摘要
中国文明超越性的问题,是学界长期以来争论不休的核心话题.以西方超越性宗教为标准衡量中国文明,是有巨大问题的.而巫史传统乃是中国古代宗教的主流,需要通过巫史传统来理解超越性.《荀子》《礼记》中对祭礼理论有非常多的讨论,其中一个基本原则是,越是高等级的祭祀,越是尚质,因为不能以人的方式来理解天神.同时,祭礼中的"神明之"也被用来解释丧礼中的明器,丧祭之礼在尚质这一点上是相通的.巫史传统的根本特点是对自然的崇拜,而巫史传统中的鬼神,代表的是自然中的神秘力量而非超自然的力量.将最接近自然的祭品献给鬼神,这当中确实有一种超越性情感,但不是创造神对自然的超越,而是自然对日常生活的超越.这种超越性与西方宗教传统有巨大差别.
Abstract
The issue of transcendence in Chinese civilization has long been heatedly debated.It is problematic to measure Chinese civilization by the standard of the transcendent religion in the West.Shamanism is the mainstream of ancient Chinese religion,through which transcendence can be properly understood.There are a lot of discussions on the theory of ritual of sacrifice in Xun Zi荀子 and The Book of Rites礼记 about.One of the basic principles is that the higher the level of sacrifice,the more natural and simpler the sacrifice is,because the gods cannot be understood in a human way.This principle also applies to funerals,especially to burial objects.The fundamental feature of the rationalized Shamanism is the worship of nature,and the gods and ghosts worshipped are mysterious but not supernatural powers in nature.There is indeed a transcendent sentiment in offering the sacrifice closest to nature to the ghosts and gods,but it is not the transcendence over nature by a creator god,but the transcendence of nature over everyday life.It is another type of transcendence that is very much different from the Western one.
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