What kind of person is Zeng Guofan?

1995165438+10/8, the first national symposium on Zeng Guofan was held in Yongfeng Town, Shuangfeng County, Hunan Province. Scholars from more than 20 provinces and cities in China submitted more than 60 papers to the conference. Scholars have put forward many meaningful and valuable questions and opinions in their papers and speeches. This exposition covers a wide range and can be described as a comprehensive evaluation of Zeng Guofan. This paper intends to summarize and introduce the following issues. First, Zeng Guofan and China's modern culture, China's modern culture and China's traditional culture are opposites in the eyes of many people. It is said that China's traditional culture is feudal culture, and the core of feudal culture is Confucianism, which is characterized by "emphasizing ethics, science, politics, production, tradition, innovation, conservatism and reform, that is, emphasizing morality over equipment and justice". China's modern culture is actually a capitalist culture. It is not bred from the soil of China, but a modern western culture transplanted from abroad. The core of modern western culture is science and democracy. Yan Fu once made a comparison between Chinese and western cultures, pointing out: "China values the three cardinal guides, while westerners value equality first;" China kisses, while western Shang Xian. China governs the world by filial piety, while the west governs the world by public; China respects the Lord and the West enriches the people; " China is in the same wind, and westerners prefer the party to live in the country ... "... Others said:" The essence of China culture is the way of saints, and the essence of western culture is the art of utensils. "There is no doubt that Chinese and Western cultures are essentially antagonistic. However, when the modern western culture is transplanted into the soil of China to germinate and grow, it must have the characteristics of China. China's modern culture was produced and developed in the long-term confrontation, struggle, reconciliation and integration between western modern culture and China's traditional culture. This is a modern western culture with China characteristics. Therefore, although there are opposites, there are similarities between modern culture in China and traditional culture in China. The historical figures in this cultural transition period have the character of accommodating two cultures. Zeng Guofan is a representative figure in this respect. Critics generally believe that Zeng Guofan is a master of China traditional culture. Some even commented that, in a sense, Zeng Guofan is the embodiment of China's traditional culture. If Confucian culture can be divided into three stages: early stage, middle stage and late stage, and there is corresponding Theory of Three Represents's character theory, then Confucius in the early stage, Zhu in the middle stage and Zeng Guofan in the later stage. Zeng Guofan did inherit the traditional culture of China with Confucianism as the core. Many papers submitted to the conference this time involve this point. Zeng Guofan completely followed the Confucian road of "self-cultivation, keeping the family in order, governing the country and leveling the world" and finished his life. He abides by the principle of "three cardinal guides and five permanents" and holds that "although a gentleman is unkind, a minister should not be unfaithful, a father should not be unkind, a son should not be unfilial, a husband should not be virtuous, and a wife should not be disobedient. "His own self-cultivation, such as" ruling the people with courtesy ","using both hands ","keeping profits and protecting Thailand ","combining rigidity with softness ","managing the family diligently, being honest and trustworthy ",and his family precepts, such as" eight books ","eight characters ","four articles "and" four defeats ",all show that Zeng Guofan is authentic. Commentators have different opinions about the "Three Cardinal Principles and Five Permanent Principles". Some commentators regard the "three cardinal guides and five permanent members" as dross, and even consider it the most inappropriate, while others hold objections. They think that since China's traditional culture should be split in two, why can't the core of this traditional culture be split in two? Can we say that the core of China's traditional culture is dross? Only the non-core part has some essence? Obviously, we can't say that. If so, wouldn't it be a total denial of traditional culture? In fact, for a long time in the past, loyalty, filial piety, loyalty, benevolence, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom and faith were all regarded as dross, or were not discussed or advocated, which did not bring any benefits to our society, but suffered greatly. Some critics say that Zeng Guofan suppressed the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in order to maintain China's traditional culture. Others said that Zeng Guofan maintained not the essence of China traditional culture, but the dross. Since Zeng Guofan is a master of China's traditional culture, can it be said that Zeng Guofan totally rejects western culture? Many critics think he can't. He is neither a feudal die-hard who rejects western culture regardless of its advantages or disadvantages, nor a so-called "wholesale westernization" who blindly copies western culture regardless of China's national conditions, but a theorist who advocates the combination of Chinese and Western cultures. Zeng Guofan holds a sublation attitude towards Chinese and western cultures and has a clear understanding of each other's advantages and disadvantages. His strong national consciousness made him put China's traditional culture in the main position, supplemented by western culture. Some critics pointed out that Zeng Guofan, while holding high the banner of "defending morality", tapped the spirit of "applying the world to practice" in traditional Confucianism, formed a new pattern of "benefiting the body through justice", endowed traditional culture with new vitality, and restored its role of calling scholars and maintaining people's hearts. It is precisely because he has a thorough understanding of the length of traditional culture that he can absorb and carry forward the essence of traditional culture and introduce modern western culture. Some critics pointed out that Zeng Guofan was a leader in introducing western science and technology and an advocate in introducing modern western culture. He was the first player to put forward the idea of' learning wisdom to build ships and guns'; He was the first person to build a ship; He was the first person to send someone abroad to buy a full set of' production tools'; He first put forward the idea of "official supervision and commercial office". It was he who first promoted Rong Hong's plan to send overseas students. As a master of China's traditional culture, why did Zeng Guofan become a leader in introducing modern western culture? Why can you be the pioneer of modern culture in China? Some critics believe that this is mainly due to two reasons: one is the inherent nature of China's traditional culture, and the other is Zeng Guofan's own characteristics. They think that the core of China's traditional culture is "Confucianism