荀子的天人观探析

On Xunzi’s View of Heaven and Man

在中国哲学中,天人关系是哲学家们所探讨的重要问题,许多思想家都为此留下了自己的深刻见解,荀子身处战国后期,在继承与发展前人的天人观之后,因其所处的时代背景而提出了别具一格的天人观。他从重新定义“天”的意义出发,继而提出“明于天人之分”,这是其天人相分的部分,但是,我们亦需要注意到荀子天人相分的思想中蕴含着天人相合的思想光辉。天与人并非是完全隔离的,在天人相分之后,人在制天的同时,亦须知天、顺天,遵从自然客观规律办事,如此才能使我们更加透彻且完整地探析荀子的天人观。

In Chinese philosophy, the relationship between heaven and man is an important issue discussed by philosophers, many thinkers have left their own profound insights for this. Xunzi lived in the late Warring States period, after inheriting and developing the predecessors’ view of heaven and man, he put forward his unique view of heaven and man because of the background of The Times. He starts from redefining the meaning of “heaven” and then puts forward “the division between heaven and man”, which is the part of the division between heaven and man. However, we also need to notice that Xunzi’s thought of the division between heaven and man contains the thought of the harmony between heaven and man. Heaven and man are not completely isolated, after the separation of heaven and man, while man is making heaven, he also needs to know the heaven, obey the natural objective laws, so that we can more thoroughly and completely explore Xunzi’s view of heaven and man.