The Chinese nation is a community of destiny formed by history, and the basic link to maintain this community of destiny is cultural identity. With the deepening and strengthening of the historical process, this cultural identity constitutes the blood of China culture and the blood of the Chinese nation.
Q: The Sixth Plenary Session of the Seventeenth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China proposed that culture is the blood of the nation and the spiritual home of the people. What do you think of this assertion? In the new era, how to give full play to the powerful spiritual power of Chinese culture?
—— China Net users Han and Tang Meteorology
The Sixth Plenary Session of the 17th CPC Central Committee pointed out: "Culture is the blood of the nation and the spiritual home of the people. In the process of China's 5,000-year-old civilization development, people of all ethnic groups have been closely United and constantly striving for self-improvement, and jointly created a long-standing, profound and profound Chinese culture, which has provided a powerful spiritual force for the development and growth of the Chinese nation and made an indelible contribution to the progress of human civilization. " This is an incisive summary of our party's role in culture, which embodies our party's high affirmation and recognition of the excellent Chinese culture that has lasted for 5 thousand years.
The Chinese nation is a big family with multiple elements. Since ancient times, tribes and nations have United and merged all the way, and finally formed today's pattern. China culture is the product of the continuous union and integration of tribes and nations, and provides a strong spiritual support for this process. At the origin stage of Chinese civilization, the combination of primitive tribes gradually replaced each other's conquest and became the mainstream of civilization development. It is generally believed that the image of the dragon was originally a synthesis of totems of various tribes, and later evolved into a symbol of the Chinese nation. Confucius said that "the rise and fall of the country, following the world and benefiting the people" should be the embodiment of fully respecting the ancient heritage of the United tribes. It is this open-minded attitude that makes the tribes willing to identify, integrate and participate in the construction of a common cultural body, thus forming the basic character of openness and tolerance of Chinese culture.
During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, after rational reflection, a hundred schools of thought contended, and extracted the universal values of benevolence, righteousness, sexuality and other trans-regional and trans-national values from his life, which greatly strengthened people's universal cultural mentality, that is, to eliminate the war and realize the ideal life, a unified and reasonable social and spiritual order must be established. Since then, in the development of the Chinese nation, no matter how long, division is always considered abnormal; No matter how short the experience is, reunification is always considered normal. Such a stable cultural psychology embodies the special and powerful cohesion and centripetal force of the Chinese nation. At the same time, due to the cultural creation of this great era, the core spirit and basic character of Chinese culture have been laid. Cultural creation in the pre-Qin period has always been an indispensable and important hall in the spiritual home of the Chinese nation.
During the Qin and Han Dynasties, the future development of Chinese civilization took shape, and the screening of mainstream culture came to an end in historical practice. If the pre-Qin "contention of a hundred schools of thought" was mainly reflected in the free creation of theory, then Qin and Han dynasties almost pushed the theory to the practical application level one by one. First, the Qin Dynasty respected legalists, then the early Han Dynasty respected Huang, and finally the Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty "respected Confucianism alone". During the experiment, various theories widely absorbed some achievements of other schools, and the final result of the experiment was to choose Confucianism as the core of ideology. This is not an arbitrary choice made by the rulers, but reflects the basic requirements of traditional society under normal circumstances. Especially at the grass-roots level, where the central power cannot be fully reached, there is a very stable family-style patriarchal autonomy in traditional society, which makes Confucianism have a profound social soil. Since then, "loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness" has become the unshakable core value of traditional China, supporting the Chinese nation to carry out deeper and wider national unity and integration under the pattern of "great unity". The Han nationality, one of the main members of the Chinese nation, was formed during this period; People in Chu, Qin and other places used to be called barbarians, and most of them were integrated into the Han nationality. In fact, the Han nationality itself is a nation defined by culture, and its blood relationship is complex, but its cultural context is clear, which lasted for thousands of years without interruption. The Chinese nation, which is a fusion of Han nationality and other nationalities, is also a cultural concept.
Generally speaking, the culture of any nation always cherishes its own blood; A nation defined by culture especially cherishes its own cultural context. This emphasis on cultural consanguinity rather than group consanguinity makes Chinese civilization show great vitality in the wave of national integration. Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties are the longest turbulent and divisive period of the Chinese nation since Qin Dynasty. During this period, there was a worldwide phenomenon of great ethnic migration, and major empires collapsed one after another, and some ethnic groups even disappeared from people's sight. The land of China has also been strongly impacted by this great wave of ethnic migration, which is known as "five disorderly flowers" in history. In this regard, some scholars even suggested that this is the most dangerous period in the history of the Chinese nation. With the great migration of nationalities, large-scale cultural exchanges and collisions occurred, and Buddhism also spread widely in China at this time. However, with its open and inclusive cultural character, the Chinese nation withstood this fierce and lasting impact and finally resolved the crisis. Many foreign nationalities have gradually recognized Chinese culture and joined the Chinese nation, and some have made outstanding contributions to the reconstruction of the unified order. China culture itself has gained a free space due to the intersection of various factors, and generate shows vigorous creative vitality. While Confucianism continued to exert its influence, metaphysics was born; Stimulated by the rapid spread of Buddhism, Taoism was born. The parallel pattern of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism has quietly emerged.
