sun, O how it is not good,’ what does this refer to?”  [Shi Wenbo] answered: “It refers to bad government.  When there is no government in a state, and it does not employ good [men], then it acquires its own fault with regard to the catastrophes of the sun and moon [i.e. the state can only blame itself for these catastrophes].  Thus government cannot be neglected.  There are but three duties.  The first is recruiting men; the second is considering the people; the third is following the seasons.” [15] (comments are Goldin’s)

 

Kongzi (Confucius, c. 551-479 BCE) also seems to attribute this moral quality to Heaven:

When under siege in K’uang, the Master said, “With King Wen dead, is not culture (wen) invested here in me?  If Heaven intends culture to be destroyed, those who come after me will not be able to have any part of it.  If Heaven does not intend this culture to be destroyed, then what can the men of K’uang do to me?[16]

 

Embedded in this moral quality was the idea that Heaven granted a Mandate to the rulers.  In the quote above we can see that Kongzi assumed that he had this mandate like King Wen.  Thus for example:

Heaven looked down upon the world below,

Its Mandate lighted on him.

When King Wen started his initiative,

Heaven made for him a mate.[17]

 

This idea of a mandate connects Tian with de, another central concept in Chinese thought, which is often translated as virtue.  It seems that what differed between Shang and Zhou thinking on this point was that while Shang thought only contained the idea of gaining de, Zhou thinking also allowed for the possibility of losing de.  A popular sociological explanation for this change in metaphysical view is that it allowed the Zhou to justify their defeat of the Shang rulers, by telling the masses that the Shang rulers had become corrupt and had thus lost Heaven’s mandate.  So, by the time we get to the Zhou dynasty, de was seen as something that could be both given and taken away by Tian/Shangdi.  Goldin tells us that King Wu of Zhou justified his conquest of the Shang by saying:

I have observed the government of Shang, but Shou [=Zhou, the last ruler of Shang] does not have a repentant heart.  He sits squatting [i.e. is indolent]; does not serve High Di [the high god] or the spirits of Heaven and Earth; and neglects the temple of his ancestors, without sacrificing to them. The sacrifice and [sacrificial] millet vessels have been robbed by the wicked.  And he says, “I have a mandate to possess the people.”  He does not correct his disgraces.  Heaven provides for the people below, making for them rulers, making for them leaders. … The crimes of the Shang are bounteous.  Heaven mandates that I destroy them; if I were not to comply with Heaven, my crime would be as great.[18] (comments are Goldin’s)

 

Similarly, Nivison quotes a ninth century BCE inscription as saying “Of old … God on High (Shangdi) sent him down good virtue [de], and greatly helped him, so that he spread his influence over all the lands.”[19]  In this way, Nivison describes de as some sort of “inner mental entity,” which might even be seen as some metaphysical substance.  Those with de were, according to Nivison, self-restrained, self-denying, listened to advice and open to the possibility of personal error.  Those without de were self-assertive, arrogant, cruel, lustful, violent, and self-indulgent.  In short, rulers with de were successful and those without were not – Heaven made sure of this.  Consequently, this allowed Chinese thinkers to develop a systematic moral code on the basis of their metaphysical world-view.  A type of virtue ethics was perhaps a natural result of seeing the world as consisting of Tian sending down de to rulers, and providing them with a mandate to rule.  It was also implicitly consequentialist, since it was generally believed that those with de would flourish, whereas those without would not.

But, before mistakenly getting the impression that Tian was merely seen as a moral anthropomorphic figure, we need to draw out a few additional themes packed into this term.  One such idea is that Tian was also the Ancient Chinese word for sky or heavens.  This is unsurprising, since Tian was the ancient sky-god.  Thus, Tian was sometimes used to merely refer to the sky, and especially in later writings the aspect of Tian-the-ancestor-spirit is downplayed.  Knoblock gives an example of Tian translated as sky:

Swiftly swooped the hawk

Straight up into the sky.[20]

 

The theme that Knoblock tries to draw out strongly is a more naturalistic account of Tian, and he goes so far as to claim that “[t]here was never a sense that Heaven [Tian] was a person or personal god like Father Zeus, such as characterized thinkers in the West.”[21]  Perhaps to some degree Knoblock is correct here, since Tian/Shangdi-as-god was seen as a mysterious, essentially unknowable entity, whereas the Greek gods tended to be anthropomorphised to a far greater extent – given human emotions, and essentially turned into characters of a soap opera.  So, while it is necessary to acknowledge that Tian was anthropomorphised to some extent, this anthropomorphic spirit ancestor was certainly not the only understanding of Tian, and the aspect of Tian as lacking intentional agency became progressively more dominant in Chinese thought.  More and more commonly, Tian is seen as being without intentionality, and simply a blind force (though not in the sense of a Schopenhauerian “Will”).

