Liang Shuming

The recorded working language is Chinese. The field of work recorded is philosophy. Employment is recorded with Peking University. Positions recorded include member of the National Political Assembly. Works named in the authority record are Eastern and Western Culture and Its Philosophy. Work by Liang Shuming is recorded in the collections of Hong Kong Baptist University Library Art Collections.

• Name — Liang Shuming 梁漱溟 • Birth Name — Liang Huanding 梁煥鼎 • Born — 18 October 1893 • Birthplace — Beijing, Qing Empire • Died — 23 June 1988 • Place of death — Beijing, People's Republic of China • Other Names — Liang Shouming 梁壽銘 Liang Shouming 梁壽名 Liang Shoumin 梁瘦民 • Title — Principal of Guangdong Guangya Middle School • Term — 1928–1929 • Political Party — China Democratic League • Opponents — * Feng Youlan • Mao Zedong

Liang was born in Beijing. His family were ethnic Mongolians of Guilin and Guangxi origin. He was the son of a famous intellectual who committed suicide apparently in despair at the state of the Chinese nation. He had a modern education and exposure to Western writings. Liang was always fascinated by Buddhism, but never joined a monastery due to the opposition of his father. At the age of sixteen, he refused to allow his mother to discuss marriage on his behalf and at nineteen he became a vegetarian, remaining so for the rest of his life. In 1917 he was recruited by Cai Yuanpei to the philosophy department of Beijing University, where he produced an influential book based on his lectures entitled Eastern and Western Cultures and their Philosophies, which expounded some of the doctrines of a modern Confucianism. He also displayed the influence of Henri Bergson, then popular in China, as well as Buddhist Yogachara philosophy. Although Liang had abandoned his determination to become a monk in 1920 and his celibacy in 1921, Buddhism influenced him for the rest of his life. Regarding Western civilization as doomed to eventual failure, Liang did not advocate complete reform and adoption of Western institutions. He nonetheless believed that reform was needed to make China equal to the rest of the world. It was his view that the required prerequisites for these institutions did not exist in China, so they would not succeed if introduced. Instead, he pushed for change to socialism starting at the grassroots level. To this end, he founded the Shandong Rural Reconstruction Institute and helped to found the China Democratic League. Liang was famous for his critique of Marxist class theory, stating that, despite obvious disparities of wealth, Chinese rural society could not be unambiguously classified along class lines. One and the same family (particularly the large patriarchal lineages found in many regions) would commonly have some members among the "haves" and others among the "have-nots". The class struggle advocated by the Maoists would necessitate kinsmen attacking each other. After the Sino-Japanese War, he mediated disputes between the Communist and Nationalist parties. After the victory of the Communists in 1949, he was occasionally persecuted in ideological campaigns, but refused to admit any error. He died in Beijing.

Liang Shuming believed that the rural village was the most important aspect of Chinese society and that for the last hundred years Chinese history had been characterized by its destruction. Between the years of 1931 and 1937 Liang was instructing the rural reconstruction in Zouping County of the Shandong Province. Many people assert that he was the reason for the great improvements witnessed there. His main emphases in rural reconstruction were the cultivation of group unity, development of science and technology, and the elimination of outdated traditions. Liang, appointed by Han Fuju to engage in rural reconstruction in Zouping County, was convinced the most effective method would be to integrate county and village schools and the local government. Between 1931 and 1933 Liang trained 800 people to run schools all over Shandong and in 1932 the Guomindang said that every province should have one of these rural research reconstruction institutions. Liang's Rural Research Reconstruction Institution had three departments. The first was the Research Department on Rural Reconstruction, headed by Liang Himself. This department trained students who already had a university education to become science advisors. The Training Department of Service personnel took students with a middle-school education to become the villages' service personnel. The final department, called the Rural Reconstruction District, was implemented to integrate local governance into the university.

At the age of 89 in an interview with Guy Alitto, Liang proclaimed himself a Buddhist. He had been interested in Buddhism since his youth, which he often attributed to his feelings that many of the mistakes of the past had been made due to a focus on the external world for answers that come from within. In his article "DOUBT", Liang expounded on the theory of ether in physics to maintain that much of the world is illusory and one must simply be conscious of this fact in order to see the world as it truly is and attain freedom. Liang wrote an "Introduction to Indian Philosophy" where he explored key concepts in Buddhism. In "CONC", he explored the history of consciousness in Buddhism and attributed the Consciousness-Only school to Asanga. He also maintained that people only get an illusory image through observations and opposed the idea of logical inference on the basis that it only explains conceptual questions. Liang was critical of Chinese folk religion. He believed that it was primitive to allow society to reach a high level of socialization while at the same time promoting conservatism that impeded social development and promoted low moral standards and selfishness. He felt that Confucianism was China's answer to religion as it provided a way to harmonize with the cosmos instead of being isolated from that which you worship. In contrasting Confucianism with religions he came to two conclusions. First that unlike western religion everyone is thought to have innate moral reason, which means they must not all have uniform morals dictated by an institution like the church. Second, in his "Treatise on the Differences and Similarities between Confucianism and Buddhism" that the two were not unrelated, but while Confucianism is based on the person and talks about moral character, that Buddhism transcends the person to talk about a final understanding. When ordered in 1974 to criticize Confucius and Lin Biao, he refused and instead wrote Human Mind and Human Life. He was often considered a beacon of intellectual freedom as well as China's conscience.