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Key words
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Laozi, Dao, interpretation hypotheses, Chad Hansen, prescriptive discourses, the second-level meaning of coherence
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Abstract
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The consistency of the principle of coherence is a necessary condition for a valid hermeneutics. In addition to determining whether a theory of textual interpretation possesses internal coherence, in the context of the Chinese philosophical tradition, which relied heavily on the practice of textual commentary, we should also be concerned with a secondary level of coherence; that is, with the question of whether a hermeneutics conforms to, and does not conflict with, the content and basic meaning of the original text.
This paper, which is divided into four sections, aims to disclose the hidden conflict in Chad Hansen’s interpretation of the Laozian concept of Dao from the perspective of this second-level meaning of coherence. The first section of the paper illustrates the unique context of the Chinese philosophical tradition, and the relationship between this context and coherence. The second section discusses scholars’ critiques of Hansen’s hermeneutic hypotheses in an effort to prove the invalidity of Hansen’s understanding of classical Chinese, which was based in an analysis of nouns and syntactic structure. It is argued here that this understanding of classical Chinese, in which the language does not denote any particular objects and does not possess the semantic functions of representation and description, is difficult to substantiate. In the third section, I examine the fundamental significance of the Laozi, and compare it with Hansen’s interpretation of the Laozian concept of Dao. On the basis of this comparison, I argue that Hansen’s view of Laozi’s Dao, which asserts that Laozi promoted the abandonment of all prescriptive discourses and the value orientations that accompanied them, fails to cohere with the basic meaning of the text. The fourth section concludes that, if the purpose of Chinese hermeneutics is to explain and discover the meaning and significance of the text, then a conflict, which violates the second-level meaning of coherence, can be found between Hansen’s interpretation of the Laozian concept of Dao and the basic meaning of the Laozi.
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