It would also be a mistake to overemphasis Tian’s moral quality, since, especially as we move into later writers, this also began to be questioned.  Along with dropping the intentional agency aspect of Tian, we also see a dropping of the moral quality.  But once again this is gradual, and we see a mix of different views.  An excellent example of a comparatively early rejection (mid seventh century) of any moral component to Tian is given below, as a royal secretary explicitly rejects the claim that fortune and misfortune come from Heaven:

In the spring of the sixteenth year, there fell five stones in Song; there fell a star; six water fowl flew backwards over the capital of Song; there was wind.  Shuxing, the royal secretary of Zhou, was a guest in Song; Duke Xiang of Song [r. 650-637 BCE] asked about it: “What are these omens?  What fortune or misfortune is in them?”  He answered: “Now in Lu there will be many great deaths [i.e. deaths of great personages]; next year there will be chaos in Qi.  My Lord will obtain [precedence among] the various lords, but it will not be permanent.”  He retired and said to someone: “The Lord asked incorrectly.  These are the affairs of yin and yang; they are not what gives rise to fortune and misfortune.  Fortune and misfortune come from men.  I did not dare oppose the lord’s reasoning.”[22] (comments are Goldin’s)

 

Perhaps what can be brought out here is that centuries of observing the actions of Heaven and Earth resulted in a more refined understanding of their relationship.  As we shall see when we turn to Xunzi, we get (in the standard interpretations) observations that the heavens act exactly the same regardless of whether rulers are virtuous or not, and that Tian contains no moral qualities (though Machle rejects this interpretation, claiming that saying Tian is moral does not further require one to say that Tian acts differently to different people, on the basis of their morality).  But nonetheless there was still an acknowledgement of some seasonal relationship (which, taken together, Knoblock identifies as a more naturalistic world-view), and we can see this in certain other writings:

There are stars that are fond of wind; there are stars that are fond of rain.  From the progression of the sun and moon there are winter and summer; from the moon’s course among the stars there are wind and rain.[23]

 

Thus, by the time we get the third century BCE (according to Knoblock), the time in which Xunzi lived, there was mostly a universal rejection of seeing Tian as an anthropomorphic entity; there was strong scepticism from many about attributing any moral characteristics to Tian; and there was a corresponding scepticism about any astrological type of prediction of future events (aside from seasonal observations).  This is not to say that Tian was universally seen as an impersonal force, but just to say that the scene had been set for Xunzi to articulate this formally and systematically in a sustained essay-length criticism in the Tian lun.  The pieces were already there, and all it took was a rigorous mind like Xunzi’s to bring it together and systematise it.

 

2.2 A Brief Biography of Xunzi

As far as biographical detail goes, we are more fortunate with Xunzi than most other ancient Chinese figures.  While it is still the case that many details are tentative, we do have more information about him provided by more reliable sources than many others of his time.  Knoblock[24] gives an excellent detailed biography of Xunzi, of which I will merely pull out some key events.

