孔子“德刑”之辨探微

孔子鉴三代政治功过 ,察列国掌运优劣 ,慧眼独注于德刑问题 ,其治国方略 ,以德治著称。但孔子并未否定法治的意义 ,而是持德刑并施 ,德主刑辅 ,先德后刑 ,德本刑末的观点。孔子之所以重德治 ,是由于他注意到了在德礼教化和刑罚政令两种不同政治环境下 ,政治主客体的互动存在重大差别。诸如抚禁之别、恩威之别、堵疏之别、得失之别、内外之别、乐苦之别、爱憎之别等

A Study of Confucian Thoughts about Virtue and Penalty

In view of the successes and failures of the political policies of the preceding three generations,the positive and negative outcomes of the government ruling in the states,Confucius studied the issues of virtue and penalty,and argued for the rule of virtue as his strategy of managing state affairs.However,Confucius did not fail to realize the significance of the rule of law.He held a view that virtue and penalty were complementary to each other and the priority should be placed on virtue.His arguments for the rule of virtue was based on the fact that under the two different political environments of education and persuasion,penalty and punishment,the political subject and object interacted in the remarkably different ways,which led to the differences between protection and prohibition,between benevolence and authority,between persuasion and inhibition,between gains and losses,between happiness and sufferings,and between love and hate.