“伦”的传统及其“终结”与“后伦理时代”——中国传统道德哲学和德国古典哲学的对话与互释

“Lun”, or “Ren-Lun” (the Sequence Within Human Society) is the key of Chinese traditional ethics. It becomes the most critical issue in Modern Chinese ethics,whose most profound change is not that of ethical ideas, but the fission of “ideas on ethics”. The de-structuring and termination of the tradition of Lun are manifested by the development of the ethical entity of civil society and its concept, the transmutation from the law in the sequence within human society to that in the human relations, and the transformation from the ethics of virtue to that of justice. Thus, moral philosophy and ethical life seem to enter into the era of post-ethic. However, the tradition of Lun should not have been terminated. The fundamental cultural strategy is to recall collectively the tradition of Lun, which is also the most precious resource of spiritual values.