Confucianism Before Confucius: The Yijing and the Rectification of Names

초록

A substantial reason behind the Confucian canonization of the Yijing can be located in some underlying patterns of thinking common to both the Yijing and The Analects; especially relevant here is the doctrine of rectification of names (zhengming 正名). In particular, I analyze the fundamental structure of the Yijing by means of the names and symbols standing in unique semantic/semiotic relations to the world, and I go on to suggest that this is what is importantly entailed by the doctrine of the rectification of names when the latter is understood by means of the perlocutionary function of the prescriptive language. © 2019 Journal of Chinese Philosophy