A major cultural project that the General Secretary cares about｜The context of the heyday of canon repair and transmission
The Chinese nation has gone through ups and downs, and the construction of history, establishing classics, and continuing its cultural heritage have since ancient times been regarded as a great cause that benefits all generations.
General Secretary Xi Jinping once said: "Cultivating literature in the prosperous times, in our era, the country is prosperous, the society is safe and stable, and we have the will and ability to inherit the national culture. We must do this important thing well." From now on, we will launch the "Major Major Concerns of the General Secretary" The "Cultural Project" series of integrated reports tells the vivid stories behind the "Prosperous Age of Revising Literature" and comprehends General Secretary Xi Jinping's profound cultural sentiments.
"Ru Zang" is a basic cultural construction project for the largest systematic collection of Confucian classics at home and abroad since the founding of the People's Republic of China. It is divided into two steps: the compilation of "Essential Edition" of "Ru Zang" and the compilation of the complete "Ru Zang".
Confucianism is the cornerstone of traditional Chinese culture and has a profound impact on world civilization. However, for thousands of years, there has never been a complete collection of Confucian writings. Although there were proposals in the Ming and Qing dynasties to compile the Confucian Canon, it was not implemented due to the sheer scale of the project.
At the beginning of this century, Tang Yijie, a professor at the Department of Philosophy at Peking University, proposed compiling the Confucian Canon, which was supported by scholars such as Ji Xianlin and Zhang Dainian. In 2003, the "Compilation and Research of "Confucian Zang"" project was officially established, with Tang Yijie serving as the chief expert of the project.
In May 2014, when General Secretary Xi Jinping visited Peking University, he paid a special visit to Professor Tang Yijie, had a close conversation with him, and was concerned about the compilation of "Ru Zang". The General Secretary asked Mr. Tang what difficulties and needs he had, and praised his diligent and rigorous academic spirit.
Up to now, nearly 500 experts and scholars from nearly 100 universities and research institutions at home and abroad have participated in the "Confucian Tibet" project. Nearly 100 scholars from South Korea, Japan, and Vietnam, which have been deeply influenced by Confucianism in history, have happily joined.
Wang Bo, now the vice president of Peking University, once studied under Professor Tang Yijie. After Mr. Tang passed away in 2014, Wang Bo took over as the chief expert and project leader of "Confucianism and Tibet". At the symposium on cultural inheritance and development held in June 2023, Wang Bo reported to General Secretary Xi Jinping on the theme of "Inheriting Chinese Civilization and Promoting the Compilation and Research of the Complete Confucian Collection".
At present, 282 volumes of the Chinese part of the "Essence Collection" of "Confucianism Collection" in 510 categories have been compiled and published by Peking University Press, with a total word count of nearly 200 million. The Korean, Japanese and Vietnamese departments are in progress. The main part of the "Essential Edition" of "Confucianism Collection" has been successfully completed, and the compilation work of the entire "Confucian Collection" has been started.
Only by not forgetting history can we open up the future, and only by being good at inheritance can we be good at innovation. Promoting the compilation and research of the complete "Confucian Tibet" in the new era is deeply in line with the spirit of the times of inheriting and carrying forward the excellent traditional Chinese culture, and will help build the modern civilization of the Chinese nation.
