Feng Youlan's "History of Chinese Philosophy" is at present still the most well-known introduction to Chinese philosophy in any Western language. During the 1980s Feng Youlan published a seven-volume new version of his "History" in which he further developed his view on history so that the work itself can be considered part of the history of Chinese philosophy in this century. This paper presents a preliminary analysis and comparison of the different versions of the "History.".

In the early and middle Tang dynasty, a reform movement took place within Buddhism that resulted in the formation of a new sect, the Chan school. It was not a sect that paralleled the other schools, as did the Weishi School and the Huayan School. It claimed to be a "door of acceptance" and called other sects "doors of teaching." The two terms are opposed to and juxtaposed against each other. After the Chan sect became popular, the influence of other (...) sects gradually declined or even faded entirely, and eventually "Chan" became a synonym for the religion and study of Buddhism. (shrink)

The class origins of my neo-rationalism were very clear to others. But for myself, it was only after going through the examination and analysis mentioned above that it became clear to me. But even though I do now have a sense that this is true, my understanding is certainly still quite lacking. I can at least say that I do feel that the criticism in recent years of various comrades concerning this aspect of my philosophical thought has been basically correct. (...) I understand that fully now. (shrink)

After Liberation I did not undertake a really serious criticism of my past philosophical thought. It basically remained in my mind unchanged. I thought that if I simply did not concern myself with it any longer, it would be fine. In fact, that did not work. Even when you don't want to be concerned with something like that, it will concern itself with you. This was my thought system, and by my not thoroughly criticizing it, it remained my world view. (...) When someone has a particular world view, he inevitably looks at the world through that world view, as if he were wearing a pair of colored glasses. Everything he sees is inevitably distorted accordingly. I thought that in my further studies of the history of Chinese philosophy I could simply ignore my own philosophical thought. But wearing that pair of glasses, it was impossible to look at the history of Chinese philosophy without distortion. (shrink)

This year marks the fortieth anniversary of the May Fourth Movement. During these forty years, our nation has undergone enormous changes, has taken amazing strides forward. The seeds of antifeudalism and antiimperialism, of democracy and science, sown by the May Fourth Movement, have not only blossomed and borne fruit; these fruits in turn have brought forth the even newer flowers and fruits of the establishment of socialism and the transition toward communism.

After my History of Chinese Philosophy was published, the worldwide struggle between Marxism and fascism became more and more sharp and intense. In China, the anticolonialist struggle against Japanese imperialist aggression and the struggle for the liberation of the nation, under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party, had already turned from political struggle to armed struggle. In these struggles, the thought struggle occupied an important position.

My formal study of philosophy began in 1915 when I entered the Philosophy Department of Beijing University. Not only was the content of what we studied at the time composed entirely of Chinese feudal philosophy; it was furthermore still presented in the form of the various traditional topics such as, "study of the Classics," "Song dynasty studies," etc. The professor who lectured on the history of Chinese philosophy began with the legendary Three Emperors and Five Kings, and in one year (...) of lecturing reached only as far as the Duke of Zhou [founder of the Zhou dynasty, some 500 years before Confucius]. We asked him: if your lecture method continues like this, when will you finish? He replied that there was no such thing as finishing or not finishing, that if he wanted to finish the course he could do so in a single sentence, and that if he did not want to finish it he could go on lecturing forever. (shrink)

In 1923, there was a debate in Chinese philosophical circles on the view of life [also known as the science versus metaphysics controversy]. In the introduction to A View of Life, I described the situation at the time.

In 1925, I went to Yanjing University to teach courses in the history of Chinese philosophy. It was from this period on that I began to seriously study the history of Chinese philosophy. At the time, this was not what I really wanted to do. I had originally wanted to work with bourgeois philosophy in preparation for founding a system of my own. To work in the history of Chinese philosophy was at the time, I felt, a kind of academic (...) duty, a kind of burden. But after working with it for awhile, I felt that there was also much that could be done in this field of the history of Chinese philosophy. That is to say, while lecturing on the history of philosophy, I also found it possible to develop my own idealist philosophical thought. (shrink)

The unification under the Qin and Han dynasties was one of the great events in the history of the development of China. Not only did it establish an authoritarian centralized polity over all China; it also combined what had originally been different peoples and tribes of seven states into one unified people, known as the Han people. In response to the political unification and the merger of these peoples under the Han dynasty, Dong Zhong-shu [c.179-c.104 B.C.] constructed a comprehensive philosophical (...) system, based on the Gongyang Commentary on the Spring and Autumn Annals, that included a wide range of natural, social, and individual aspects of human life and was used as the theoretical basis of the current unification. At the same time it was an intellectual, philosophical reflection of this unification. (shrink)