Xunzi (given name Xun Kuang, but commonly called Xun Qing – Minister Xun, or Xunzi – Master Xun) was born probably around 310 BCE in the state of Zhao.  It seems that he was extremely gifted intellectually as a boy, and as a young teenager he left home to study at the Jixia Academy in Qi, the intellectual centre at the time.  Records tell us that he arrived in Qi when he was fifteen years old, and studied there for a number of years.  Knoblock suggests that we can date a number of Xunzi’s writings to this period of his life.  In particular, we get criticisms by Xunzi (and also others at the Academy) against the rulers, King Min of Qi and Tian Wen.  There are records of Xunzi speaking out against their policies, and Xunzi had an interview with Tian Wen between 286 and 284 BCE.  In 284 BCE a combined army of Yan, Qin, Wei and Zhou invaded Qi and King Min was killed.  The scholars at the Jixia Academy, including Xunzi, mostly left Qi to pursue other goals.  Xunzi next travelled to Chu, staying there until around 276 BCE.  Knoblock suggests that it is more than likely that it was here that Xunzi gained his reputation, since he was considered an eminent scholar on his return to Qi sometime after 275 BCE.  In Qi, Xunzi once again returned to the Jixia Academy, this time teaching there, and becoming the “most eminent elder scholar.”  Two of his most famous students here included Han Fei and Li Si.  In around 265 BCE Xunzi was slandered, and was thus forced to become a “travelling persuader,” receiving invitations to visit the courts of other rulers.  Xunzi first travelled to Qin, and was very impressed with what he saw, though he left Qin for his native Zhao in around 260 BCE when Qin began a campaign against Zhao.  In 255 BCE, after Qin was defeated, the Lord of Chunshen appointed Xunzi to the position of magistrate of Lanling in Chu.  He lived there until sometime between 246 and 240 BCE, when Chunshen dismissed him on the advice of a retainer, who claimed that Xunzi would use Lanling as a base to take over the world.  In 240 BCE Chunshen asked Xunzi to return, but he declined the offer.  He was again asked, and this time accepted, resuming his post until he was dismissed again in 238 BCE when Chunshen was assassinated.  We know little of Xunzi’s activities after this point.  Between 230 and 221 BCE the states of Han, Zhao, Wei, Chu, Yan and Qi were absorbed or conquered by Qin, and Xunzi, now an old man, witnessed the unification of China under the king of Qin, the First Emperor.  Xunzi’s old student, Li Si, now an influential member of the court of Qin, offered Xunzi a position, which he declined.  Xunzi died sometime later, probably in his late nineties or even a hundred years old.

What we presently have of Xunzi’s writings is a collection of 32 pian (books or essays), individually titled and collectively know as the Xunzi.  The format of the Xunzi that we have today is the result of editing by Liu Xiang, who, in the first century CE analysed 322 manuscripts, and eliminated 290 of those he considered duplicates.  Once again, Knoblock[25] provides a detailed history of the texts as we presently have them.  In English, the texts I am working with are Knoblock’s complete translation of the Xunzi, Machle’s translation and commentary of the Tian lun, and both Watson’s and Hutton’s partial translations of the Xunzi.  In order to try to make sense of the work as a whole, it is often useful to assume that it was all written by a single person, though Knoblock points out that firstly there is a possibility that some of the later books (25-32) were compilations made by Xunzi’s students, and secondly it is clear that the texts were written at different times of Xunzi’s life.  For my purposes this potential lack of coherence is not terribly problematic, since I am focusing primarily on the Tian lun.  Knoblock dates the Tian lun to Xunzi’s intellectual maturity at the time of his return to the Jixia Academy, and it was thus more than likely written sometime between 275 and 265 BCE.  I will now turn to a more detailed examination of this book.

 

3.0 Tian in the Tian lun

What I want to do in this section is bounce three different interpretations of Xunzi’s metaphysical views given in the Tian lun off each other to try to analyse which (if any) is the most plausible interpretation.  The three views I will discuss are Knoblock’s naturalistic analysis, Goldin’s deistic analysis and Machle’s anti-naturalistic (and Xunzi-as-religious-writer) analysis.  In doing this, I will try to draw out what we might plausibly recognise as the main metaphysical themes expressed in the Tian lun.

In the Tian lun, as with much of the rest of the Xunzi, Xunzi main concern is ethical and political considerations, rather than strictly metaphysical ones, and he only develops his metaphysics in order to aid his ethical discussions.  Thus, we find Xunzi saying: “only the sage acts not seeking to know nature”[26] and: “the greatest skill consists in what is not done; the greatest wisdom lies in what is not done.”[27]  Of course, this causes a problem from my perspective, since I am trying to draw out more explicitly what Xunzi may have believed only implicitly.  Nonetheless, in amongst Xunzi’s ethical considerations, we do find some useful insights regarding his metaphysics.

