26 Facts About Mou Zongsan

Mou Zongsan was a Chinese philosopher and translator.

Mou Zongsan was born in Shandong province and graduated from Peking University.

Mou Zongsan's thought was heavily influenced by Immanuel Kant, whose three Critiques he translated from English, possibly first, into Chinese, and above all by Tiantai Buddhist philosophy.

Mou Zongsan was born into the family of an innkeeper in Qixia, Shandong.

Mou Zongsan went to Peking University for college prep and undergraduate courses.

Mou Zongsan lectured frequently on Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist, and Kantian philosophy at Hong Kong University, National Taiwan Normal University, and National Taiwan University.

Mou Zongsan died in Taipei in 1995, leaving dozens of disciples in top academic jobs in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Mou Zongsan identifies a third lineage, whose main figures are Hu Hong and Liu Zongzhou, which best conveys the basic message of the classical sage Mencius.

Mou Zongsan expresses strong interest in the utility of Buddhist philosophy for Confucian purposes.

Mou Zongsan did not intend it as his final book, but scholars generally treat it as the definitive summary of his thinking.

Mou Zongsan's philosophy develops as a critique and transformation of Kant's critical philosophy.

Mou Zongsan believes in the compatibility of Chinese thought and Kantian philosophy because both are backed by the Way, where the Way is essentially truth and different philosophies manifest different aspects it.

Mou Zongsan rejects Heidegger because according to Kant, true metaphysics is transcendent.

Mou Zongsan further departs from Kant's philosophy, eventually transforming it into what is commonly referred to as New Confucianism or Mind Confucianism.

Mou Zongsan agrees to a certain extent with Heidegger's interpretation of Kant.

Mou Zongsan agrees with Heidegger's analysis of Transcendental Schematism, which indicates that the meaning of objectification presupposes a subjective horizon that enables the object to appear.

Mou Zongsan rejects Kant's declaration that human beings are incapable of producing any intuitive knowledge of thing-in-itself.

In general, Mou Zongsan holds a critical attitude towards Heidegger's fundamental ontology in his treatise Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy:.

Mou Zongsan believes moral learning can pave a way to moral metaphysics, while Heidegger believes that we can open ourselves to the Being in our daily lives.

Mou Zongsan confuses Heidegger's Time with temporality and thereby fails to see the transcendental nature in neither Time nor Being.

Mou Zongsan fails to recognize that Heidegger's Time represents the transcendental metaphysics that overcome the normal sense of time in phenomenal world.

Concurrently, Mou Zongsan's philosophy was influenced by Yogacara Buddhism, which believes that no objectivity is possible aside from subjectivity.

Further, Mou Zongsan believes that one's uncomfortable reaction to crime and degeneracy indicates the presence of moral consciousness, which Mou Zongsan signifies as the inner essence of human beings.

Again, Mou Zongsan chooses to translate his philosophy in Kantian terminology.

Mou Zongsan borrows this conception of moral transformation from Confucianism, as well as the concept of summum bonum, in which there exists a connection between one's worthiness of happiness and the actual attainment of happiness.

Some traditional Confucians reject Mou Zongsan, citing his wholesale acceptance of Western liberty and democracy as problematic.