本体论的差异——柏拉图的哲人王与先秦儒家圣王的比较

The Ontological Difference:A Comparison between Plato’s Philosopher King and the Confucian Saint King of Pre-Qin Dynasty

在柏拉图的《理想国》中有对哲学家和哲人王的描述,而先秦儒家传统中有对圣人以及圣王的诉求。哲学家和圣人都是先知先觉者,并通过心灵及精神上的转化来觉醒他人。他们都强调道德德性,都试图用一定的秩序来规范现实的世界以实现理想政制。但是他们所追求的目标的差异体现了他们之间有着更加深刻的本体论的区别。这个区别导致了柏拉图的哲学家不情愿在现实中做哲人王,而儒家的圣人却以在现实中成为圣王完成自我修养的目标。

In Plato’s Republic there is a description of the philosophers and the philosopher King,while in the Pre-Qin Confucian tradition there is a call for saint and saint kings.Philosophers and the saints are all people of foresight and forethought,who awake the others by a transformation of the soul or spirit.Both of them insist on moral virtues and both try to adjust the actual world with some rules in order to realize the ideal regime.But the difference of their aim presents the deeper ontological difference between them.It is this difference that led to the result that Plato’s philosophers are unwillingly to become a king in the actual world,while the Confucian saint will reach the final end of the self-education when he becomes a saint king in the actual world.