Ever since Matteo Ricci came to China in 1583, bringing Western science, philosophy, and Christianity to Chinese culture, scholars of Chinese philosophy have faced a totally new task: how to accommodate Chinese philosophy to Western ideas. This task began with the translation and publication of Western books into Chinese by matteo Ricci, Hsu Kuangchi, Li Chih-tsao, and others. Matteo Ricci’s "True Ideas of God" introduced such Scholastic concepts as "being", "substance", "essence" and "existence" and tried to synthesize the Scholastic philosophy of man with the Confucian theory of human nature. It interpreted the Confucian concept of Heaven with the help of the Scholastic concept of a personal God, justifying this later by combining the Thomistic Quinque Viae with the Mencian theories of Liang Chi and Chin Hsin. This approach provided the philosophical foundation for integrating Confucian Jen with Christian love. This was the first attempt to use Scholastic philosophy to reconcile Chinese and Western philosophical systems. This tendency has been continued by Chinese neo-Scholastic philosophers in Taiwan.

The second attempts were launched by the Ch’ing scholars Ku Yen-wu and Yen Jo-chu, and by the subsequent Ch’en Chia school of philosophical studies. These scholars adopted the logic and mathematical methods introduced into China by Matteo Ricci, Francisco Futardo and others, applying methods of induction and classification to study the ancient Chinese phonological systems investigating ancient texts. Their key contribution was to set a precedent for positivist research, to be continued by later researchers in the natural and even the social sciences. (It was in reaction against this positivist tendency that contemporary neo-Confucianism emerged in Taiwan.)

Chinese philosophy did experience a period of development, however, after the central government moved to Taiwan in 1949, and its visage today is vastly different from what it was in Tsai Yuan-pei’s day. On the one hand, research in the area of Western philosophy became more sophisticated and refined; it is no longer content with mere translation and introduction. On the other hand, scholars of traditional Chinese philosophy have familiarized themselves with Western philosophical concepts and incorporated them into their studies, resulting in more eclectic philosophical systems.

Generally speaking, there are three approaches to a synthesis of Chinese and Western philosophies: a Comprehensive Synthesis, a Contemporary Neo-Confucian Synthesis, and a Chinese Neo-Scholastic Synthesis.

Thomé Fang (1899-1977) and His Followers.

Clinging to the essence of Chinese philosophy, which it characterizes as a unique type of transcendental-immanent metaphysics, this school helps itself to any kind of philosophical idea -- Chinese or Western -- where it finds pertinent insight into cosmic existence and human nature. Chinese philosophy, with its different systems of thought, is seen by Thomé Fang as having three common features:

(a) a doctrine of pervasive unity taken in multifarious significations,

(b) a doctrine of the Tao -- a common idiom imbued in each system with the richness of difference in meaning, and

In this sense, this trend toward synthesis could also be called a "metaphysical synthesis". The two pillars of Thomé Fang’s philosophical system are the theory of being and the theory of human nature. In the domain of being, he affirms the multifaceted nature of existence, including the physical, biological, psychological, aesthetic, moral, and religious, as well as the unfathomable. He argues that something at a basic, fundamental level can evolve and develop into something at a subsequent higher level (represented as a "turning upward"), and that things that exist at the higher levels can pour their creative forces back into, and thereby fortify, those at the lower levels (represented as a "turning downward").

Taking these two theoretical points as the structural framework of his system, Thomé Fang’s philosophy emphasizes specifically the creativity, rationality, and interconnectedness of thinking and existence.

Aesthetic experience forms the core of Thomé Fang’s philosophy of life. It stresses the unending creativity that finds a common denominator between all sorts of differentiated realms and the unfathomable, and combines them as well -- in this way incorporating elements of both Western and Chinese philosophy into a new thought system.

and their Followers.

