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Once Again: The Concept of Wu-Hsing

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 March 2015

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Extract

The following letter, received on 25 March 1985, was written by Dr. Michael Friedrich and Dr. Michael Lackner. Further correspondence may be addressed to them at the Institut für Ostasienkunde – Sinologie, Universität München, Trautenwolfstrasse 3, 8000 München 40, Federal Republic of Germany.

We submit the following as a belated addendum to the debate on the concept of wu-hsing in Early China 2 (1976) and 3 (1977).

First, we should like to point out that the whole debate is obviously based on a narrowly modern conception of “element,” which only covers one tenth of the history of the term. The following passages should help to remedy this regrettable neglect of the broader and chronologically more significant meaning of the concept. They are drawn directly from original sources rather than from works such as Needham's, which has already been overworked for this purpose.

Type
RESEARCH NOTES AND COMMUNICATIONS
Information
Early China , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , 1985 , pp. 218 - 219
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Study of Early China 1983 

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References

REFERENCES

1. Locus classius: Plato Sophistes 252bl-6.Google Scholar
2. Partial transformation: Plato Timaios 56e9-57b2.Google Scholar
3. Definition of “element” in metaphysical respect: Aristotle Metaphysica 1014a26-101415.Google Scholar
4. Unfolding of the term in physical respect: Aristotle De qeneratione et corruptione 331a7-332a2.Google Scholar
5. Conjunction and separation of elements: Isidorus of Sevilla (ca. 570-636) De natura rerum XI.1. In De natura rerum. Traité de la nature. edited by Fontaine, Jacques. Bibliothèque de l'Ecole des Hautes Études Hispaniques, fasc. 28. Bordeaux: Fèret et Fils, 1960.Google Scholar
6. Analogies and correspondences: Agrippa of Nettesheim (1486-1536) De occulta philosophia II.7. In Henrici Cornelii Agrippae ab Nettesheim opera … tomos concinné digesta, Lugduni (Bering) ca. 1600. Reprint with an introduction by Popkin, Richard. Hildesheim/New York: Olms, 1970.Google Scholar