Song and Ming dynasty neo-Confucianism was an important aspect of the superstructure of China's feudal society, was an important tool by which the landlord class controlled the people intellectually. The development of Song dynasty neo-Confucianism reached its peak with Zhu Xi [1130-1200] and Lu Jiu-yuan [Lu Xiangshan, 1139-1193], with whom both objective idealism and subjective idealism became well established as systems of thought. The objective idealism of Zhu Xi later became the orthodox philosophical system of the feudal ruling class, and (...) throughout the Yuan, Mind, and Qing dynasties Zhu Xi was regarded as the official spokesman for the ideology of the landlord class. (shrink)

The history of Chinese philosophy concerns the history of "China's" or "Chinese" philosophy, not the history of "philosophy in China." If we were to write a book on "The History of Chinese Mathematics," such a work would really be a history of "mathematics in China," or of "the development of mathematics in China" because "mathematics is mathematics" and there is no such thing as "Chinese" mathematics. But philosophy, like literature, is different. There really is a "Chinese" philosophy and a "Chinese" (...) literature, or in general a "Chinese" culture. (shrink)

Feng Youlan's (1895-1990) "History of Chinese Philosophy" is at present still the most well-known introduction to Chinese philosophy in any Western language. During the 1980s Feng Youlan published a seven-volume new version of his "History" in which he further developed his view on history so that the work itself can be considered part of the history of Chinese philosophy in this century. This paper presents a preliminary analysis and comparison of the different versions of the "History.".

The collection contains published and unpublished essays, lecture transcripts, notes, poems, etc., often with handwritten edits and comments. Topics vary, with a focus on Chinese philosophy, comparison of Chinese and Western thought, contemporary intellectual and social reform movements, biographical reflections and self-criticism. The collection may reflect how 20th century political developments, especially the Cultural Revolution, impacted Feng Youlan's thought.

Di 1 juan. San song tang zi xu -- di 2-3 juan. Zhongguo zhe xue shi -- di 4-5 juan. Zhen yuan liu shu -- di 6 juan. Zhongguo zhe xue jian shi [translation of Short history of Chinese philosophy] -- di 7-9 juan. Zhongguo zhe xue shi xin bian -- di 10 juan. Zhe xue lun wen ji.

本书选取冯友兰作品中关于哲思的经典篇目,讲述作者对人生诸多领域的思考,对诸多人生问题的剖析,处处洋溢着丰富的智慧与哲人的洞见.

Since its original publication in Chinese in the 1930s, this work has been accepted by Chinese scholars as the most important contribution to the study of their country's philosophy. In 1952 the book was published by Princeton University Press in an English translation by the distinguished scholar of Chinese history, Derk Bodde, "the dedicated translator of Fung Yu-lan's huge history of Chinese philosophy" (New York Times Book Review). Available for the first time in paperback, it remains the most complete work (...) on the subject in any language. Volume I covers the period of the philosophers, from the beginnings to around 100 B.C., a philosophical period as remarkable as that of ancient Greece. Volume II discusses a period lesser known in the West--the period of classical learning, from the second century B.C. to the twentieth century. (shrink)

Feng Youlan est l'un des grands philosophes du XXe siècle en Chine. Selon certains intellectuels de Pékin aujourd'hui, c'est même le plus important. Il fut aussi le plus exposé, car il a critiqué aussi bien les gardiens de la tradition que les iconoclastes, ceux du parti communiste ou ceux de certains mouvements libéraux. Ce Nouveau traité sur l'homme n'est pas une apologie ou une nouvelle version du confucianisme. Feng Youlan s'adresse à ses étudiants réfugiés avec lui (...) au fin fond de la Chine pour échapper à la guerre : après tous les bouleversements des dernières décennies, est-il encore possible de poser des repères objectifs? Quel est le sens de l'existence? Mettant en lumière différents niveaux de conscience de soi, Feng analyse les conditions d'une conduite morale authentique qui, totalement investie dans les tâches de la cité, est aussi ouverture à la transcendance. Cette réflexion, venue d'ailleurs, est une invitation à mesurer la particularité de notre propre discours sur des enjeux qui sont ceux de notre humanité commune. Michel Masson en présente ici la première traduction en langue occidentale. (shrink)

本书阐述的是一种独特而圆润的人生哲学,在统揽古今中外人生哲学的基础上提出了自己认为的人生哲学。本书也是一种别开生面的中西简明哲学史,以人生哲学为切入点,对中国古代哲学、西方古典哲学以及欧美现代哲学等提 出了自己的真知灼见。.

《新原道：中国哲学之精神》是冯友兰的经典著作，是一本中国文化的普及读物，通过考察中国古代各个思想流派，点明中国哲学的最高境界-“极高明而道中庸”，这不仅是的哲学智慧，也是极高的人生境界，在出世与入世之 间找寻中国哲学的独特精神内涵。全书贯穿了冯友兰对中国哲学的认识，阐述了新理学哲学体系在中国哲学中继往开来的地位，可以从中品味博大精深的中国传统文化精髓。.

本书共分十章,包括:孔孟、杨墨、名家、老庄、易庸、汉儒、玄学、禅宗、道学、新统等。.