Chapter 1 - The Failure of Abdication as a Regular Method of Monarchic Power Succession : A Study of the Tang Yu zhi dao Manuscript

Summary

Abstract

This chapter focuses on a newly discovered manuscript, Tang Yu zhi dao, and discusses the reasons why the practice of abdication (shanrang) failed to become a prominent way of power transmission in pre-modern China. In addition to attributing this failure to the promotion of abdication through the legends of Yao and Shun, as scholars have suggested, this chapter offers an alternative explanation and argues that there were two other theoretical deficiencies that Tang Yu zhi dao and other supporting texts could not address. The first shortcoming pertains to the eligibility of serving rulers’ sons to ascend the throne. It remains unclear whether one's worthiness was the sole determining factor. The second deficiency revolves around the problem of hypocrisy that abdication introduced. It provided opportunities for usurpers to encroach on their power and seize control of the states they had served.

Keywords: abdication, Tang Yu zhi dao, hereditary succession, Yao, Shun

This chapter discusses why abdication (shanrang 禪讓) could not be established as a prominent way of power transmission in pre-modern China. In his study of ancient empires, Shmuel N. Eisenstadt (1923–2010) observed that throughout the history of imperial China, hereditary succession (shixi 世襲) constituted the primary method of political succession. He further noted that when incompetent rulers were involved, changing the heavenly mandate (geming 革命) was another method to which people resorted. However, in contrast with the routinal ways of power succession, i.e., hereditary succession, this method of transferring monarchical power was irregular and usually violent. This does not mean that the ancient Chinese never sought an alternative way of transferring an incompetent ruler's power. A wide range of texts from the pre-imperial period alluded to a peaceful method of political succession entailing abdication to a worthy person. Among these texts, which include abdication legends from the pre-dynastic period, three Chu-script bamboo-slip manuscripts from the middle of the Warring States period (5^th-3^rd centuries BCE) – Tang Yu zhi dao 唐虞之道 (The Way of Tang [Yao] and Yu [Shun]), Zigao 子羔, and Rongchengshi 容成氏 – unhesitatingly supported the notion of abdication.