 

3.1 Xunzi as Naturalist

As I have already alluded to in the introduction, the current orthodoxy in interpreting Xunzi is the naturalistic one.  This is exemplified most recently in Knoblock’s massive three-volume work.  Unsurprisingly, given Knoblock’s naturalistic interpretation, he tends to translate Xunzi’s use of Tian as “Nature,” saying: “[t]he primary meaning of the word tian in this book [Tian lun] and in Xunzi’s thinking more generally is ‘Nature.’”[28]  However, he also continues with:

But the word is a common term and is used in this book in several different senses; thus it is best translated by a different word for each separate meaning, even though the Chinese conceived all of them as ‘one thing.’  The abstract, objective tian is translated as ‘Nature’; when a moral, directive sense is implied, the word is translated as ‘Heaven’; and when celestial events are involved, it is rendered ‘heavens.’  Further, in many contexts, particularly where man is contrasted with Nature, tian is short for tiandi ‘Heaven and Earth.’[29]

 

Knoblock thus explains the main position of Xunzi’s Tian lun as defending a view that sees Tian (Nature) as an impersonal amoral constant universal power that is fundamentally different from human activities.  Although Tian produces (sheng) it does not act (wei), and thus Xunzi explicitly rejected the view that Tian has consciousness, intelligence or intentionality, or that it could love or sense or know anything.  In this view, Tian is seen as separate from Man in the sense that they perform different roles, much like different classes in society each have their own stations and duties (as discussed above, Xunzi goes along with the orthodox Chinese belief in a metaphysical hierarchy).  Similarly, Knoblock tells us that Xunzi saw Tian as mysterious in the sense that it operates profoundly differently than human activities.

One of the main themes that we can draw out here is the view that Tian does not respond to the actions of humans, as this would violate the idea of constancy.  At all times Tian is constant, and even though there are changes, these changes are regular and cyclic (seasons, etc.).  This regularity is expressed most clearly in 17. 4, in which Knoblock translates Xunzi as saying:

What is the relation of order and chaos to Heaven?  I say: the revolution of the sun and the moon and the stars and celestial points that mark off the divisions of time by which the calendar is calculated were the same in the time of Yu as in the time of Jie.  Since Yu achieved order and Jie brought chaos, order and chaos are not due to Heaven.

What about the Seasons?  I say that crops germinate and grow to maturity in the course of spring and summer and are harvested and gathered for storage during autumn and winter.  This also was the same in the time of Yu and in the time of Jie.  Since Yu achieved order and Jie brought chaos, order and chaos are not due to the seasons.

What about Earth?  I say that if something obtains land on which to grow it will live and if it loses that land it will die, and that this as well was the same for both Yu and Jie.  Since Yu achieved order and Jie brought chaos, order and chaos are not due to Earth[30]

 

Xunzi does not ignore more unusual events, and while admitting that we might not be able to explain them (or is not overly interested in attempting an explanation), he thinks that they should not be given special status (according to Knoblock):

When stars fall and trees groan, the whole state is terrified.  They asked what caused this to happen.  I reply that there was no specific reason.  When there is a modification of the relation of Heaven and Earth or a transmutation of the Yin and Yang, such unusual events occur.  We may marvel at them, but we must not fear them.  As for the sun and moon being eclipsed, wind and rain occurring unseasonably, and the sudden appearance of a marvellous new star, there has been no age that has not occasionally had them.  If the ruler is enlightened and his governmental regulations equitable, then although all of these should occur within a generation, it would cause no harm.  If the superior is benighted and his government regulations harsh, then although not one of them occurs, it would be of no advantage. [31]

 

In other words, this is saying that stars falling, trees groaning, and unusual weather or celestial events are not the result of human actions, or the foretelling of future events, but are a part of the normal operations of Nature (Tian), even though we do not know the details.  Thus, we should marvel at them, but not fear them.  In these passages Xunzi explicitly rejects the claims put forward by various writers of the day including the Yin-Yang school, the Moists, and his fellow Ruists (Confucians) – Kongzi, Zisi, and Mengzi.  These writers claimed that Tian gave warnings to humans in the form of just such unusual events, or that humans could influence Tian to produce these events.