The reconstruction and unification of Sui and Tang Dynasties made Chinese civilization reappear after Qin and Han Dynasties. The reform of the official system and the establishment of the imperial examination system in the Sui Dynasty not only greatly improved the efficiency of political operation, but more importantly, the scientific system opened up a formal and legal social mobility channel that crossed the hierarchical system and broke the monopoly of power by aristocratic giants, which was a great pioneering work of human civilization. On this basis, the Tang Dynasty governed the western regions, pro-Tubo and expanded the Silk Road, which laid the basic pattern of the living space of the Chinese nation and culture. As can be seen from the historical data, after hundreds of years of great ethnic integration, the ethnic relations in the Tang Dynasty were particularly harmonious and the cultural mentality was particularly open. Hu people can be seen everywhere in politics, the army, the literary and art circles and the homes of ordinary people. Paying attention to the selection criteria of scholars in the imperial examination of poetry and fu almost turned the Tang Dynasty into a poetic country. In an open, confident and poetic cultural atmosphere, western Buddhism has been localized, and the profound and exquisite Zen Buddhism stands out, which is respected and accepted by intellectual elites as part of their spiritual home. Confucian classics are continuously passed down in textual research, and the concepts of governing the country with Confucianism, cultivating the body with Taoism and cultivating the heart with Buddhism are more and more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. During this period, there was only equal competition, each taking what he needed, and there was no religious war. The reason lies in the fact that China's culture is open and tolerant, and exclusive extremism is not allowed to grow.
In the Song Dynasty, China culture ushered in another creative peak. Compared with Sui and Tang Dynasties, the channels of imperial examination in Song Dynasty were greatly broadened, the criteria for selecting scholars were more important than literary talent, and the examination procedures were more rigorous and fair, which created a rich atmosphere in which the whole people attached importance to education. In view of the prevalence of Buddhism in the late Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties, the literati launched the revival movement of Confucianism, advocated honesty, raised relative ethics to absolute ethics, absorbed Buddhist wisdom to rebuild Confucian values and beliefs, and actively competed with religion for the commanding heights of spiritual transcendence. At the same time, the literati in the Song Dynasty clearly formed a collective consciousness of "taking the world as their own responsibility", consciously shouldered the great responsibility of reversing the trend of "monarch and minister are inferior to people" since the Qin Dynasty, sang the concept of "monarch and minister rule together", strictly adhered to the moral integrity of "advancing and retreating together with Tao", and established the fate of "reason"-"Tao" to counter the fate of "potential". These new cultural creations. A mature culture is marked by a mature value system, universal values are generally recognized, and basic moral norms are widely followed. Cultural maturity is also manifested in cultural self-confidence and cultural openness. At that time, the cognition of China was mainly defined by culture, not by region and population: the foreign land was China; Deviating from this set of universal values, China is also a barbarian. Objectively, this has opened the way for greater national unity and integration.
After the Song Dynasty, there was no chaotic situation of frequent replacement of small courts in China, and the unified regime changed among different ethnic groups. During the Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, Mongolian, Han and Manchu held political power respectively, and all recognized Chinese culture and were members of the Chinese nation. The deeper this cultural identity is, the longer its regime will last. China is a world supported by this culture. Protecting the world means protecting the Chinese nation and Chinese culture. At the end of a dynasty, the Chinese nation did not perish, because Chinese culture continued. In this sense, culture is the blood of the nation. The Chinese nation is made up of many ethnic groups, and each ethnic group has its own blood. The key to our integration is to have a consistent cultural identity. Every nation has its own unique culture, but this does not hinder the cultural identity between nations. The core of cultural identity is the recognition of universal values. As for the cultural differences, it has always been highly respected in the cultural tradition of China, and this respect for cultural differences can be traced back to the source of China culture. It can be seen that the Chinese nation is a community of destiny formed by history, and the basic link to maintain this community of destiny is cultural identity. With the deepening and strengthening of the historical process, this cultural identity constitutes the blood of China culture and the blood of the Chinese nation.
After experiencing deep sufferings in modern times, the Chinese nation firmly chose the road of Socialism with Chinese characteristics and began the historical process of great rejuvenation. National rejuvenation can only be achieved by building a modern and powerful country, and the role of building a spiritual home shared by the whole nation is increasingly apparent. An era has a spiritual home, which is the starting point and destination of people's spiritual pursuit in this era; A nation has a national spiritual home, which is the spiritual residence of this nation through different times while maintaining its main identity. People in every era will always cling to certain demands, but only those parts that can provide people with inner peace and soul destination will be truly included in the category of spiritual home.
Every major civilized region in the world has its own spiritual home, which is based on the primitive and classic cultural achievements of this civilization. These original and classic achievements will be reinterpreted in the new era, thus fully adapting to the requirements of the new era and continuing to be the deepest, most stable and powerful spiritual power source supporting this civilization. Therefore, the common spiritual home of the Chinese nation must include the most primitive and classic achievements in Chinese culture and the profound enlightenment of its modernization, and it will also include the basic consensus reached by the Chinese nation in the pursuit of modernity. Among them, as a "faithful inheritor and disseminator of Chinese excellent traditional culture" and an active advocate and developer of China's advanced culture, China * * * has always attached importance to the role of culture in leading the way forward and rallying the struggle forces, consciously united and led the people of all ethnic groups throughout the country, and constantly pushed forward the cause of the party and the people with new awakening in ideology and culture, new achievements in theoretical creation and new achievements in cultural construction. The organic integration of these contents and strengths will certainly provide a strong spiritual pillar for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
(Zhao Feng is the director, associate professor and doctor of the Cultural Office of the Department of Literature and History of the Party School of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China)