Mou Zongsan (; 12 June 1909 – 12 April 1995) was a Chinese philosopher and translator. He was born in Shandong province and graduated from Peking University. In 1949 he moved to Taiwan, and later Hong Kong, remaining 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,• Chan, Wing-Cheuk. "Mou Zongsan's Transformation of Kant's Philosophy." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 33.1 (2006): 125-39. Print. into Chinese, and above all by Tiantai Buddhist philosophy.
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.
Biography Mou Zongsan was born into the family of an innkeeper in Qixia, Shandong. 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 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. He died in Taipei in 1995, leaving dozens of disciples in top academic jobs in Taiwan and Hong Kong.Jason Clower, "Mou Zongsan (Mou Tsung-san) ," Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Works 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.
Histories of philosophy 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 CE), 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" ( 心學) or 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. Mou's later book From Lu Xiangshan to Liu Jishan () (1979) is treated as the fourth volume of this book.
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 the usual Chinese recognition of the Huayan school as the 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.
Philosophical treatises 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.
Treatise on Summum Bonum () (1985). This is Mou's last major work. Mou did not intend it as his final book, but scholars generally treat it as the definitive summary of his thinking. It attempts to use Tiantai ontological concepts as inspiration to find Confucian solution to Kant's problem of the highest good or summum bonum. It includes a chapter with Mou's commentary on Mencius and a more complete evaluation of the place of Daoist and Buddhist philosophy for the modern Confucian.
Philosophical work
Mou and Kant
Following his teacher Xiong Shili, Mou Zongsan sought to articulate and justify a moral metaphysics.• Bunnin, Nicholas. "God's Knowledge And Ours: Kant And Mou Zongsan On Intellectual Intuition." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 35.4 (2008): 613-24. Print. A moral metaphysics asserts the interconnectedness of ontology and morality, implying the moral value of all objects including the self. Mou's philosophy attempts to demonstrate the limits of Kant, suggesting instead the ways in which Chinese thought may surpass Kantian morality. Several of Mou's titles directly reveal his engagement with Kant – Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Phenomenon and Thing-in-Itself, and Treatise of the Perfect Good – a commitment that is reflected in Mou's decision to express his philosophy in Kantian terms. For example, Mou's philosophy inherits the Kantian concepts of autonomy, intellectual intuition, and Thing-in-Itself, although Confucianism inspires Mou to transform these concepts.• Billioud, Sebastien. "Mou Zongsan's Problem With The Heideggerian Interpretation Of Kant." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 33.2 (2006): 225-47. Print. The reason behind this decision to use Kantian terms remains unknown, but some scholars argue that Mou's use of certain terminologies aims to facilitate a dialogue between the East and West, pointing to Mou's comparison of Mencius and Kant, whereby he demonstrates the compatibility of Chinese and Western philosophies.• Guo, Qiyong. "Mou Zongsan’s View of Interpreting Confucianism by “moral Autonomy”." Frontiers of Philosophy in China 2.3 (2007): 345-62. Print.
Mou's philosophy develops as a critique and transformation of Kant's critical philosophy.• Schmidt, Stephan. "Mou Zongsan, Hegel, and Kant: The Quest for Confucian Modernity." Philosophy East and West 61.2 (2011): 260-302. Philosopher's Index [ProQuest]. Web. Mou believes in the compatibility of Chinese thought and Kantian philosophy because both are backed by the Way, where the Way is essentially truth and different philosophies manifest different aspects it.• Jiadong, Zheng. "The Issue of the "Legitimacy" of Chinese Philosophy." Contemporary Chinese Thought 37.1 (2005): 11-23. Print. Mou's analysis of Kant centers on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. One of Mou's major criticisms of Kant involves Kant's regard for free will as theoretical. Herein lies one of Mou's fundamental beliefs, that morality and the moral life are, contrary to what Kant posits, really real. This presumption stems from Mou's belief in the metaphysical necessity of the capability of improving one's moral praxis, and thus Mou develops a moral metaphysics within the tenet of subjectivism. While Kant believes that intellectual intuition is only possible for God, Mou ascribes human beings equal capability of this intuition, which Mou finds superior to Heidegger’s fundamental ontology. Mou rejects Heidegger because according to Kant, true metaphysics is transcendent. Mou further departs from Kant’s philosophy, eventually transforming it into what is commonly referred to as New Confucianism or Mind Confucianism.
Mou and Heidegger Mou's relation to Heidegger Mou Zongsan’s interest in Martin Heidegger’s philosophy arises from his critique and transformation of Kant's philosophy. Mou's interpretation of Kant is greatly influenced by Heidegger’s elaboration of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason in his books Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (Kantbuch) and Introduction to Metaphysics. Under the influence of Heidegger’s philosophy, Mou changed his interpretation of Kant’s first critique from an epistemological approach to an ontological approach.• Chan, Wing-cheuk. "Mou Zongsan's Transformation of Kant's Philosophy." Journal of Chinese Philosophy Vol. 33 (2006): 125-139. In his treatise Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy (zhi de zhexue yu zhongguo zhexue) 智的直覺與中國哲學 (1971), Mou not only wrote his reflection on Heidegger’s philosophy (and translated two chapters from Being and Time), but also criticized Heidegger’s fundamental ontology with his moral metaphysics. In fact, Mou may have been influenced by Heidegger even in his early major work Substance of Mind and Substance of Human Nature (xinti yu xingti) 心體與性體 (1968–1969). Mou’s argument of the “Three modes” of Neo-Confucianism may be inspired by Heidegger's “Three ontological difference”, which was introduced to Mou from Max Müller’s works.• Chan, Wing-cheuk. "Mou Zongsan and Martin Heidegger." National Central University Journal of Humanities Vol. 51 (2012): 1-23.
Mou Zongsan agrees to a certain extent with Heidegger’s interpretation of Kant. Mou introduces a two-layer structure of understanding of the transcendental determination of the Kantian categories: a “logical” layer of understanding and an “ontological” layer of understanding. Mou believes the Kantian thesis that “objectivity is subjectivity” is not an “ontical proposition” but rather an “ontological proposition”. He agrees with Heidegger's analysis of Transcendental Schematism, which indicates that the meaning of objectification presupposes a subjective horizon that enables the object to appear. Mou names the ontology of the phenomenal world as “attached ontology” (zhi de cunyoulun).• Billioud, Sébastien. "Mou Zongsan's Problem with the Heideggerian Interpretation of Kant." Journal of Chinese Philosophy Vol. 33 (2006): 225-247. Mou rejects Kant's declaration that human beings are incapable of producing any intuitive knowledge of thing-in-itself. He embraces Heidegger's affirmation of the “subjective” character of the Kantian transcendental distinction, which he learns from Kantbuch:
The distinction between the concept of thing in itself and that of appearance is not objective but merely subjective.The thing in itself is not another but another aspect (respectus) of the representation with regard to the same object.• Heidegger, Martin. "Kant and Metaphysics." p.37.
Mou's critique In general, Mou holds a critical attitude towards Heidegger's fundamental ontology in his treatise Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy: