《論語》篇章結構及其哲學意涵──集中在前三篇的研究

Abstract

「論語哲學」還有待於建立。本文以《論語》文本的前三篇為研究對象，嘗試分析既有文本排列順序中的哲學意涵。在該項研究中，重視對於各章內容「主旨」的分析，並提出介於「篇」與「章」之間的新的分析範疇「段」，以「數章之章旨形成一段旨，數個段旨形成當篇之主旨」的形式，回應過往一直無法解決的「無法假設每一章都與所屬之篇的主旨相關」的問題。本文處理的《論語》前三篇內容，〈學而〉的主旨為「學為君子」，〈為政〉的主旨則是在「為政以德」，〈八佾〉的主旨是「君子正禮」。各篇的銜接通過章句內容中的「元素」實現，〈學而〉與〈為政〉間的銜接是「知人」元素，〈為政〉與〈八佾〉間是「政治行動」的元素。本文試圖建構一種新的研究方法，以研究由《論語》編輯者所建構的，隱藏於《論語》篇章結構中的哲學意涵。

'The Analects Philosophy' has yet to be established. This research analyzes the philosophical meaning concerning the order of the text of the first three chapters of the Analects. This research emphasizes the analysis of the 'gist' of the content of each verse and proposes a new analysis category 'section' between 'verse' and 'chapter'. With the idea that “Several gist form the central theme of the current section, while several sections form the central theme of the current chapter”, it responds to the previously unsolvable problem that 'It is impossible to assume that each verse is related to the central theme of the chapter'. This article studies the first three chapters of the Analects, where the central themes of Xue Er, Wei Zheng, and Ba Yi are, respectively, 'Learning to be Junzi', 'Junzi Exercising government with virtue', and 'Junzi correcting rules of propriety”. The cohesions between the different chapters are realized through the 'elements' in the text. The element between Xue Er and Wei Zheng is 'understanding people', and that between Wei Zheng and Ba Yi is 'political action'. This article attempts to develop a new research method to study the philosophical meaning constructed by the editors of the Analects and hidden in the text structure.