Texts from the Zhou and Han periods regularly use the term quan “to weigh” when describing or prescribing human action. This essay seeks to determine precisely which concrete acts of weighing underlie the metaphoric application of the term to human action. A survey of the available textual and archaeological evidence shows that even before the Eastern Han, when steelyards became the most common weighing device, the act of weighing might have been executed and conceptualized in multiple ways. A similar conclusion is drawn from a survey of pictorial and literary references to metaphoric weighing in non-Chinese traditions. More precisely, I suggest three distinct possibilities: matching the object to be weighed with a known standard, determining which of two objects weighs heaviest, and, lastly, seeking the point at which the balance beam will gain or recover balance.Early Chinese texts provide examples of all three (quan A, B, and C). Quan B became prominent especially during the 3rd century B.C.E., when persuaders discussed how every choice had negative as well as positive consequences. Quan A and C are attested in texts usually dated to the 4th century B.C.E. or before. In this essay I argue that it is quan C that became the dominant metaphor in moral-political discourse, and that it had two competing interpretations: it could refer either to the multiple ways in which a sage adapts his actions to the circumstances, or to a temporary lifting of moral standards during an emergency. Whereas scholars in the Han and Qing dynasties generally accepted that moral rules were not absolute, Song scholars were scandalized by the notion that deviations from the rule were part and parcel of moral action.
This paper examines the controversy surrounding two Han laws that concern the relatives of criminals. The one law ordered that, in certain cases, the relatives of a criminal should be tried and punished together with the criminal ('coadjudication'). The other stated that people who had hidden a criminal relative should no longer be punished. Those in Former Han who opposed coadjudication and favored hiding, drew their arguments from ancient philosophical literature. They believed that a person was innocent unless he was himself involved in criminal acts, they 'could not bear' (bu ren) to punish an innocent person; they also held that the law should respect the feelings of love existing within the family. The defenders of coadjudication argued that a group was collectively responsible for the crimes of one of its members; they also believed that co-punishing a criminal's relatives would deter crime and enhance law and order.Key Words ᭛ coadjudication ᭛ family ᭛ Former Han ᭛ punishments ᭛ Yantielun (Yen t'ieh lun) During the Former Han dynasty (206 BCE-8 CE), two legal rules addressed the question of how relatives of a criminal should be treated. The first, a law inherited from the preceding Qin dynasty (221-206 BCE), ordered the coadjudication (xiang zuo) of the close family members of the perpetrator of a crime. The second, issued by imperial edict in 66 BCE, stated that family members should be legally allowed to hide each other from justice (shouni). These rules did not sit comfortably with one another. Whereas the edict on hiding one's relatives was meant as a strong pro-family measure, coadjudicating a criminal's relatives aimed to safeguard society from the harmful effects of close family ties. It is not surprising, therefore,
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