Abstract:

Tan Sitong’s posthumous work Doctrine of Ren (Renxue) is a renowned yet insufficiently studied masterpiece of modern philosophy. Rooted in the Confucian tradition of ren (humanity), it responds to the urgent concerns of an era of upheaval by interpreting ren through the lens of “thoroughgoingness” (tong). Beneath its surface blended of mysticism, ethics, common sense and new knowledge, we can outline the framework of a “ren-throughgoingness” philosophy and examine its doctrines of the dao, social theory, and mind-body philosophy. For Tang, “ren takes thoroughgoingness as its primary meaning”. Taking that of the self and the other as its core, thoroughgoingness also encompasses that between China and the West, the superior and the inferior, and female and male. Its social philosophy advocates radical egalitarianism, providing robust justification for the concept of the self orienting toward the thoroughgoingness of the self and the other. As for the means of achieving throughgoingness, its best expression is “mind/heart-force”, which serves as both the impetus of social reform and the driver of spiritual “throughgoingness”, leading to a universally harmonious ideal. Departing from the classical concept of the self, Tan’s philosophy of “throughgoinness” aims to “forge a new learning that can break through all nets”. It thus must dismantle “blockages” and integrate modernity elements like “rights” so as to channel the tide of “human liberation”. Tan remains a philosopher who “continually cultivates himself toward the purity of selfless in a unity with the cosmos”. Nevertheless, in Tan, active salvation has replaced contemplative meditation as the path of cultivation. A cosmology enriched by new scientific knowledge, traditional doctrines of Confucianism and Daoism, and Buddhist wisdom - all of these are woven into multilayered discourses that try to dissolve the tension between the “self” and the “selflessness” in both theory and practice. “The selflessness of the self” unfolds as a blueprint for radical social reform and a classical ideal of personality, which also offers a philosophical narrative for “Tan Sitong’s death”.

Key words: Tan Sitong, Treatise of Ren, thoroughgoingness, thoroughgoingness between the self and the other, self, selflessness