Feng Youlan

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Feng Youlan or Fung Yu-Lan

Feng Youlan ( Chinese  馮友蘭  /  冯友兰 , Pinyin Féng Yǒulán , W.-G. Feng Yu-lan  ; also: Fung Yu-Lan; * December 4, 1895 in Tanghe , Henan Province , Empire of China ; † November 26, 1990 in Beijing , People's Republic of China ) was a Chinese philosopher.

Feng Youlan gained importance with his main work History of Chinese Philosophy , which was translated into English by Derk Bodde . A much expanded version of this work has recently appeared, the New History of Chinese Philosophy ( Zhongguo zhexue shi xinbian ) in 6 volumes (Beijing) and 7 volumes (Taipei).

biography

Feng Youlan was born in Tanghe in the south of Henan Province on the border with Hubei Province, the son of a wealthy landowner. Because of his excellent high school exams, the provincial government granted him a scholarship to study philosophy at Peking University in 1915 .

From 1919 to 1923 Feng studied under Professors John Dewey and Frederick JE Woodbridge at Columbia University in New York . His doctoral thesis was A comparative study of life ideals (Eng. " A comparative study of life ideals ").

From 1939 to 1946 he published a total of six books (貞元 六 書) in which he established his own philosophical system. His system was a major attempt to combine Western and Chinese philosophy.

In his system, Youlan Feng differentiates the inner state of humanity in four levels: 1. the natural level 2. the utilitarian level 3. the moral level 4. the universal level (天地 境界).

He further criticizes: The mistake of Taoism lies in confusing the natural and the universal plane; the mistake of Confucianism is again to confuse the moral and the universal plane; The mistake of religious Buddhism is that it does not see that the universal and the natural plane are very similar to each other. Furthermore, as Buddhism teaches, one does not have to turn away from the earthly world at all. Therefore, his system is not only seen as a synthesis between Chinese and Western philosophy, but also as a synthesis within the three schools of Chinese philosophy.

Works in English translation (selection)

  • A Comparative Study of Life Ideals: The Way of Decrease and Increase with Interpretations and Illustrations from the Philosophies of the East and the West. Shanghai: The Commercial Press, 1924
  • A History of Chinese Philosophy. Translated by Derk Bodde. With introduction, notes, bibliography and index. Princeton, Princeton University Press 1952 and 1953
    • Vol. I: The Period of the Philosophers (From the Beginnings to Circa 100 BC)
    • Vol. II: The Period of Classical Learning (From the Second Century BC to the Twentieth Century AD)
  • A Short History of Chinese Philosophy. Macmillan London 1948
  • The Spirit of Chinese Philosophy. By Fung Yu-Lan (Feng Yu-Lan; Feng Youlan). Translated by Ernest Richard Hughes . London, Routledge 1962
  • Chuang Tzu , and Yu-Lan, Fung (Translated by): A Taoist Classic: Chuang-Tzu. Beijing Foreign Languages ​​Press 1989 (First published, 1931)
  • Selected philosophical writings. Beijing, Foreign Languages ​​Press, 1991

Extended history of Chinese philosophy

  • Zhongguo zhexue shi xinbian , 6 vols. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1982-1989

See also

literature

  • Xiaoqing Diana Lin: Feng Youlan and Twentieth Century China: An Intellectual Biography. 2016 ( partial online view )
  • Hans-Georg Möller: The most philosophical philosophy: Feng Youlan's new metaphysics. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2000 ISBN 3-447-04175-7

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Feng Youlan: A comparative study of life ideals; the way of decrease and increase with interpretations and illustrations from the philosophies of the East and the West . Ed .: Columbia University. The Commercial Press, Limited, Shanghai, China 1924 (English).
personal data
SURNAME Feng Youlan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION chinese philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH 4th December 1895
PLACE OF BIRTH Tanghe , Henan Province , Chinese Empire
DATE OF DEATH November 26, 1990
Place of death Beijing , People's Republic of China