Wang Yangming · Philosophy

Forming One Body with All Things

Wang’s culminating vision: the great man forms ‘one body’ with Heaven, Earth, and the ten thousand things. Innate knowing, fully extended, expands moral sensitivity outward - alarm for a child, pity for suffering animals, plants, even shattered tiles - until compassion embraces the whole world as continuous with the self.

What you'll be able to recall

You learned that Wang’s culminating teaching is that the ‘great man’ forms one body ( yiti ) with Heaven, Earth, and the ten thousand things: extended innate knowing expands moral sensitivity outward from humans to animals, plants, and even tiles, so that compassion embraces the whole world as contin…

Leads to Zhuangzi.

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