REVERE THE ANCIENT AND SCORN THE PRESENT: THE USE OF THE DISTANT PAST IN EARLY CHINESE MASTERS TEXTS

Abstract

One feature of early Chinese philosophical texts, retrospectively classified as Master Texts, or Zǐ Shū 子书, is that significant real estate in these texts are dedicated to references to and discussions of antiquity. This thesis consists of three chapters discussing this feature as it develops across different texts of various philosophical persuasions. The first chapter compares Pre-Qin Confucianism, as recorded in the two Master texts the Analects and Mengzi, with the core chapters of the Mozi, a Mohist text, by highlighting significant differences between the two groups of texts on how the past is discussed. The second chapter examines an interesting phenomenon in the Laozi, a quintessential Daoist text, a concerted attempt to appeal to a past more ancient than the aforementioned Confucian and Mohist texts.