在反欺诈中提升:春秋时代对于诚信的体验、认同与诠释

Honesty Outlook of the Spring and Autumn Period

春秋时代的大变革和大国争霸,为欺诈肆行提供了社会条件;一次次上当受骗之后,华夏社会发起了反欺诈行动,诚信观念从中被实践、总结和提升起来。就国家层面而言,如何取信于天下和取信于民,是春秋时代统治集团中有识之士极为关心的问题之一。他们反对短期行为,主张从长远处看问题,呼吁国家无论大小都要以诚相待,大声疾呼国与国之间的互信。他们清醒地认识到,“民保于信”,“民无信不立”,信誉是聚拢民众的先决条件。背信弃义就会丧失民心,没有民众的支持就会失败。春秋时代所主张的个人诚信,基本内涵为个人对国家诚实守信与一般人伦上的互信两个层次。华夏社会赞扬诚实守信,谴责欺诈行为;呼唤君臣之间、人与人之间以诚相待,把守信看作立身的根本;“守命共时”,不做非分之想;要求人们“信不叛君”,守信“以卫社稷”,把守信与爱国联系起来。孔门师徒在总结这些观念的基础上,更加强调人与人之间的互信。取信于神明是春秋时代诚信观的另一个侧面,祭祀和盟誓都被赋予了崭新的内容,“取信于神”的旧瓶子被装上了“取信于民”的“新酒”。轻亵祭祀和肆意渎盟事件时有发生,鲜明地表征着华夏社会的主体性自觉,这是春秋时代诚信观念提升的另一种表现形式。春秋时代的诚信观,在中国历史上占据了十分重要的地位。

The big social transform and the kingdoms' contending for hegemony made possible the spread of fraudulent conduct. However, after being cheated and fooled several times. the people in Huaxia society began to launch an attack on dishonesty, from which the Honesty Outlook was summarized and developed. The paper is mainly to explain the fundamental connotations of the Honesty Outlook in Spring and Autumn period through four aspects. How to win the people's confidence was one of the essential matters to those members with breadth of vision in the ruling circles. They were against short-term actions, advocated long-term sight in dealing with affairs, appealed for honesty among the kingdoms, large or smalK and called on mutual trust between them. They knew clearly that prestige was the prerequisite to unite the people or otherwise they would lose the people's support, which meant undoubtedly the failure of the ruling circles. Personai honesty in this period fell into two aspects: honesty to the country and mutual trust according to feudal ethics. The people of Huaxia society sang high praise for honesty, condemned dishonesty, called on honesty among people and between the monarch and officials. They looked on being honest as the base of conducting oneself in society. On the base of sumniarizing those viewpoints mentioned above, the scholars of Confucian school emphasized the mutual trust among the people. To win the gods' trust was the other aspect of the Honesty Outlook during this period. Both offering sacrifices to the gods and oath of alliance were endowed with brand-new contents and the old bottle of 'win the gods' trust'was filled with the new wine- 'win the people's trust'. The Honesty Outlook of Spring and Autumn Period played a very importam role in Chinese history of ideology.