A paper, about 3500 words, "Comparison of the Differences between Chinese and Western Ancient Historical Development".

A Comparison of Ancient Chinese and Western Concepts of "Great Unity"

Source: Journal of Capital Normal University Author: Li Zenghong

In the ancient history of China and Europe, after a long period of wars and disputes, a huge empire was established, which not only gave the later politicians unlimited fantasy space, but also gave the military strategists the goal of galloping on the battlefield. China people have lived under the beautiful aura of "great unification" for a long time, and Europeans also conceive European integration from time to time. The environment they live in is different, and the results brought by the aura of "great unity" are also very different. China's thought of "great unification" has been deeply rooted in people's hearts after numerous political forging from concept to reality. In Europe, since the fall of the Roman Empire, the idea of "great unification" has been in the stage of conceptual thinking, which is rarely shown in real political life. Until now, the emergence and development of the European Union has made us see the realistic possibility of "unifying" Europe.

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China's concept of "great unification" has a long history, which germinated in the early stage of the formation of the country and improved with the development of class society. It not only plays an extremely important role in history, but also has a very important influence in real life.

The concept of political unity and legal unity of kingship originated from the Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties in China. From the stepfather's founding the country for the emperor to the integration of monarchical power and patriarchal clan system in Zhou Dynasty, a relatively complete national management system was established, and the concept of kingship was gradually formed. There are three points worthy of our attention: first, the dynastic lineage condensed by the clan kinship in primitive society, that is, in a certain dynasty, the royal family system was inherited and continued by the eldest son of the father and son. "When the supreme power is in the hands of a specific member of the royal family, people can and will think that this supreme power is legal; On the contrary, people can accuse it of being illegal. " [1](P.32 1) and the management of the whole country has also been brought into the patriarchal clan system with extremely strong blood relationship. For example, Zhou people expanded their clan organization into a political organization through the enfeoffment system. Zhou is the biggest Sect in the world, the * * * Lord of the world, the vassal is the bulk of the country, the * * * Lord of the country, and so is Qing Dafu in his fief. "The clan is based on blood, the monarch is based on geography, and it is the patriarch and the monarch for two terms, which precisely reflects the unity of clan power and political power." [2] The second is the theory of Wang Tong, who won the world when the dynasty changed. If Xia Qi seized power through naked violence, then when Shang Tang destroyed the summer, people stipulated Wang Ze's virtue. That is, when the king's behavior is unreasonable, the people have the right to overthrow him and set up a new king. When Shang Tang resisted Xia, he said, "Xia committed many crimes and was killed by destiny." It was on this basis that Shang Tang raised his arms and shouted, "Friedrich Hirth Lodz, I'm going now." [3] (Tang Shi, p. 78) The establishment of the Zhou Dynasty was just like the Xia Dynasty of the Shang Dynasty, and the "tyranny" of the Shang King Di Xin (that is, Shang Zhouwang) became the reason for his loss of the throne. Indiscriminate killing of local forces in Shang Zhouwang, such as Guihou, Fuehou and Wenwang; They also persecuted members of the royal family and nobles, such as killing Bigan, imprisoning Ji Zi and wasting their business reputation. All these anomalies led to Shang Zhouwang's divorce. For example, Cabbage, an ordinary brother, ruined his business and fell to Zhou, while a surname and literature and history fell directly to Zhou people. "This once again shows that in the early national development process of China, the concept of legitimacy of state rule has been integrated into the evaluation of rulers' virtue." [1] (page 400) Third, the national orthodoxy associated with a specific region. After the founding of New China, the areas controlled by Xia Dynasty gradually became an inseparable part of the main body of the state, which resulted in an important political tradition in the history of our country, that is, to establish a real and recognized country, it is necessary to occupy specific areas and have corresponding central power. [1] (p.393) This specific area is "China", which is the Central Plains. If you occupy the Central Plains, you will gain strong self-esteem, and you can give orders to the surrounding areas and conquer them. People who don't have the right to live in the Central Plains try their best to join the Central Plains, hoping to get the recognition of the Central Plains culture. As long as the ruling power of the Central Plains is slightly weak, the powerful forces around it will invade one after another and seize the dominance of the Central Plains. Shang Dynasty, Xia Dynasty and Zhou Dynasty only gained the orthodox status after acquiring the Central Plains. The organic combination of these three is "great unity". However, the concept of "great unification" in the Three Dynasties is only a vague consciousness of people, and it is not systematic and theoretical. The so-called "all over the world, is it the land of kings?" Is leading the land king? [4] (Volume XIII, page 797) is just an exaggeration of people's vague consciousness. Its concept of the world is limited by the times.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, although the society in China was turbulent, it created an era of ideological prosperity of "a hundred schools of thought contend". A hundred schools of thought contend in troubled times, but she is planning the "unification" of the future world. They not only systematized and theorized the original concept of "great unification", but also added new contents. On the basis of the above three aspects, a hundred schools of thought contend and pay more attention to the unity of domestic political order. At the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, Confucius put forward the ideal society of "Rites and music conquer vassals" and "accompany ministers to carry out state affairs", "Jun Jun, ministers, father and son". Since then, Mencius said: You are benevolent and loyal, you and the people enjoy the same happiness, the fashion is simple, and you are close to the people. The world is "integrated", [5] (on the sentence of Liang, P. 12) "There are no two kings in the world." [5] (Zhang Wan, P.2 15) Xunzi said: "Therefore, heaven and earth give birth to gentlemen, and gentlemen govern heaven and earth. Gentleman, the participation of heaven and earth, the foundation of all things, the parents of the people. " [6] (Chapter 9 of Wang Zhi, p. 163) Han Feizi believes that "two males living in one house", "two expensive families" and "husband and wife politics" are the reasons for the disaster. "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals" said: "Everything is right when you hold one. ..... One cure, two chaos ". [7] (Zhi Yi, p. 590) Guan Zhong said: "It is the best way to govern the country to respect the subjects from the top and make pedestrians obey them." "Make the world two days, the world is hopeless. One country has two monarchs, and one country cannot be ruled. A family with two fathers, a family is hopeless. You can't do it without being advanced. Don't listen if you don't specialize. The people of Yao and Shun are not born to be ruled, and the people of Jie are not born to be chaotic, so the rule of chaos is also in the world. " [8] (Page 229) Guan Zhong even put forward the unification of specific systems, namely, "The emperor orders the world, the minister orders the emperor, the doctor orders the king, the son orders his parents, and the younger brother listens to his words, which is the most suitable." The stone is weighed, the bucket is measured and the ruler is made. Once, soldiers and soldiers had the same name, and their cars were on the same track. This is also a fact. [8](P. 194) Mozi said: "What is above is necessary; What is wrong must be wrong. " "All people in the world are like the son of heaven." [9] (ibid., pp. 68-69) Obviously, these are different expressions of the concept of "great unity" in the domestic political order, emphasizing the unity of top-down decrees.