is both conservative and enterprising, closed and open", but they don't agree that Confucianism is completely closed and conservative. It is precisely the enterprising and open nature of Confucianism that led China to put forward his own countermeasures in the face of the western capitalist ideological and cultural system, which has never been encountered for thousands of years: "learning from China", "learning from the West" and "trying to maintain his own ideological and cultural system". This is Zeng Guofan's creation of modern culture. Its subjective aspect is its own reason. The commentator said, "First of all, he is not only a scholar, but also a politician. The purpose of his learning all knowledge is to solve the political problems faced by the ruling class. Therefore, the knowledge he contributed was not mainly Neo-Confucianism, but the study of the world. " He is concerned about the highest interests of the ruling class as a whole and the safety of its rise and fall, not just the prosperity of a school. Therefore, he is blind to learning. He advocates accepting all useful knowledge, learning in an all-round way, "using it when necessary, choosing its strengths" and "learning from foreigners and strengthening oneself". "And in the process of suppressing Taiping rebels, Zeng Guofan borrowed foreigners' tools and foreigners' strength, and achieved results, which made him taste the sweetness and enhanced his self-confidence in learning from foreigners. Some commentators agree with the above analysis of subjective and objective aspects, but emphasize that China traditional culture and western modern culture are not absolutely opposite, and there are the same aspects besides the opposition. Only by recognition can two opposing cultures blend with each other, resulting in the modern culture of China with the characteristics of China's history and national conditions. Commentators further raised another question, that is, did Zeng Guofan change his cultural thought because he introduced modern western culture? Some commentators said: "Zeng Guofan was the last representative of Neo-Confucianism and the last spiritual pillar of China feudal society, and all his thoughts belonged to feudalism. In fact, if we look at Zeng Guofan's remarks and writings, besides consciously defending feudalism, he also unconsciously abandoned and changed feudalism. Especially in the cultural spirit, it has taken a stumbling step from traditional culture to modernity; It has had an important and far-reaching influence on the formation and development of China's modern cultural spirit. I also support this statement. Because, with the entry of modern western culture, China's social existence has changed, and Zeng Guofan's thought is likely to change. Especially as a leader who introduced modern western culture, his thoughts could not remain unchanged. Chinese and western cultures can't be put in people's minds like two kinds of persimmons (native persimmons and exotic persimmons) in a sack without interfering with each other. Earlier, we mentioned that we should see the confrontation, conflict and struggle between Chinese and western cultures. The confrontation, conflict and struggle between Chinese and western cultures exist not only in society, but also in Zeng Guofan's thought. Therefore, the difference between Zeng Guofan and Woren is not only the difference that Zeng Guofan advocated the introduction of western science and technology, but also the difference between a westernization leader who adapted to the times and a feudal die-hards, mainly the difference between the old and new schools. The struggle between them is not a struggle for individual issues, but a struggle for socialism. There are also comments that "Zeng Guofan really started the transformation from ancient cultural spirit to modern cultural spirit". Therefore, we can use such a couplet to summarize Zeng Guofan's cultural achievements and contributions: to worship Han Hong in Song Dynasty, to uphold Taoism and to uphold Confucianism in previous dynasties; Save the nation, revitalize industry, inspire education and create modern romance. Of course, we can't overestimate Zeng Guofan's cultural achievements and contributions, we can only seek truth from facts. After all, he just started the transformation from traditional culture to modern culture in China. He is only the main initiator of modern culture in China, and naturally he has many defects. He is quite conservative. For example, some critics pointed out that when he rectified the salt policy in Huai 'an and Huai 'an, he "resolutely opposed the use of foreigners to manage the tax collection of salt boats, and he was dissatisfied with his children's request for Western medicine to see his wife. "However, we should not expect too much from Zeng Guofan. For example, he said, "the western political system and ideological system, such as system and freedom, equality and fraternity, will never be introduced." Actually, it's not his personal problem. No one else has introduced these things. For quite some time after him, no one advocated the introduction of these things. Only after the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895 did some people in China learn the political and ideological weapons of evolution, civil rights and equality from the western bourgeois arsenal to criticize feudal culture. Some commentators said, "In the period of great historical and cultural transformation, people's understanding of this new situation, new situation and new things was slow at the beginning, not to mention that in the confrontation and conflict between old and new cultures and Chinese and Western cultures, the influence of middle school (old learning) was far greater than that of' western learning' (new learning) for a long time. Even among advanced thinkers, this confrontation between old and new cultures was very obvious. "Zeng Guofan did not introduce western systems, freedom, equality and fraternity. It was not his personal problem, but a social problem, a historical problem and a time problem. We can't talk about culture by culture, but we must talk about cultural changes in connection with changes in social, political and economic systems. " As long as the economic base and political system of feudal society have not changed significantly, the structure and level of feudal culture can not be fundamentally changed. "During Zeng Guofan's activities, China's feudal economic base did not change greatly. The capitalist mode of production was re-germinated and produced in China only because Zeng Guofan introduced western technology. The economic base can't put forward the requirements of introducing western systems, freedom, equality and fraternity. If Zeng Guofan really proposed to introduce western systems, freedom, equality and fraternity, he was not a pragmatic person, but a visionary. However, China at that time didn't even have the conditions to produce such a visionary. In addition, we should also see that cultural changes and the construction of new culture have a long logical process from the object level to the system level and then to the ideological level. Zeng Guofan can only do what he could do during the pioneering period of modern cultural relics in China. Well, he did it. So we call him the founder of modern culture.