曾国藩“礼学经世”说的宗教仪式渊源——以送痘神与求雨求晴为例

The Religious Origin of Zeng Guofan's Doctrine of"Lixue Jingshi"——Sending Away the God of Smallpox and Praying for Rain or Sunny Day As Examples

人们研究曾国藩"礼学经世"的主张,对"礼"的内涵不够重视,或者泛泛而谈,或者把"礼"当作是笼统的道德规范,而忽视其中宗教仪式性的内容,其实是从现代人的世俗心态出发,滤去该主张的政教合一色彩。从曾氏担任总督期间送痘神和求雨求晴的活动入手,探讨"礼学经世"的这一层面在当时社会生活中的来源,看仪式过程中地方风俗和朝廷典制如何互动﹑合作。送痘神是曾氏行送神之礼,为百姓祈求免灾,一方面使私人行为得到升华,另一方面也收揽人心。求雨求晴,则可以看到他把龙神崇拜推向中心,在天人关系中掌握主动权的尝试。两者都反映他平乱以后把有利于统治的民间信仰纳入正统,重建礼仪秩序的努力。

The previous study on Zeng Guofan＇ s idea of ＂Lixue Jingshi＂ （礼学经世） generally takes ＂Li＂（礼） as moral norm while neglecting its religious and ritual implication. In fact that opinion reflects the secular mentality of modern Chinese and deprives the idea of the characters related to unification of the state and the church. This paper explores the religious origin of Zeng＇s ＂Lixue Jingshi＂ by depicting and analyzing his activities in sending away the god of smallpox and praying for rain or sunny day as a governor-general to see how the local customs interplayed with the official rites in the ritual process. After his second son recovered from smallpox, Zeng sent away the god of smallpox and prayed for local people＇s immunity from the disease according to Nanjing local customs. By doing so, he would like to officialize his private behavior and appease local people. Through his activities in praying for rain or sunny day, we can see that he tried to make good use of the dragon worship and take the initiative in his hand in dealing with the human-heaven relationship. In a word, the two issues exemplified his efforts in incorporating the useful folk culture into the orthodox and reestablishing the ritual order after the Taiping Rebellion.