This concept finally came true from the Qin Dynasty, where "the sea is the county and the law and discipline are unified" [10] (the biography of Qin Shihuang). Starting from Qin Shihuang, "everything in the world, big or small, depends on the world." [10] (Biography of Qin Shihuang) Until the Qing Dynasty at the end of feudal society, this tradition never ended. [ 1 1](P.2 18)

After a long historical evolution, the concept of great unity is finally manifested as a high degree of political unity. Even in the period of division, the rulers of separatist regimes often regard reunification as their responsibility and make unremitting efforts for it. After the peasant uprising army established political power, its leaders were also determined to unify the whole country. The concept of "great unification" is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, has become the cohesion of the Chinese nation, and has played an extremely important role in promoting the political unity of the Chinese nation.

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The concept of "great unification" in the west originated from the decline of ancient Greek city-states in the 4th century BC and was put forward as an ideal to save the crisis of city-states. The short-lived Alexander Empire of Macedonia turned it into reality, and the Roman Empire made it a concept that haunted Europeans for a long time. However, this idea is rarely reflected in European political life.

After the Peloponnesian War, many Greeks were expelled from the traditional city-states. "In the past, in the old city-state, life was relatively simple. Laws, morals, religions and obligations are clearly defined and generally accepted by everyone. Now, all this has disappeared, and urban residents find themselves in an amorphous world, especially after Hellenistic cities are often torn apart by race, culture and class division. " People feel at a loss in the new living environment. Faced with troubled times, thinkers put forward their own prescriptions to save the world. Epicurus put forward that true happiness lies in avoiding all pains, troubles and worries and making the body and mind peaceful; Diogenes of Sinop thinks that a wise man should be completely self-satisfied, and nothing matters except moral quality. Obviously, the philosophy of Epicurus and diogenes is to give up everything, but the latter is asceticism and nihilism. This is also the sigh of the helpless people in the turmoil. Aristotle strongly advocated the superiority of the city-state system and asked people to return to the city-state era of small countries and few people. Obviously, this is a retrogression.

While thinkers are arguing endlessly, politicians are acting. After Aristotle's student Alexander brought the Greeks back to his own rule, he immediately made an expedition to the East, aiming at establishing a "joint * * * body" in which the Greeks, Macedonians and Persians were inseparable. [13] (I, P. 178- 179) Although the empire established by Alexander was short-lived, "due to Alexander's conquest, cultural integration and national chaos, it accomplished the task of overthrowing many ideals of the Greeks in the golden age of the 5th-4th century BC. A new civilization based on Greek and oriental factors has emerged. " [14] (Volume I, page 263) As the famous British writer Wells said in the Outline of World History: "Before Alexander died, especially after his death, when people had time to think about him, the concept of a worldwide law and organization was already a practical and absorbable concept in people's minds." [15](P.403) The Stoic thought of "great unification" was born under this historical background.

