Gadamer and the Language of Nature in Chung-Ying Cheng Neo-Confucianism and the Yijing

What is it about?

This article is about how North American interpretations of Gadamer and hermeneutics stand in the way of developing connections with Chinese philosophy, specifically Neo-Confucian thought of Chung-ying Cheng. The barrier to any cross-cultural communication seems to be language, especially for Gadamer who believes that language mediates understanding. However, there are other ways in which to construe language than as a linguistic phenomenon that characterizes a given culture. While I agree that language is subject to historical influences, it is also a biological inheritance. In this regard, there is evidence in Gadamer of a rhythm in the back and forth movement of the dialogue form. This movement that imparts self-movement to a conversation is important because it dovetails or is coordinate with a concept of nature that is congruent with Neo-Confucians and pivots on a dialectic of harmonization. However, a dialogue that moves in a self-similar way in which an organism grows in the sense of a self-unfolding number (one and many), and toward organic unity, also depends on a change in ethos. Chung-Ying Cheng and Linyu Gu both recognize how Whitehead does not address his issue. Their Neo-Confucian account of it in terms of comprehensive observation (of the totality of all relations) resonates with attunement or an auditory disposition toward being-as-as-whole (or logos) in Gadamer. Hence, Gadamer by way of Cheng and Gu surpasses a limit in the binary logic of the Western mind and confirms the insights of the Neo-Confucian tradition, represented by Cheng, into how human beings are oriented by the ontological structure of reality.

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Photo by LĂZĂRESCU ALEXANDRA on Unsplash

Photo by LĂZĂRESCU ALEXANDRA on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This paper is important because it explains, in light of classical Chinese philosophy, how a transhistorical foundation for life does not amount to foundationalism. Furthermore, it shows how the prejudices or prior understandings of North Americans stand in the way of recognizing the moving structure of reality in Gadamer's ontology and language. This is indicative of a cultural or normative bias that is ameliorated with comparative philosophy or in this case, a constructive and critical dialogue with Neo-Confucian tradition that is open to the West. By drawing Cheng's interpretation of Chinese classics into an examination of Western interpretations of Gadamer, a case is made for confirming the nature of reality (through comparative philosophy)

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