Related to this, Xunzi (again according to Knoblock) also builds the picture of a strictly amoral understanding of Tian, in the sense that Tian is neutral with regards to the morality or immorality of humans.  In other words, Xunzi held that acting virtuously will not necessarily result in reward, and it is possible for even the most virtuous of sages to die unappreciated and unsuccessful.  Once again this is an explicit rejection of a number of influential schools of thought of the day.  For example, Mozi defended a version of the older traditional anthropomorphic understanding of Tian, in which he claimed that Tian sent disease, famine and so forth as punishment of the wicked, and that these events did not happen in an orderly age.

Finally, Knoblock introduces a decidedly non-realist feel to Xunzi, when we apply Xunzi’s conclusions above to ceremony and ritual.  Knoblock does not use this term himself, but it seems to me that it is an appropriate term to apply to Xunzi, as Knoblock interprets him.  That is, Knoblock interprets Xunzi as making two separate claims.  Firstly, he says that Xunzi was a naturalist; Xunzi completely rejected the existence of a supernatural realm.  Secondly, he says that Xunzi was a traditionalist with respect to ceremonies and ritual.  He tells us that Xunzi supported the continued practice of rituals that were originally based on supernaturalist origins.  Knoblock sums up his interpretation of Xunzi below:

Xunzi discounted the magical qualities of ritual and disbelieved entirely in the spirit realm.  He rejected any notion of a sentient Heaven that might respond to prayers or curses.  He endorsed ritual only as an embellishment to life that gave form and expression to our emotions.[32]

 

Why did Xunzi continue to support rituals that ought presumably to be meaningless with the rejection of their original purpose and ground?  Because ritual ceremony also has a social role, in addition to its metaphysical role.  The ceremonies had no effect in and of themselves, but they were (and are) useful for their social and ethical role of teaching people how to act in their society.  Knoblock states:

Divinations with bone and milfoil do not in fact reveal what we should do or want to know; rather they embellish occasions with ceremony.  The intent of all ceremony is to regulate the occasion whenever there is a tendency to panic because of a possibility of calamity.  For the gentleman their purpose is to regulate human affairs and not to appease the spirits.[33]

 

In other words, to use the language of current Christian non-realists[34], when Xunzi is discussing metaphysics he is clear to explicitly reject any notion of a supernatural heaven or spirit realm, but when he is discussing ethics he allows that it is useful to act as if this supernatural realm exists (i.e., it is a useful fiction), to enable us to participate in social gatherings that instil in us the appropriate ethical outlook for our society.  In particular, for Xunzi, it is by participating in Confucian ritual that one gains an understanding of how one ought to live, as one is participating in rituals prescribed by the sages – people who lived fully flourishing lives.[35]

 

3.2 Xunzi as Deist

Although Goldin’s work is written after Knoblock’s work was published and Goldin refers to Knoblock in his bibliography, Goldin does not explicitly discuss Knoblock’s interpretation or suggest that he is giving an opposing view.  Nonetheless, it seems to me evident that Goldin’s interpretation of Xunzi differs from Knoblock’s interpretation in a significant way.  This difference lies fundamentally in how one is to interpret Tian.  As we have seen, Knoblock is clear that Tian ought to be seen naturalistically.  In contrast, Goldin claims that Xunzi is only naturalistic in the sense that Heaven is an impotent bystander with respect to earthly and human events.  That is, he still wants to keep in Xunzi’s concept of Tian a supernaturalistic or otherworldly aspect, and does not want to reduce it entirely to naturalism.  Goldin sees Xunzi as being fundamentally a deist.  Goldin writes of Xunzi’s view:

Heaven has established its works, but thereafter, like an absentee god, plays no active role in terrestrial affairs. … At this point Xunzi may begin to sound to us like an eighteenth-century deist. … An impersonal creative force brings forth a universe that obeys a congeries of natural laws.  The force then plays no active role in the governance of that universe.[36]

 