Contemporary Neo-Confucianism emerged as a transcendentalist movement against what had been a trend toward positivism since the Ch’en Chia school. It represents a search for a foundation in subjective experience for the science and democracy that have become essential to Chinese intellectuals since the reinforcement of these ideals by the May Fourth Movement. Following this philosophy of subjectivism, they have been trying as well to resolve the cultural crisis of modern China, especially since the advent of the Communist regime. In their efforts at synthesizing Chinese and Western philosophy these intellectuals explain why they place particular emphasis on the idealist school of hsin-hsing studies, and especially on the writings of Mencius, Lu Hsiang-shan, and Wang Yang-ming. They are attempting to appropriate the teachings of this school and accommodate them to German Idealism, in particular to the transcendental philosophy of Kant and the spiritual phenomenology of Hegel.

(1) Based on a Kantian critical approach, Mou traces the transcendental foundation of the sciences, especially the formal sciences such as logic and mathematics, in order to save them from the trap of positivism.

(2) He overcomes the critical limitations of Kantian philosophy and affirms the necessity of intellectual intuition, the existence of which is proved by Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism.

(3) He reinterprets, on an ontological level, Kantian free will, resulting in the affirmation of a "free, unlimited mind".

(4) Through a process of self-negation (tzu-wo k’an-hsien) and a "twofold unfolding of the unlimited mind" (conceived through Mou’s interpretation of the Mahayana-sraddhotpada atra), the free and infinite mind could be developed into both modern science and modern democracy.

(5) Mou proposes a principle of coordination, as opposed to subordination, as the basis of modernization.

Mou’s philosophy is a reaction against positivism, with the help of transcendental philosophy, and a reaction against Westernization, with the help of a reinterpretation of Chinese philosophy, especially Confucianism. His concept of free and unlimited mind stands in the place of the God of Christianity, thereby giving Neo-Confucianism a religious overtone.

Other Catholic Philosophers.

This school mainly carries on the tradition of Matteo Ricci and his followers. It is based on the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition, which is combines systematically with Chinese philosophy. In its incorporation of Chinese philosophy, it places particular stress on classical or primordial Confucianism of the pre-Ch’in period.

In short, the Chinese Scholastic philosophers posit a personal God as the creative source of all life, and the communion of love as the ultimate attainment in human life. Clearly these two insights are closely linked to the core religious experience of these philosophers.

In addition to the three syntheses just described, the continued absorption and evaluation of Western philosophy has been from the outset a major task of contemporary Chinese philosophers. For example, logical positivism has had a strong influence on Fung Yu-lan and Jin Yue-lin and some philosophers in Taiwan. Analytic philosophy, phenomenology, existentialism, structuralism, hermeneutics, and critical theory, all have been imported and given close study. They too may someday become components of a future new synthesis.

For example, existentialism enjoyed a period of popularity in Taiwan in the 1960s, and the works of Sartre, Kafka, Camus, Heidegger, and others were translated into Chinese and widely studied. Existentialist thinking was able, on the one hand, to satisfy the intellectual and emotional needs of Taiwan’s dejected and apprehensive youth as the country was undergoing the process of industrialization. On the other hand, existentialism was in accord with the traditional concern in Chinese philosophy for the meaning and value of life. It was particularly compatible with the Zen Buddhist emphasis on existential enlightenment.

But for the Chinese philosopher, the study of existentialism, analytic philosophy, hermeneutics, phenomenology, and critical theory cannot simply follow Western currents; instead, these currents must be analyzed and utilized in novel and creative syntheses. To this purpose, new trends in Western philosophy, including its problematic and methods, must be subjected to the following questions.

(1) What is their possible relationship to the Chinese experience today, and their relevance to the problems encountered by the Chinese people and society in the process of development?

(2) What is their relevance to the categories of values, cultural expression, life purpose, human nature, and so forth so cherished by the Chinese people in their everyday life praxis?

(3) What is their relevance to the problems and methods of traditional Chinese philosophy, and how is this to be made explicit through comparative studies?

However, the notion of incommensurability does not hinder Chinese philosophers in Taiwan who have the following intentions in their study of Western philosophy: first, to use Western philosophical languages as conceptual instruments for translating and thematizing Chinese philosophical ideas; second, to use different philosophical languages as revealing and expressive of different cultural experiences; and third, to appropriate different languages to express philosophical ideas emerging from new contexts of the life-word.

