Two Interpretation Orientations on"Treating the People as Injured"in Mencius and their Significance
"Treating the people as injured"is a highly distinctive expression in Mencius'political philosophy,but scholars of different dynasties have different interpretations of its sentence pause and pronunciation,so the actual meaning of the phrase is not clear.Previous interpretations can be roughly divided into two categories.Zhao Qi and Jiao Xun,who followed the principle of"not disrupting the original meaning,"depicted the emotion of"treating the people as injured"as the emperor's empathy for the people,thus making"injured"the people themselves.Zhu Xi,a representative figure of Neo-Confucianism,combined the concept of"Tao"with the emotion of"treating the people as injured"and portrayed"injured"as the inner state of King Wen of Zhou,ultimately depicting this emotion as an abstract sense of pain.Zhu Xi's interpretation of"treating the people as injured"inherited the Confucian tradition of"all have sinned,and the sin is on my own shoulders,"and required the emperor to bear unlimited responsibility for the people and strive to avoid harming them.The two interpretive orientations towards"treating the people as injured"show the difference in hermeneutic approach and educational philosophy between Han scholars and Song scholars,which is a manifestation of the gradual transformation of Confucian thought from"external kingship"to"inner sainthood".
Menciustreating the people as injuredthe emotion of empathyseeing the way but not yet reaching it
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