Language As Bodily Practice in Early China by Jane Geaney

Author:Jane Geaney
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2018-02-28T16:00:00+00:00

Tong 通 in Canon B41 Revisited

Informed by the intervening analyses, we return to Canon B41. Taken on its own, the Canon seems to say that making yi become tong, which should precede answering, has something to do with discovering the referent of some unknown thing. This unknown thing is ostensibly the referent of a ming because ming refer. The Explanation seems to reinforce that interpretation because it addresses not knowing the referent of something. I contend that the Explanation does actually explain the process of making yi become tong, and it does so insofar as asking the referent of the name contributes to being in emotional or “intentional” accord with the speaker. Several considerations support my contention:

•Typically, the Explanation explains the Canon.

•The Canon seems to say that asking about not knowing the referent of something is making yi become tong, not merely a prelude to it.

•The Canon instructs us not to answer until we have made the yi become tong. The Explanation implies that we should not answer until we have asked about the referent. This parallel between the Canon and the Explanation makes it seem as if inquiring about the referent in the question might be the act of making the yi tong.

Although my evidence is not conclusive, it is at least reasonable to posit that the Mo Bian is associating the act of making yi become tong with asking follow-up questions about an utterance. Whereas the answer has to do with knowing, the asking has to do with tongyi. Hence it is important to phrase the activity as “making the yi become tong.” Tongyi is not a state in this passage; making yi become tong is a process.

In other words, if the Explanation in B41 is about making yi become tong, then if Susan asks me, “Do you know Nad?” and I respond by asking, “Who does ‘Nad’ refer to?” then I have already made our yi tong. If, on the other hand, I had cut her off at the first sound of an unfamiliar name by saying I did not know, I would have simultaneously committed an error in knowing and in not being tong. To say I did not know “Nad” would have been wrong—“mistaken,” as the Explanation asserts—because I do know him, although under a different name. Keeping in mind that tongyi (通意) is different from zhiyi (知意), what makes this a matter of tong is the willingness to cooperate and to persist in posing questions. As the Canon instructs, before answering, one should create a state of nonobstruction (tong) with the intentions.

In this regard, it is worth considering how the Huainanzi describes tong (in terms unrelated to yi but related to both speaking and hearing).

夫言者、所以通己於人也,

聞者、所以通人於己也.

瘖者不言, 聾者不聞, 既瘖且聾, 人道不通, 故有瘖聾之病者, 雖破家求醫, 不顧其費. 豈獨形骸有瘖聾哉? 心志亦有之.

Speaking is that by which one makes oneself tong to others, and hearing is that by which one makes others tong to oneself. Mute people do not speak, deaf people do not hear, and if people are mute and deaf, the human dao cannot tong.

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