This creates an interesting difference of interpretation that is, on the face of it, a substantive difference.  Is Tian entirely naturalistic, or is it dualistic and deistic?  Is Tian part of the world, or fundamentally alien and empirically undetectable?  The first thing to be clear about is that Goldin is not suggesting that Tian is an absentee intentional agent (which is my usual understanding of deism), but rather an absentee impersonal creative force.  That is, it seems to me that he is saying that Xunzi’s Tian, as an impersonal creative force, created the Earth and Man, and the laws of nature, and now plays no further part.  But at heart what seems to be at issue here is a different view relating to Xunzi’s use of the word fen.  Knoblock writes:

Xunzi … absolutely rejects the idea that Heaven and Man are united, act in unison, and respond to one another.  He proposes instead the idea that Nature (Heaven and Earth) has a role distinct from that of Man.  The word he uses is fen (read fèn in the sense of fenzhi), which is his technical term for the separate roles, functions, and offices that the various classes carry in society and the station in life those roles, functions, and offices provide.  He does not mean that Nature and Man are separated from one another, disjoined, or alienated (read fēn in the sense of fenli).[37]

 

If we accept Knoblock’s interpretation of fen here,[38] then our problem seems to be rapidly resolved.  Contrary to Goldin, it is not that Tian is completely separated from Man (as in deism) but that they have different roles.  So, in the same way those in different social classes still interact despite their separate roles, so to do Heaven and Man interact in their way.  In fact, even more clearly, if we look to Xunzi’s analysis of the sages, there needs to be some relationship between Tian and the sages, and since, according to Xunzi, sages have existed in the past, there is some relationship between Tian and Man.  Machle states:

We hold, in short, that ‘Tian-like’ qualities of the sage are mediated not by the natural processes of production, but through some Tian-to-human channels Xun implies, but was saved from having to identify by the fact that there had already been sages, and hence their cultural functional equivalents had already been opened.[39]

 

Thus, if we accept Knoblock’s view of fen and Machle’s claim of channels, then Goldin clearly misreads Xunzi, and he is incorrect to interpret Xunzi deistically.

 

3.3 Xunzi as Religious Writer

Machle’s approach departs significantly from either Knoblock or Goldin, and he develops a far more complex analysis of Xunzi.  His main thesis in his book-length examination of the Tian lun is the difficulty of satisfactorily translating the Archaic Chinese word Tian into any modern language.  In addition, he worries that each of the various later Chinese commentaries on Xunzi has brought in its own cultural episteme’s understanding of Tian, rather than using the Zhou one (and even more precisely, Xunzi’s view within Zhou culture).  The problem for us as Machle sees it is that Tian is a vague and ambiguous word that contains connotations that do not overlap sufficiently and ideally with any modern equivalent.  He is critical of the modern Chinese approach of translating it as ziran (which is the equivalent of “nature” in English) because of its close affinities with the sciences.  Likewise, when translating to English, Machle is critical of the common approach of translating Tian as “nature,” as he thinks that “nature” is also a vague and ambiguous term that, unfortunately, is not vague and ambiguous in the same ways as Tian.  As he says: “if we insist that Tian is ‘Nature,’ we must use ‘Nature’ in so different a sense from any of our other uses that the word itself becomes an anomaly.”[40]  This linguistic difficulty, and the fact that Tian is commonly translated as “nature,” leads Machle to conclude that the resulting interpretations of Xunzi are distorted.  Machle’s positive analysis of Tian is difficult to concretely discern, but I will attempt to articulate it after first looking more closely at what he identifies as six mistaken points in the “consensus view.”

Firstly, Machle rejects the claim that Xunzi was sceptical with regards to the supernatural.  His claim is that although Xunzi was clearly sceptical with regards to specific instances of popular superstitions, he was not sceptical with regards to the supernatural as a whole.  Once again, Xunzi’s aim was ethical, not metaphysical, and he tended to only bring up metaphysical considerations to illustrate other points.  Machle thus claims that we cannot attribute to Xunzi any universal claims about the supernatural, and he seems to ultimately withhold judgement as to whether or not Xunzi believed in a supernatural.  Machle identifies two terms that Xunzi uses in this context – gui and shen.  Gui are ghosts, and are said to be invisible (wu xing) unless incorporated in a human or animal.  He refers to Xunzi’s story of gui in pian 21, in which a story is told about a man who mistook his shadow and hair for a gui.  The usual interpretation is to say that this story showed that Xunzi rejected the existence of gui, but Machle counters: “whether we are entitled to hold, on the basis of this one passage, that he denied the reality of gui is not clear,” [41] since Xunzi never claimed to be generalising to a universal claim.  Machle thinks that Xunzi used shen in a different way, to refer to supernatural beings or forces.  Machle refers to the end of pian 19, where he claims that Xunzi is not denying the existence of an invisible (wu xing) shadow.  Machle writes:

