「事天」與「尊天」——明末清初地方儒者的宗教關懷

Service to Heaven' and 'Reverence for Heaven': Religious Concerns of Four Marginal Confucians in the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties

本文不以「大人物」、「大敘事」為考論對象，而以明末清初中國「不發達地區」的地方儒者──俠西的文翔鳳、廣西的王啟元、江西的謝文洊、河北的魏裔介為分析個案，揭示他們在儒學信仰之外，其實在宗教問題領域亦別有一番思想旨趣值得關注。本文主要指出三點：一、他們積極主張「事天」、「尊天」、「畏天」、「立命」，其中甚至有人企圖建立「孔教」、「儒教」；二、他們對「天」、「上帝」等宗教問題的觀念表述，應是晚明清初儒學與宗教的互動格局的一種生動反映；三、他們應對外來天主教的態度各異，或從傳統宗教或從理學本位的角度來排斥或評價外來新宗教。總之，明清之際的這些思想、新動向足以提供我們許多深刻的省思。

Instead of 'great figures' in 'grand narratives,' this article is a case study of four marginal Confucians in the under-developed areas of China during the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties: Wen Xiangfeng in Shanxi, Wang Qiyuan in Guangxi, Xie Wencun in Jiangxi, and Wei Yijie in Hebei. The paper aims to show that, in addition to their Confucian convictions, their unique ideas on religious matters also deserve our close attention. Particularly, it attempts to show that (i) they all advocate the ideas of 'service to Heaven,” 'reverence for Heaven,” 'fear of Heaven,” and ' establishing one's destiny,” with some of them even attempting to institutionalize a Confucian or Ruist religion; (ii) their conceptualizations of the religious ideas of 'Heaven” and 'God” vividly reflect the interactions between Confucianism and other religions in that period; and (iii) they assess and reject Catholicism as a foreign religion from their standpoint as followers of either traditional religions or Neo-Confucianism. In short, this intellectual trend of the Ming-Qing Dynasties demands our serious attention.