Golovachev, Valentin Ts., Pub. Lidia I. Golovacheva (1937–2011) – The Problem of the Genesis of an Autonomous Human Personality in Ancient China: Discussions of Soviet and Chinese Scholars in the 1980s.

Abstract

In 1986, the pilot issue of the Kongzi yanjiu (Confucius Studies) Journal in China issued an article by Zhou Jizhi “Concerning the problem of self-consciousness of an individual in the ideas of Confucius and pre-Qin Confucianism”, followed by a special discussion. Jin Chunfeng, the Zhou’s opponent, repeating the com­mon arguments on different status of individuals in Ancient Greece and China during the genesis of philosophy, insisted that there were no conditions for the genesis of an autonomous human personality in China. In general, traditional ideas about the absence of personality in China during the Chunqiu-Zhanguo Era prevailed in China and foreign historical and philosophical science in the 1980s and early 1990s. However, these ideas are in many ways controversial and do not stand up to criticism. A comparison of answers by Confucius and the Ancient Greek thinkers to the “Challenge of the Epoch” reveals that the Confucius’ phi­losophy is freer from the mythological shell and answers the question more di­rectly. From this point of view, it cannot be considered less “mature” than the Antic concepts.