Abstract

This paper is a article of Pojeo Cho Yik (浦渚 趙翼: 1579~1655)’s point of view related to the book of Doctrine of the Mean (中庸) in the mid-Joseon Dynasty, when Neo Confucianism was overwhelming. At the age of 24, he wrote the Article of Doctrine of the Mean (jung yong seol 中庸說) which was explained the basic lines of the books related to the book of Doctrine of the Mean (中庸) to be written later. He wrote the Indivisual Opinion of Zhongyong (jung yong sa ram 中庸私覽) at 29, and wrote the Hard-earned Zhongyong (jung yong gon deuk 中庸困得) at 37. This paper examines the transitions and consistency of his point of view of the Doctrine of the Mean (中庸) in Korean History of Classical Learning, focusing on the Indivisual Opinion of Zhongyong (中庸私覽) and the Hard-earned Zhongyong (中庸困得). The early research on his scholarship started from the work of clarifying the relationship between Wang Yangming (王陽明) and it has been mistaken as one of the schools derived from the teachings of Wang Yangming, but it turns out to be absolutely irrelevant. His thoughts and arguments are so strong in the colors of Neo Confucianism, whicd is derived from the teachings of Zhu Xi (朱熹). And the scholars who knew him at that time absolutely did not define his study as the study of Wang Yang-ming. We can not say that he is the opposite of Zhu Xi, just because his way of distinguishing sentences of the book of Doctrine of the Mean (中庸) is different from Zhu Xi. Because Zhu Xi had already mentioned it in his other works. And although he had been associated with the Yangming scholars, they had never mentioned him as a Yangming scholar. Cho Yik regarded Zhu Xi as the best person after Confucius, and genuinely admired him. His submission of opinions different from Zhu Xi only added to his meticulousness to further strengthen Zhu Xi’s neo Confucianism.