從常性思考解釋何以「唯女子與小人為難養也」

Explaining Why ‘Only Women and Petty Men are Difficult to be Reared’From the Perspective of Natural-generality-thinking

《論語‧陽貨》「唯女子與小人為難養也」這句話，頗令宋代以來的經學家和今日的儒家學者頭疼，不曉得要怎麼說，才能為孔子多少疏脫一些歧視婦女之嫌疑。可惜他們所循的途徑不外是文字更正、文義重詁和訴諸時代背景等三種。本文認為：如果從思考方式下手，回到中國古代的「常性思考」去，這句話根本就不會引起這些問題，更不必費心思為孔子另作辯護。所謂「常性思考」，就是以事物之「通常的」或「經常的」陰陽狀態（氣象、氣質、氣勢、形勢）作為事物之「天性」或「本性」的思考方式。而所謂「常」，是就事物之「自然韻律狀態」或「正常韻律狀態」而言的，與我們今日從西方學來的所謂「必然的本質」或者「或然的結果」無關，而是與「一陰一陽之調和變化方式」有關。萬事萬物不外就是這「一陰一陽之調和變化方式」之不同形式而已。「女子」這種「物」，就是因為「稟陰閉氣多，故其意淺促閉著」，結果跟小人一樣，近之則承狎而不遜順，而遠之則生不己愛之怨恨，不好畜養。但這句評語乃是一種「倒三角形話語」，「頭放尾收」，旨在指點一種「千古不易」的道理，以便人因應自省自修，不再陷於氣性泥淖之中。至於個別「女子」之是否「好養」，這還得看其天生氣質是否特別中和秀異和是否經過特別修養，懂得應對進退之分寸而定。一般來講，「女子」同「小人」一樣「難養」。這是「常性」問題，與歧視婦女無關。

The sentence 'Only women and petty men are difficult to be reared' in ”The Analects of Confucius” has been so problematic and controversial to the Confucian scholars since Song Dynasty that it was handled inappropriately and apologetically by the following three approaches: text correction, text reinterpretation, and appealing to the customs of the era. In this paper, we suggest rather to handle it by the way of the traditional 'natural-generality-thinking'(常性思考). If doing so, this sentence would be problematic no more.What is called 'natural-generality-thinking' is that those generally appeared yin-yang stylistic rhythms are taken as the 'natural and normal' nature of things. They are not the same as the 'necessary essence' or 'probable result' of things, which is characteristic of Western mode of thinking about the nature of things.In traditional Chinese thought, 'woman' as one of the things in the world is characteristically 'mostly yin in its natural disposition therefore always being shallow-minded and closed-minded.' Because of this, 'woman' is similar to ”petty man” in that they will not be humble when being closed to a gentleman, and will complain when being kept at arm's length by a gentleman.This commentary sentence is in fact a kind of 'upside-down triangular discourse,' with indeterminacy upside and determinacy downside, aiming at showing a kind of 'generally right' proper way of conduct, and is convenient for people to self-reflect and self-cultivate. This does not mean all the women in the world must be difficult to be reared. Whether an individual woman would be so is just a problem of 'natural-generality,' not a problem of women discrimination.