[Xunzi] is celebrating the expressiveness of the rites, not discussing existents and nonexistents.  If anything, he is implying that there is an ‘invisible shadow’ involved, for the other three times he uses wu xing he clearly intends something real but invisible, and the four times he uses the verbal negative with xing, as bu xing, he indicates something that may be real but is not manifested.  For these and other references to shen it would appear that whatever doubts Xun may have had about gui did not extend to shen.[42]

 

With respect to shen, Machle goes so far as to say that Xunzi accepts the existence of it, and quite possibly (but not certainly) it had supernatural elements.

Secondly, Machle questions the claim that Tian, for Xunzi, was amoral.  Again, Machle notes that Xunzi neither explicitly accepts nor denies this claim, and further, since the Confucian orthodoxy indicated a moral element, the burden of proof is on the other side.  More substantively, Machle states: “Xun speaks of having a chang Dao in a context where chang appears to have a moral quality.” [43]  He refers to pian 26: “Tian will not forget,” [44] and also pian 27: “thus, if he who acts as king if first benevolent (ren) and afterwards follows ritual (LI), Tian will act generously.” [45] In addition, pian 9 talks of graded ranks, which Machle claims always implied moral qualifications.

Thirdly, Machle questions whether Tian ought to be seen as constant and predictable.  Whereas Knoblock (as I discussed above) sees Xunzi in 17.7 saying that unexpected events are still a regular part of nature, even if we cannot explain the regularity, Machle takes this to indicate precisely that Xunzi denied that Tian was constant.  Machle thinks that Xunzi “saw the universe to be neither chaotic and unpredictable nor regular, law-abiding, and predictable, but one whose seasons were reliable although many other things were not.”[46]  That is, Machle sees in Xunzi no indication of believing in what we would understand as natural laws.

Fourthly, Machle rejects the claim that Xunzi held that nature was available to human exploitation.  He tells us that Xunzi holds that it is the sage who orders things, but only after “aligning” with Tian and Earth.

Fifthly, Machle rejects a common Chinese claim (which is not so often made in English-speaking circles) that Tian has a negative value, since it produces humans, and human nature is evil.  Machle’s reply is that, according to Xunzi, it is Tian’s duty to “act through the natural processes of sheng,” and some of what it produces may influence humans towards disorder and chaos.

Sixthly, Machle deals with the claim that culture is an imposition on nature.  Machle’s replies by referring back to point four – cosmic order depends on humans for its completion, through the acts of the sages.  Cultures that accord with LI fulfil nature, they do not impose on it.

Finally, to draw together Machle’s view of Xunzi ‘s Tian.  Machle reject the dichotomy that Tian must either be an anthropomorphic god or a universal impersonal force.  He says: “Tian performs the functions of a god, but has no anthropomorphising stories.”[47]  As I read Machle,[48] he seems to be somewhere in between Knoblock and Goldin.  Knoblock’s view is too mechanistic to fully appreciate the richness that Xunzi injects into Tian, and Goldin’s view seems to go too far in distancing Tian from humans.  Tian is theistic, in the sense of being intimately connected with humans while being hierarchically superior, but not anthropomorphically theistic, in the sense that philosophers conceive of omniGod.  Xunzi does not criticise sincere sacrifice to Tian, and he accepts that Tian could be addressed, at least by the king.  Tian is moral, in the sense that it possesses de.  And Tian is like Xunzi’s ideal ruler, who rules without acting.  Tian simply performs perfectly its duty, and it is in this sense, and the sense that Tian is at the peak of the hierarchy, that Machle thinks it can rightly be called a god.  Tian is not a god in the sense that mainstream Judaism/Islam/Christianity conceives of a god, but can correctly be called a god based on its functional requirements (e.g. worship-worthiness, provides meaning, show how one ought to act, explains the structure of reality).  Machle concludes by observing that the model for Xunzi’s concept of Tian might best be found in pian 20, in his discussion on music.  Xunzi wrote that the drum resembles Tian, the bells resemble earth, the sounding stones resemble water, the mouth organs and lutes resemble the sun, and the scrapers resemble the beings of creation.  Machle reverses the resemblance relation, and shows that the cosmic hierarchy resembles music and dance.  Ancient Chinese dance was highly ordered and choreographed, and each component played its part, working in together to create harmony.  Humans are the dancers, with the sage as the dance leader, who parallels the drum/Tian as that which sets the rhythm.

