Other
than the brief selections in Chan 1963, there is no English translation of
their works. Of secondary materials, Graham 1958/1992 is an early work of this
known sinologist, and it offers a comprehensive but accessible introduction to
the two brothers’ views. Of late, Yong Huang has done extensive writings on the
two brothers, such as Huang 2008 and Huang 2003. He has a book on the Cheng brothers
forthcoming. Graham, A.
C. Two Chinese Philosophers: The
Metaphysics of the Brothers Ch’eng. La
Salle, IL: Open Court. 1992.
Graham’s work on the
Cheng brothers opened the door of Neo-Confucianism to scholars on Chinese
philosophy in English. Originally published in 1958, this small book analyzes
key concepts in both Cheng Hao’s and Cheng Yi’s philosophy. Even though this book was written in the
1950s, it is still a valuable study on the Cheng brothers.
Huang 2008 deals with
the issue of moral motivation, and offers a sophisticated and contemporary
analysis on Cheng brothers’ moral psychology. It is an important paper for anyone interested
in the comparative analytic study on Neo-Confucianism.
Huang’s works on the
Cheng brothers’ virtue ethics are among the first to take the comparative
approach to establish Neo-Confucian virtue ethics. Huang 2003 also examines the
issue of fact and value to address Hume’s concern about deriving ought from is.
This paper is not a textual interpretation of the philosophy in its historical
context, but an innovative reconstruction of the Cheng brothers’ view to
address a contemporary philosophical issue. |