沃格林论“天下时代”的秩序转换

Eric Voegelin’s Discussion on the Transformation of Order in“The Ecumenic Age”

作为雅斯贝尔斯“轴心时代”的替代性理论,沃格林的“天下时代”以一种更为复杂的方式刻画了人类文明的秩序变迁:从“治出于一”的宇宙论帝国秩序到“治出于二”的“天下秩序”。天下秩序的核心是精神与权力的分离,以及以此为基础的世界宗教与世界帝国的对峙及其张力。秩序本性从“社会的宇宙化原理”转向“社会的人化原理”;秩序的担纲者从“前天下时代”集宗教权力与政治权力于一身的帝王转变为文明的精神担纲者——圣贤、先知、哲人。这些转变的核心是“精神突破”,在具体社会不再能够承载生存意义的状况下,它指向以人的内在心性承受超越体验。

As an alternative theory to Karl Jaspers’“the Axial Age”,Eric Voegelin’s“The Ecumenic Age”describes the order paradigm of human civilization in a more complex way:The transition from a cosmological imperial order where politics and religion have not yet been differentiated to“the ecumenic order”where politics and religion are differentiated;The thought that the core of the Ecumenic Age is the separation of spirit and power;The confrontation and tension between ecumenic religions and ecumenic empires based on this.The type of symbolization of the order has also changed.In the cosmological imperial order,society will be symbolized as a microcosmos,but in the“the Ecumenic Age”,society will be symbolized as a macroanthropos.The subject of the order has also changed from the Emperor-King who combined religious power and political power in the previous era to the spiritual bearer of civilization-sages,prophets,and philosophers.The core of this order shift is a spiritual breakthrough movement.When the cosmological order collapses and the concrete society can no longer carry the meaning of existence,those capitalized people turn to the inner soul to carry the transcendent experience.