以美解脱:《红楼梦评论》的“佛味”与王国维美学之思的症候

Delivered by Aesthetics: the Buddhist Taste in Wang Guowei's Comments on A Dream of Red Mansions and the Symptoms of His Aesthetic Thought

《红楼梦评论》并非简单搬演叔本华的意志论哲学和美学,从佛学角度观察,王国维将个人丰富的佛学知识"化"进了中西学术会通的大结构,这一"大结构"的起承转合和关键走向由解决何为生活本质的个体人文冲动"小结构"所推动。其主导方向在欲的态度、苦的认知与解脱境界等方面与中国佛教心性论传统形成对应,"佛味"成为中西古今"视域交融"的一个背景和中介。但由于大小双重结构的复杂性,转个体人文冲动为学术研究的过程中,"佛味"见证了王国维美学之思含混性的一面,此症候既为中国现代美学带来突破之功,同时又被宗教功能定位的后遗症所困扰。"佛味"未进一步向佛理转化,也未实质引入其他可能的宗教解脱资源或主体建设方案,以美解脱最终只获得了理想价值,真正独立的现代美学主体之诞生就此夭折。

Wang Guowei＇ s Comments on A Dream of Red Mansions is far from a simple reproduction of Schopenhauer＇ s philosophy and aesthetics. Wang incorporated his knowledge of Buddhism into the general structure of world academics, in which the individual＇ s humanistic impulses to question the essence of life functioned as the local structures to push its smooth motion and modulate the dominant direction. Different aspects in life such as the attitude toward desire, the cognition of sufferings and the state of deliverance mirrored the mind -nature tradition of Chinese Buddhist thought, and ＂Buddhist taste＂ became both the background and intermediary of the fusion of horizons among the ancient, the present, China and the West. The complexity of the double structures functioning in the process in which the individual impulses turned into academic research entailed the ambiguity of Buddhist taste in Wang＇ s aesthetic thought, and this symptom in Wang＇ s aesthetic thought brought about a breakthrough in Chinese modern aesthetics on the one hand and was perplexed on the other hand by the conditioning of the religious function. Buddhist taste did not go further to religious thought of Buddhism, and did not imbibe other elements for religious deliverance or subject construction. Therefore, the deliverance through aesthetics remained to have ideal value without initiating and substantiating an independent modern aesthetics.