Birds and Beasts in the Zhuangzi, Fables Interpreted by Guo Xiang and Cheng Xuanying

Abstract

Birds and beasts often appear in the Zhuangzi, in fables and parables meant to be read analogically as instructions for human thought and behavior. Whereas the analogical significance of some fables is obvious, in others it is obscure and in need of explication, and even the readily accessible can be made to yield more clarity thanks to commentaries. This paper explores contributions made by the commentaries of Guo Xiang (252–312) and Cheng Xuanying (ca. 620–670) to the understanding of such fables. Guo Xiang and Wang Bi 王弼 (226–249) are the two most important figures in the xuanxue 玄學 “arcane learning” or “Neo-Daoism” movement of early medieval China (third to sixth century C.E.), which combined elements of Confucianism with the thought of Daoist foundational texts, especially the Daode jing (Classic of the Dao and Virtue) and the Zhuangzi (Sayings of Master Zhuang). Focus of the movement was the promotion of the concept and practice of the sage-ruler as a catalyst for the regeneration of self and society, leading to the foundation of a worldly utopia. Guo’s is the earliest intact philosophical commentary to the Zhuangzi and one of the most widely read during premodern times. Cheng Xuanying composed the only subcommentary to Guo’s commentary. Its more explicit style is most helpful in deciphering Guo’s too often cryptic and elliptical statements. However, it also tends to shunt Guo’s statecraft reading of the Zhuangzi more in the direction of explicating philosophical and religious dimensions of the text. Whereas Guo’s observations about sagehood, self-fulfillment, and the good life largely focus on the sage-ruler and his relation to his people, Cheng’s approach tends more to explore issues of personal self-realization and individual enlightenment, and, as such, is far more “religious” than Guo’s. However, when it comes to accounts of birds and beasts, parodies and satires, which address the limitations, failures, delusions and faulty assumptions, narrow-mindedness, and other human foibles, both Guo and Cheng see them all rooted in self-conscious thought and knowledge, and thus deadly impediments to enlightenment. Other passages about beasts and birds use animal fables as exemplars of truth concerning endowed personal nature and the natural propensity to stay within the bounds of individual natural capacity. Since the commentaries of Guo and Cheng add important dimensions to these accounts, this study explores these as well.

Animals, Sages and Saints: Alfonso Vagnone’s Rhetorical Strategy in Chinese Context

“…The use of this rhetorical device is in harmony with a basic precept propounded by the School of Principle (Lixue 理學): "Using natural laws to clarify human affairs (tui tiandao yi ming renshi 推天道以明人事)" 6 , a precept that departs from pre-Qin Confucianism: the pre-Qin Confucian tradition was rarely concerned with "naturalism" nor did it often elevate observations of animals to ethical principles. (It goes without saying that our discussion would be totally different if the Jesuits' main interlocutor had not been Confucianism but the doctrine originating from the Zhuangzi for instance-see (Lynn 2019). ) In fact, Matteo Ricci (1552Ricci ( -1610 had implicitly rejected the naturalistic tendency of the School of Principle and insisted upon the fact that that pre-Qin Confucianism was more conducive to the spread of the Catholic faith than latter versions of the same tradition.…”

On Small and Large Vessels

“…This notion has gained certain recognition in recent decades, particularly within the scholarship located at the intersection of anthropology, animal studies and philosophy, opening new perspectives on the question of otherness, historically anchored in the binary of the human and non-human world (Agamben 2004;Glock 2012;Steiner 2010;Gross et al 2012;Braidotti 2013). Studies concerning the role played by animals and other non-human beings in formation of Chinese culture, philosophy and political thought and imagery (Møllgaard 2010;Nappi 2012;Sterckx 2012;Lynn 2019;Back 2018; D'Ambrosio 2022) could be taken as part of this "nonhuman turn" (Grusin and Grusin 2015) in the contemporary humanities. Both Neo-Confucian learning of the Cheng-Zhu school as well as Jesuit scholastics introduced in China by Ricci, mainly through his 1603 cathehism Tianzhu shiyi (天主實義, The True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven; Ricci 2016), addressed the question of anthropological difference in a direct manner; a fact that provides a convenient comparative ground for studying how the Neo-Confucian tradition interfered with Western thinking at the early stage of the Sino-European intellectual exchange.…”

Guo Xiang’s Metaphysics of Being and Action: On the Importance of Xing 性

“…8 However, more work can be conducted to explore different avenues of Guo's thought, and from different perspectives. Just last year Richard John Lynn published the first complete English translation of Guo's commentary to the Zhuangzi (Lynn 2022), which will hopefully draw more scholarly attention to Guo's work. 9 There does, however, need to be solid scholarship on the philosophical implications of various terms Guo uses, especially with regard to the importance of xing, and this paper hopes to contribute to this area.…”