In this sense, philosophical activity in Taiwan, increasingly centered on the project of synthesizing Chinese and Western philosophies, is at the same time engaged in a process of language appropriation. This is essential not for synthesis itself, but for the creation of new ways of thinking.

It is not enough to consider philosophical synthesis merely on the level of philosophical ideas. It is rather a process of appropriating other languages as a prelude to new creations. Languages translate our philosophical experiences into intelligible and therefore understandable forms for ourselves and others in the process of historical and cultural change.

As we have seen. T’ang Chun-yi’s philosophy is based on his moral experience, whereas Mon Tsung-san based his philosophy especially on his own critical and cognitive experience. The philosophical languages they appropriate, both Kantian and Hegelian, are considered by them as ways of modernizing Chinese philosophy and providing transcendental ground for the study of science and morality.

Thomé Fang has aesthetics as the core of his philosophical experience. The philosophical language he adopts, not grounded in a specific doctrine but comprehensive in its synthesis, is based on the problems of existence and human nature; it has offered an all-encompassing vision for reconstructing Chinese philosophy as a whole.

Lo Kuang, basing his philosophy on his religious experience, which finds its themes in traditional Scholasticism, adopts Chinese philosophy -- especially classical Confucianism -- in order to make his religious belief suitable for enculturation.

As I have said, the synthesis of Chinese and Western philosophies is not, as the philosophers mentioned above might think, merely a synthesis of systems of ideas; it is a process of enrichment of philosophical languages in view of the new possibilities of philosophical creativity facing a life-world that is always changing -- now more rapidly than ever. One’s personal philosophy is a constitutive element of a world-in-the-making. For Chinese philosophers in Taiwan, and also for those on the Chinese mainland, a new "synthesis" has to be conducted in and for the life-world. This is especially true as the whole process of modernization taking place on both sides of the Taiwan Straits has its philosophical implications. Mainland China has been suffering social and cultural alienation as a result of conditions created by the Marxist regime. This situation must also be analyzed, clarified, and evaluated from a philosophical perspective. Moveover, we are coming to a crucial point in world history where capitalism and socialism can no longer offer any viable principle for organizing individual and collective lives. The very modernity of this world is now being criticized, and even rejected, in a growing postmodern cultural reaction. Between the modern and the postmodern, the Chinese mind has to orient itself consciously and philosophically toward its own future Way.

Chinese philosophers like Thomé Fang, T’ang Chun-yi, Mou Tsung-san and Lo Kuang have established their model for a synthesis of systems of ideas; but now it is time, based on their experiences and in response to the dynamics of the life-world, to search further for possibilities of creative philosophical synthesis.

1. Tsai Yuan-pei, "Chinese Philosophy over the Past Fifty Years," in Fifty Years of China since Late Ching (Shanghai: 1922), p. 31.

2. I use the term "life-world" in the Husserlian sense; see Vincent Shen, "Life-world and Reason in Husserl’s Philosophy of Life," Analecta Husserliana, 17 (1984), 105-116.

3. Thomé Fang, Chinese Philosophy: Its Spirit and Its Development (Taipei: Linking Press, 1981), p. 1.

4. Thomé Fang, Creativity in Man and Nature (Taipei: Linking Press, 1980), p. 84.

5. T’ang Chun-yi, The Existence of Life and the Horizons of the Spirit (Taipei: Student Bookstore, 1977), vol. 1, pp. 39-46.

6. Mou Tsung-san, Fourteen Lectures on the Encounter and Synthesis of Chinese and Western Philosophy (Taipei: Student Bookstore, 1990).

7. Wu Ching-hsiung, The Spiritual Source of Joy (Nei-hsin yueh-le chi chuan-yuan) (Taipei: Tung Ta book Company, 1981).

8. Lo Kuang, Philosophy of Life (Sheng-ming che-hsueh) (Taipei: Student Bookstore, 1985).

9. Vincent Shen, Disenchantment of the World (in Chinese) (Taipei: Times Publishing Co., 1984).

10. Alasdair MacIntyre, "Incommensurability, Truth, and the Conversation between Confucius and Aristotelians about the Virtues" (Paper presented at the Sixth East-West Philosophers’ Conference, Honolulu, Hawaii, July, 1989).