Abstract
Xunzi develops an elaborate, systematic, and powerful account of moral self-cultivation, a long-standing Confucian preoccupation. In this chapter I give a rational reconstruction of this account, covering a number of aspects of his presentation. I first survey the historical and cultural context within which Xunzi developed his views, then outline the overall shape and trajectory of his account of moral development, which is correlated closely with his understanding of human nature and psychology. I then analyze his account of how the crucial practices of study, ritual, and music and dance contribute to the transformation of people from our initial pettiness to states of increasing wisdom and goodness, which Xunzi arranges into an explicit hierarchy of ethical achievement. I close with a consideration of notable strengths and weaknesses of Xunzi’s account, considered from a contemporary perspective.
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Notes
- 1.
There are several excellent studies of Xunzi’s views of these topics. Probably the best are Ivanhoe (1990, 1991, 1994), Kline (1998), and Schofer (1993). For my own account, from which this chapter borrows heavily, see Stalnaker (2006), portions of which are reprinted here with the permission of Georgetown University Press.
- 2.
For more on “Confucius ,” and astute discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of reading the Ru movement as a religious tradition called “Confucianism,” see Csikszentmihalyi (2001). For ease of comprehension by English language readers, I will continue to refer to “Confucianism” throughout this essay, despite the problems with the term.
- 3.
For a fuller discussion of Xunzi’s intellectual background and influences, see Goldin (2000).
- 4.
Yi is commonly translated as “righteousness,” but in the Xunzi it is an important concept that includes but also goes beyond the virtue of being inclined to do what is right. For Xunzi, yi involves a whole conception of social justice elaborated in terms of a hierarchical social system of roles , responsibilities, and interrelated duties , which spells out what “doing right” consists in. For more discussion, see Hutton (1996).
- 5.
For an alternative view of desire in the Xunzi, see Sung (2012a).
- 6.
- 7.
See, for example, Sherman (1989).
- 8.
For a pithy summary and accurate assessment of the textual problems in this paragraph, see K II.289–90nn104–6. All emendations follow the HKCS text, which follow Yang Liang , with one addition from Wang Niansun .
- 9.
On “connoisseurship” applied to the early Confucian Mengzi , see Hutton (2002).
- 10.
- 11.
Historians debate whether Xunzi actually had access to texts or text collections on ritual and music, or whether later editors of his text projected Han dynasty presuppositions about classic texts back into the Xunzi. Similarly, there is vigorous debate regarding the direction of the dependence relations between the chapters on music in the Xunzi and the Liji .
- 12.
There are many historical issues glossed over here, for example, about orality and literacy at various stages of early Chinese history. My own view, which I cannot defend here, is that by the latter part of Xunzi’s lifetime such learning practices did use written rather than memorized and orally recited texts.
- 13.
The text literally reads: “The petty person’s study is used like an ox calf,” with the implication that such animals were given to superiors as gifts to win favor.
- 14.
See especially chapter 15 for evidence of debates within Xunzi’s group, specifically in the substantive argumentative exchanges between Xunzi and his students Chen Xiao and Li Si .
- 15.
Unfortunately, both li 理 (“pattern” or “good order”) and li* 禮 (“ritual”) are Romanized identically, so when necessary I will mark the ritual li* with an asterisk to distinguish them.
- 16.
For fuller discussion of the physical aspects of Xunzi’s theory of ritual as a technique of self-cultivation, as well as the targets of his arguments on these points, see Tavor (2013).
- 17.
It seems clear, however, that the ultimate aim of Confucian learning and practice is to become a sage, and actively participate in government. One might teach along the way, or aspire to teach when circumstances do not permit one to serve in government, but teaching per se is not the highest goal.
- 18.
- 19.
For further discussion, see the chapter by Hutton and Harold in this volume.
- 20.
The potential interpretive problem here is whether this mention of “the good in people’s hearts” might conflict with Xunzi’s contention that human xing is “bad.” Briefly, I think it does not. There are essentially three routes away from the difficulty: what I propose here (a rhetorical flourish that alludes to music’s transformative power); reading “the good in people’s hearts” as referring to people as they actually are in a functioning society, with at least some reasonable cultural and moral training that points them toward goodness; and a textual solution that hinges on a well-attested alternative meaning of the character zhi 之, often a possessive marker, as “go to” or “reach,” which would change the sense of the phrase to something like “move people toward developing good hearts.”
- 21.
Xunzi is clearly focused on males as the only audience for his prescriptions, so the masculine nouns in these stages are unfortunately appropriate. However, if Aristotle can be “retrieved” for contemporary philosophical adaptation and development, surely Xunzi can as well.
- 22.
- 23.
The word shi 士 was in wide use before and during Xunzi’s lifetime to refer to a common class of government officials. While this may once have been a relatively low level of aristocratic hereditary office, in Confucian hands this word, and also most notably the more lofty junzi 君子 (often “gentleman,” on which see below), are transmuted into markers of developed states of good character and capability.
- 24.
Continence and incontinence are discussed in Book 7 of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. Briefly, the continent person has disordered desires but correctly uses reason to choose rightly, overcoming or “mastering” his wayward desires to do the right thing. The incontinent person loses track of his knowledge of the good and is swept away by his desires to choose wrongly.
- 25.
It is worth noting that there are occasional passages in the Xunzi that seem to treat the gentleman as equivalent to the sage, operating splendidly at the peak of human perfection (for example, HKCS 9/39/1–7), but this distinction still seems a useful way to track different degrees of moral excellence in Xunzi’s vision.
- 26.
- 27.
He seems not to take “weakness of will ” very seriously as a problem, in contrast to many Western analyses, although he does think inappropriate desires and emotions will skew the perceptions that provide the basis for our decisions, sometimes disastrously. For more discussion, see Stalnaker (2006).
- 28.
In his direct comments on Mencius’ theory of human nature , Xunzi argues that what counts as our xing are those abilities that are truly innate, and require no practice or learning to activate; Xunzi gives as examples the ability of eyes to see and ears to hear. He grants, somewhat obscurely, that human beings have an original “simplicity” and “material,” but necessarily depart from them as they grow up (HKCS 23/113/21–22, H 249). While this might be a recognition that the stark line he likes to draw between what is innate and what is learned is for adults often rather hard to draw (a point he makes more clearly elsewhere: HKCS 22/111/6–8), it seems more likely that he is insisting that as we grow up and become acculturated we necessarily learn to defer immediate satisfactions in pursuit of higher goods, like deferring to elders when eating together in order to show appropriate respect to them, and refraining from contending with others and stealing from them when we can, in order to live in a decent society that does not thwart everyone’s desires (HKCS 23/113/16 – 23/114/6).
- 29.
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Stalnaker, A. (2016). Xunzi on Self-Cultivation. In: Hutton, E. (eds) Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Xunzi. Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-7745-2_2
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