Mou Zongsan

Mou Zongsan (1909–1995) was a Chinese philosopher and translator.

He was born in Shandong province and graduated from Peking University.

He went to Peking University for college prep (1927) and undergraduate courses (1929).

During that time he became a follower of Xiong Shili, author of the New Treatise on Consciousness-only and soon to be the most eminent philosopher in China until supplanted by Mou himself.

After graduating in 1933, Mou moved around the country working as a secondary school teacher and a faculty member at different universities.

In 1949 he moved to Taiwan and later to Hong Kong, and he remained outside of mainland China for the rest of his life.

His thought was heavily influenced by Immanuel Kant, whose three Critiques he translated from English, possibly first, into Chinese, and above all by Tiantai Buddhist philosophy.

In 1949 he followed the Nationalist government to Taiwan.

His student at Tunghai University was Tu Weiming.

In 1960 he moved to Hong Kong and eventually took up a post at New Asia College in Hong Kong (now part of the Chinese University of Hong Kong) and helped found New Asia Middle School.

During the last two decades of his life Mou was something of an intellectual celebrity.

He lectured frequently on Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist, and Kantian philosophy at Hong Kong University, National Taiwan Normal University, and National Taiwan University.

Physical Nature and Speculative Reason 才性與玄理 (1963).

This is Mou's main treatise on "Neo-Daoism" or xuanxue 玄學.

It is an analysis of intellectual developments of the Wei-Jin dynasties (220-420 AD), said to set the agenda for much of later Chinese philosophy and anticipate the developments in Buddhist philosophy later understood by Mou as a pattern underlying the main line of Song-Ming Confucianism.

Substance of Mind and Substance of Human Nature 心體與性體 (1968–1969).

This is probably the most studied of Mou's books, and by far the most famous in the West.

It is a three volume history of Confucianism in the Song (960-1279) and Ming (1368-1644) dynasties, often called "Neo-Confucianism" in the West.

It challenges usual two-part division of Neo-Confucian thought into a "school of principle" (lixue 理學), the Cheng-Zhu school represented by Cheng Yi, Cheng Hao, and Zhu Xi, and a "school of mind" (xinxue 心學) or xinxue represented by Lu Xiangshan and Wang Yangming.

Mou identifies a third lineage, whose main figures are Hu Hong (Hu Wufeng) and Liu Zongzhou (Liu Jishan), which best conveys the basic message of the classical sage Mencius.

Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy 智的直覺與中國哲學 (1971).

In this treatise, Mou applies the Kantian idea of 'intellectual intuition' to Chinese philosophy, which he believes affirms the idea that human beings can have such awareness.

He expresses strong interest in the utility of Buddhist philosophy for Confucian purposes.

This book is often thought of as an early version of Phenomenon and Thing-in-Itself.

Phenomenon and Thing-in-Itself 現象與物自身 (1975).

This develops Mou's famous doctrine of "two-level ontology," patterned off of Kantian and Buddhist metaphysics.

Buddha-Nature and Prajna 佛性與般若 (1977).

This is Mou's main examination of Buddhist philosophy, written in two volumes.

It upends usual Chinese recognition of Huayan school as most well-developed form of Buddhism and puts the Tiantai school in first place.

Mou credits Tiantai with having the best concepts for understanding the authoritative Hong-Liu line of Confucianism.

Mou's later book From Lu Xiangshan to Liu Jishan (從陸象山到劉蕺山) (1979) is treated as the fourth volume of this book.

Over the last 40 years of his life, Mou wrote histories of "Neo-Daoist," Confucian, and Buddhist philosophy (totaling six volumes) a group of constructive philosophic treatises, culminating in his 1985 work, On the Summum Bonum, in which he attempts to rectify the problems in Kant's system through a Confucian-based philosophy reworked with a set of concepts appropriated from Tiantai Buddhism.

In the People's Republic of China, Mou is especially famous for his cultural traditionalism and his defense of democracy as a traditional Chinese value.

Mou Zongsan was born into the family of an innkeeper in Qixia, Shandong.

Treatise on Summum Bonum (圓善論) (1985).

This is Mou's last major work.

He died in Taipei in 1995, leaving dozens of disciples in top academic jobs in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Mou's complete works contains more than 30 volumes written over about 60 years.

In religious studies and philosophy programs, attention is paid mostly to his production in his last 30 years.

These can be divided into histories of Chinese philosophy and philosophic treatises.