Stoicism was founded by Zhi Nuo in Athens around 300 BC. This school thinks that people in the universe have no hierarchy. Anyone (whether slave or free, savage or civilized) can be happy as long as he obeys his own destiny, is satisfied with his position in life and is indifferent to what is happening around him. The state can guarantee the happiness of the wise who do good. Since mankind is a whole, there should be only one country, that is, the world country; There is only one kind of citizen, and that is the citizen of the universe. And this country should be led by a wise monarch, that is, priests of all ethnic groups. [16] (P.66) This cosmopolitanism, which transcended the boundaries between city-states and nations, met the needs of imperial rule and was quite popular during the Roman Empire. [13] (Volume I, P. 19 1) "From Scipio, Cicero, Caesar, Augustus to Trajan, all emperors explained their ideal of ruling all ethnic groups more or less according to Stoic philosophy." Page 220

In the history of Europe, with the establishment of the Alexander Empire and the Roman Empire, the concept of "great unity" was established. Even though the Roman Empire has perished, people living in its land are still reluctant to leave it. Whenever a powerful man enters European politics, he almost always carries out the dead of the Roman Empire to clear his name.

First of all, the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire always claimed to be the emperor of the Roman Empire. During Justinian's reign (527-565), he tried to eradicate the country established by the Germans in the territory of the Western Roman Empire and realize real reunification.

Secondly, the Pope strived for the secular rule of the Roman Empire. The Pope has taken two measures to this end:

One is to create public opinion in theory and shape himself as the successor of the western Roman Empire. Augustine (354-430), the godfather of Latin, proposed in his City of God that there are both cities of God and the earth between heaven and earth, which are imperfect, temporary and will be destroyed, and full of evil because of Satan; The city of God is perfect and eternal, and the church is the embodiment of the city of God in the world. Only the church established through Christ can be saved and have eternal life. Only when secular countries obey and serve the church in religion can they become a part of the city of God. Therefore, he believes that religious power is supreme. Gregory I (about 540-604), the first Pope in Rome, spread Augustine's teachings to the west, although he lacked original views on Christian theology. In particular, he insisted that the Pope was the head of all churches appointed by God, and boldly exercised the duties of the emperor and the power of the secular monarch in the west to compete with the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire. In the 9th century, the Pope even forged the document "The Gift of Constantine" in the name of Emperor Constantine I (reigned from 306 to 337), claiming that as early as the 4th century, Constantine I handed over the rule of the Western Roman Empire to the Bishop of Rome. At this time, the defenders of papal power also fabricated the "isidore Fatwa Collection". From this set of pseudo-fatwa, people seem to think that from the earliest times of Christianity, the emperor belongs to the Pope, and the Pope is the successor of Christ and the apostle Peter.

The second is to collude with the Frankish kingdom, use Frankish power to deal with Lombardy who constantly invaded Rome, and at the same time start to compete with the Eastern Roman Empire. In 75 1 year, Pippin, a dwarf with real power in the Frankish kingdom, successfully completed the transfer of power with the support of the Pope and established the Carolingian dynasty. In order to repay the Pope, Pippin sent troops to Italy twice to defeat the Lombards, and dedicated the land he obtained to the Pope, which laid the foundation for the establishment of a papal state in the future. In 754 AD, Pope Stephen went to Gaul and anointed him with pi, and awarded him the title of Roman aristocrat, which could only come from the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire who was in Constantinople at that time. In 799, Pope Leo III was persecuted by his political opponents and fled to Frank. The following year, Charlie personally escorted him back to China to recover. In order to repay Charlie and get further protection, Leo III crowned Charles as "Augustus" and "Emperor of Rome" when the Romans gathered in St. Peter's Cathedral to crown Charles' son Louis I on Christmas Day in 800 AD. The emperor and the Pope joined hands to regain the inheritance of the Roman Empire from the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, and Frank, as a Germanic country, was therefore included in the list of orthodox successors of the Roman Empire. Judging from the situation in Europe at that time, the Pope granted Charlie powers that he could not obtain or maintain. This is killing two birds with one stone. First, the most powerful Frankish kingdom in Western Europe was closely tied up with itself against the Eastern Roman Empire. Second, there is still room for expansion of his power in the future, because this coronation ceremony is increasingly interpreted as a symbol that the power of heaven is higher than the secular. It was the Pope who used his theocracy to recover the empire from Byzantium and awarded it to King Frank. The Pope has become the heir of the Roman Empire, and the legal status of secular kings must rely on the approval of the Pope.

