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SUMMARY:A view of Confucian canonical scholarship under the Tang dynasty -
  Professor David McMullen (St John's College\, Cambridge)
DTSTART:20140225T170000Z
DTEND:20140225T190000Z
UID:TALK51123@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:36937
DESCRIPTION:This lecture will aim to provide an overview of  the main deve
 lopments in canonical scholarship (Jingxue 經學) in the Tang period (618
 -907)\, emphasizing the changing role of the state. At the start of the dy
 nasty\, the official scholar community  formed a cohesive community centre
 d on the educational agencies of the government at Chang’an 長安. Unde
 r Taizong 太宗\, (reigned 626-649) they were involved in determining a c
 orrect  or orthodox text (Ding ben定本) of the Wu jing 五經. A compend
 ious official sub-commentary\, the Wu jing zheng yi 五經正義  or Wu ji
 ng shuyi五經疏義followed.  Under the emperor Xuanzong 玄宗（reigned
  712-756)\, there was debate about the value of commentaries and a growing
  volume of unofficial writing by individual scholars.  But after the An Lu
 shan安錄山 rebellion of 755\, the official scholarly world lost its for
 mer cohesion. Individual scholars\, sometimes away from the capital\, star
 ted independent initiatives reinterpreting certain canonical texts.  Their
  motives varied from a strident anti-Buddhism to a search for contemplativ
 e\, Buddhist-influenced  values  from within the Confucian canon.  They pa
 id more attention to the Mencius (Mengzi 孟子) than scholars had hithert
 o done. The lecture will end with an assessment of these revisionist initi
 atives and their influence  on the direction of Confucian scholarship in t
 he post-Tang period.\n\nDavid McMullen is Emeritus Professor of Chinese at
  St John’s College\, Cambridge. He read Oriental Studies (Chinese Studie
 s) at St John's from 1959 to 1962\, after National Service in the Royal Ai
 r Force. He researched for the doctorate under Professor E G Pulleyblank a
 t Cambridge\, with periods of study at Taiwan National University and at H
 arvard University. From 1968\, he served in the Faculty of Oriental Studie
 s (now the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies)\, as an Assistant 
 Lecturer and Lecturer. From 1989 until retirement in 2006\, he was Profess
 or of Chinese. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1994\, an
 d also served as President of the British Association for Chinese Studies 
 from 1985 to 1987.\n\nHis research interests are in the intellectual\, ins
 titutional and religious history of the Tang dynasty in China (618-907). H
 e has published State and Scholars in T'ang China (Cambridge: Cambridge Un
 iversity Press\, 1988) and just under twenty long articles on aspects of T
 ang history\, as well as shorter articles\, encyclopaedia entries and book
  reviews.\n
LOCATION:Armitage Room\, Queens' College
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