中國文學裡的法律文化－以「義」的概念為中心的探討

要尋找中國傳統的正義思想，必須從中國傳統文化下的價值觀來探討。廣大的民間社會雖然深受統治階層之正義理念影響，但也囿於生活現況而綜合發展出不同於統治者所定義的正義，因此本文決定以貼近民間社會生活的古典小說為研究客體。本文討論的架構分為六章：第一章旨在說明本文的研究動機、研究目的與方法及本文討論架構、範圍與侷限。第二章首先討論西方的正義觀，歸納其探討正義時切入的角度與共識；接著討論傳統中國的正義觀，從義的概念開始討論，最後尋找出中西在不同文化下交集的核心概念，也就是「義」。因為第二章肯認了正義有一核心概念，但在不同文化下有不同的內涵，所以在第三章進而探討正義在中國傳統文化裡的思想背景，由於歷代是採「以禮入法，德主刑輔」的模式進行統治，因此在探討時，首先討論作為思想來源的天命觀，接著先後論及作為身分社會之規則的「禮」、僅具有從屬性的法律與無訟思想，此外民間佛、道教思想的盛行，這些都影響了正義觀的發展。第四章則開始從中國傳統文學裡的描寫來看，主要分別自道德正義與法律正義兩個領域作研究，道德正義主要從忠義、仁義、信義、孝義等規範著手，而法律正義則從基於人性的復仇制度開始，再討論司法制度的正義，最後跳脫前二者，從俠義與民風民德外宇宙觀中的正義思想兩個角度去看，從本章可以發現，傳統文學與正統的正義思想原則上大致吻合，但仍有若干不同之處。第五章是針對傳統中國文學裡不正義現象的反思，前章傳統文學裡的正義思想趨近於正統思想，然而到了明清出現一些有別於傳統的新思潮小說，開始探討封建階級制度、禮教束縛、清官定義、法律制度、冥法功能等議題，出現了對部分傳統正義觀的反省，從西方觀點來看，甚至可以說是隱含西方個人主義思潮的正義觀。第六章總結以上各章討論內容，得出本文結論與研究心得。

關鍵字

正義；義；古典小說；法律與文學

並列摘要

In order to find out the traditional Chinese thought of justice, we have to research it from the values of traditional Chinese culture. Although the folks were deeply influenced by the governing class, however, according to their conditions of life, they also developed their ideas of justice which were different from those ruled by the governing class. Therefore, I decide to take the classical novels which are close to folks’ life as my research topic in this thesis. There are six chapters in the thesis, and the main content of the thesis is abstracted as follows: Chapter 1 It introduces the research motivation, research purpose and method, framework, range and limit of the thesis. Chapter 2 First of all, it discusses the western viewpoint of justice, and generalizes a conclusion from the discussing and common consensus of justice. Then it discusses the traditional Chinese thought of justice from the concept of “Yi”, and finally finds out that the core concept of the justice between Chinese and western cultures is “Yi”. Chapter 3 The core concept in justice was confirmed in Chapter 2; however, the meaning of the justice in various cultures is different. The next step is to discuss the background of the justice in traditional Chinese culture. Because the mode of governance in the Chinese history is ”bringing rites into law” and ”morality-guiding and punishment-supplementing”, therefore, it discusses the primary viewpoint of heavenly mandate, then follows the concept of rites ruling status society, and subordination of law and non-litigation. Besides, the prevailing of Buddhism and Taoism in the folk society also influences the development of justice. Chapter 4 In this chapter, it studies traditional Chinese literature through the fields of moral justice and legal justice. Moral justice contains the values of loyalty, benevolence, and trust, filial duty; however, legal justice contains vengeance system and justice in the judicial system. In addition, it also discusses the aspects of chivalry and karma. From this chapter, we can find out that the concepts of justice in traditional literature and legitimate justice fields are similar, but there are still some difference between them. Chapter 5 In this chapter, it makes a self-examination of unjustness in traditional Chinese literature. Several novels of new trend of though appealed in Ming and Ching Dynasty discuss the feudal class system, ritual captivity, the definition of upright officials and legal system etc.. The novels begin making a self-examination of part of the traditional viewpoint of justice. Even it implies the western viewpoint of individualism in the novels. Chapter 6 Finally, in this chapter, I summarize the main concepts of aforementioned chapters, and propose my conclusion of this thesis.