From then on, Frankish Charlemagne was crowned "Roman Emperor" in Rome. The German king was crowned as the "Holy Roman Emperor" in Rome, and they all claimed to be the successors of the Roman Empire. 13 10, when Emperor henry vii of the Holy Roman Empire came to Italy, he was praised by Engels as "the last poet in the middle ages and the first poet in the new era" [18] (Volume I, page 269). Motivated by maintaining and strengthening the status of the Italian Empire, Dante wrote The World Empire with great enthusiasm. The book demonstrates the natural rationality of the existence of the empire from the history of ancient Rome, and advocates using "Roman emperor" as the title of monarch and setting the capital in Rome. 1453, the Eastern Roman Empire was destroyed by the Turks. Russian Ivan III of Russia, the Grand Duke of Moscow, married Sophia, the niece of the last emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, and considered herself the legal heir to the cause of the Eastern Roman Empire. Whenever a grand ceremony is held, Ivan III of Russia of Russia always wears a shawl symbolizing imperial power, wears the crown left by the Roman emperor of Dai Dong and sits on the jade throne. Moreover, Russian Ivan III of Russia took the national emblem of the double-headed eagle of ancient Rome and the Eastern Roman Empire as the national emblem of the Moscow Principality. When Ivan IV arrived, he even called himself "Caesar", hence the name "Tsar". Until the late Middle Ages in Europe, with the emergence and development of nation-States, the new "European view" gradually replaced the concept of great unity called by the Roman Empire.

The difference is that these "successors" of the Roman Empire in European history did not get their wish and really established a unified country like China. On the contrary, whoever wins this title will bear a heavy burden on his nation and country. For example, Justinian I, the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, spent his whole life trying to establish a unified Roman Empire, and finally the treasury was empty. After his death, the dream of imperial reunification disappeared. Charlemagne empire was also a flash in the pan, and Charlemagne split into three shortly after his death. The Holy Roman Empire was even more unfortunate. Not only did its emperor never establish a real Roman empire, but even the political unity of the German nation-state was never realized. When Ivan IV called himself the "Tsar", Europe had entered a new era of bourgeois nation-states, and the attraction of the Roman Empire had declined.

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Through a rough comparison, we can find that the difference in the development results of the concept of "great unity" between China and the West is due to the difference in political practice. In the history of China, since the establishment of the Qin Empire, despite numerous divisions and separatist regimes, political unity has always been the mainstream of development. Even according to Mr. Ge's calculation, the time of real reunification in China's history is not longer than that of actual division, or even longer. However, compared with Europe, the number and length of reunification in China's history are much more and longer. This difference in political practice, in turn, has seriously affected the development of their respective cultures, resulting in the uninterrupted and stable continuity of China's cultural development (that is, continuity), while the development of European culture is obviously intermittent and unstable.

Mr. Liu Jiahe believes that the continuity of culture should include two aspects: "First, the continuity of language development, that is, the continuity of tools or its important manifestations on which culture depends;" First, the continuity of academic development itself (especially philosophy and history), that is, the continuity of cultural and spiritual content. " [ 19]

The ancient language and writing in China has never been interrupted in its development process, and has maintained a stable development state, and its application scope is also expanding. From Oracle Bone Inscriptions to modern simplified Chinese characters, it is a step-by-step process, and in this development process, no matter how much the glyph has changed, the basic principles of the construction of new words and the expansion of the meaning of old words are relatively unchanged, that is, the so-called "six books" (pictograph, reference, understanding, phonology, annotation and borrowing). [19] In the classical era of world civilization (65438 BC+0000-500 AD), China people unified the written language, "it enables people who speak completely different dialects to communicate with each other." After [12] (above, page 278), the use of Chinese and Chinese characters has been expanding, and its influence has become increasingly far-reaching, until today.

In contrast, although ancient Greek and Latin have not disappeared with the development of history in the western world, their influence is weakening day by day, and they have not developed into the same language in the western world. Alexander's eastward expedition established the Alexander Empire and the Hellenistic country that will be established later, which made the vast area from Adriatic Sea to Indus River unimpeded as long as you knew Greek, but Greek did not develop into the lingua franca of this area. With the establishment of the Roman Empire, Roman Latin became the most widely used language in the Mediterranean world, but it did not develop into the lingua franca of the Mediterranean world. The development of Greek has always been limited to a few Greeks, while Latin was no longer a spoken and living language in medieval western Europe, but only remained in the religious and academic fields. 15 and 16 centuries, with the rise of western European nation-States, national languages are increasingly developed, not to mention any common language in Europe. Although the national languages of western European countries are all Latin, there are still great differences between them.

Therefore, this discontinuity and instability in the history of western cultural development makes the "great unity" in the history of western political development lose its cultural connotation. On the other hand, the delay of political unification also makes the development of western culture unsupported.