The Baoxun Bamboo Manuscript of Tsinghua University and Confucian Daotong Revisited: With a Discussion of Xun Zi’s Status in Daotong

Abstract

Through the stories of Shun and Shangjia Wei, the Baoxun bamboo manuscript expresses the Confucian political idea of zhongdao (中道 the middle way). Early Confucians had a strong sense of propagating the dao (道 the Way), but they kept an open mind as to how it was to be understood, which was very different from the later doctrine of daotong (道统 the tradition of the Way). Although ancient China possessed a long and continuous intellectual tradition of zhong (中 center, middle, etc.), a tradition that gave rise to a series of concepts such as zhongzheng (中正 being fair and upright), zhongyong (中庸 the principle of the Mean) and zhonghe (中和 being central and harmonious), zhong actually originated from ancient religious rituals and was an important category of the ancient study of li (礼 rites or ritual). After Confucius, it was Xun Zi who was the true heir to the tradition of zhong in all its fullness. The Confucian daotong is the combination of the tradition of ren (仁 benevolence) and that of li, and the Confucian dao or Way refers to the Way of becoming a sage within and a king without.