 

4.0 Conclusions

As I come to the end, I find myself with a less clear-cut understanding of Xunzi than when I started.  My aim in this essay was to identify and articulate a metaphysics of presence of Xunzi, showing precisely the types of entities that he accepted and those that he rejected.  At one point I was even considering the possibility of including another section in which I would critically analyse Xunzi’s metaphysics to determine whether, in the light of contemporary knowledge, Xunzi’s metaphysical ideas were plausibly true.  So much for my modernistic aims.  Now, it is not so clear to me that such a project could ever be productive.  These aims might have even worked if I had stuck to examining Knoblock and Goldin (who both tend to overemphasise the certainty of our clear-cut and solid conceptual structures of Xunzi), but after reading Machle I am forced to conclude that Xunzi’s view is not so simple (or, more negatively, it is more ambiguous) that it can be neatly categorised as naturalistic or deistic, or some other neat conceptualisation.  In my mind, Machle, more than anyone else, has emphasised that Xunzi was simply not interested in articulating, with clear conceptual categories, a structure of reality.  The main debates that went on between Xunzi and his contemporaries were political, ethical and religious in nature, and, where metaphysical issues were introduced, they were only done so to prove a point about how to act, with the assumption that the reader already understood and agreed, in a vague and general way, with the metaphysical position.  It seems that the question of describing the fundamental structures of reality was never clearly posed.

In addition, Machle brings out a more religious element that Knoblock misses, and Goldin only partially sees.  Tian is, and should rightly be considered, a god (given a functional understand of ‘god’)[49].  This religious element is not non-realist, since the ideas expressed in the immediacy of the rituals are not at odds with the reflective component of Xunzi’s work.  Tian is natural in the sense that it is neither unnatural nor artificial, yet it is also supernatural.  It is also not deistic, since there is an intimate relationship between Tian and humans.  This means to say that I am concluding in Machle’s favour, and, as I read the Xunzi, in various translations, it is with Machle in the back of my mind, and this seems to fit with what I read.

Bibliography

Bishop, J. (1998). Can there be Alternative Concepts of God? Nous, 32(2) 174-188.

 

Chai, C. & Chai, W. (1973). Confucianism. Woodbury, NY: Barron’s Educational Series.

 

Cua, A. S. (1985). Ethical Argumentation: A Study of Hsün Tzu’s Moral Epistemology. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press.

 

Fung, Y. (1952). A History of Chinese Philosophy. Vol. 1. (trans. D Bodde). Princeton: Princeton University Press.

 

Goldin, P, R. (1999). Rituals of the Way: The Philosophy of Xunzi. Chicago, IL: Open Court.

 

Ivanhoe, P. J. & Van Norden, B. W. (2000). Reader in Classical Chinese Philosophy. Seven Bridges Press.

 

Knoblock, J. (1988-94). Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works. 3 Vols. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

 

Lau, D. C. (1979). Confucius: The Analects. London: Penguin.

 

Machle, E. J. (1993). Nature and Heaven in the Xunzi: A Study of the Tian Lun. Albany, NY: State University Press of New York.

 

Nivison, D. S. (1959). Confucianism in Action. Stanford CA: Stanford University Press.

 

Nivison, D. S. (1996). The Ways of Confucianism: Investigations in Chinese Philosophy. Chicago, IL: Open Court.

 

Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. (1952). Religion and Society.  In Structure and Function in Primitive Society: Essays and Addresses. London: Cohen & West, 153-177.

 

Watson, B. (1963) Hsün Tzu: Basic Writings. New York: Columbia University Press.