科举制与儒学的传承繁衍

On the Development and Multiplication of the Imperial Examination System and Confucianism

从唐代至元代科场中存在错综复杂的经术与文学之争。受科举考试的推动,儒家经学不仅在社会上具有崇高的地位,而且造成所有士人努力钻研经典的现象,各种关于儒家经典的阐释和辅导著作层出不穷。《四书》、《五经》为普通中国读书人所熟知,经学得以不断传承和繁衍,很大程度上得力于科举制的倡导利诱。1 300年间,科举以经术取士,以考促学,造成了一场旷日持久的读经运动,使古代中国成为一个儒学社会。科举废后,儒学不可避免地走向衰落。

There had been complicated conflicts between ＂Jingshu＂ and literature in the Imperial Examinations from Tang Dynasty to Yuan Dynasty. With the promotion of the Imperial Examinations, the classics of Confucianism had earned a high social prestige and created a phenomenon of probing classics by all the scholars, which led to the immense production of explanations and tutorship works on the classics of Con- fucianism. Four Books and Five Classics became familiar and known to the ordinary readers in the Imperial Examination period. And the study of classics was thus developed and multiplied, depending greatly on the advocating and seducing by the Imperial Examinations. The Imperial Examination in 1300 years of selec- ting officials through ＂Jingshu＂ and promoting by examinations created a long wave of classic reading, which made China become a nation of Confucianism. After the abolition of the Imperial Examination, Confucianism declined inevitably.