SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The moral philosophy of Dai Zhen can be summarised as "fulfil desires and express feelings". Because he believed that life is the most cherished thing for all man and thing, he maintains that "whatever issues from desire is always for the sake of life and nurture." He also claimed that "caring for oneself, and extending this care to those close to oneself, are both aspects of humanity" He set up a strong monastic moral philosophy based on individual human desire and feeling. As the title 'Dai Zhen's philosophy of the ethical human being' demonstrate, human physical body and activities of life is ethical base of philosophy of Dai Zhen. He regards the cause of activities for life is desire and feeling and he claimed that it is the prime concern of his moral philosophy. He set up a strong monastic moral philosophy base on the individual human desire and feeling to establish man as the moral subjectivity. Dai Zhen applied a systematic research agenda and built on palaeography and phonology to reconstruct the meaning of the Canons to become a sage by using the "meanings" of words as a method of reconstructing the "intentions" of the words of Canons, rather than by using metaphysics and intuitive meditation.