本文汲取《莊子》一書中的哲學內涵，以建構《莊子》的教育理念，透過詮釋讓《莊子》代表道家思想對著教育界發聲，這是一個針對教育的反省，讓教育工作者「虛己」且選擇成為一個智慧的啟蒙者、引導者。教育的內涵不應是一味的灌輸、雕塑人，而是成為指引後輩學生們認識「道」，引導進一步地修煉、自化，以「道」為宗師，透過真我回歸，以致真我展現，與「道」合一，樂天知命，獲得幸福美好的人生的道路。
The question this research would like to ask is “just what kind of person does the education theory in the Zhuang Zi hope to cultivate?” This dissertation takes the notions of the Dao and the Subject in the Zhuang Zi and then looks at how in ties in with the educational notion of “striving toward the De.” This in hopes of showing that the crux of Zhuang Zi’s thought emphasizes self-reflection and self-realization in freely cultivating the complete person. In “striving toward the De,” the Dao is the guide toward self-cultivation and transformation, allowing one to achieve this completeness. This in turn allows the practitioner to go from striving toward the De to attaining it, thereby achieving the educational ideal of “sageliness within and kingliness without.”
In today’s world, people suffer from confusion more than ever. The mind is not free from the constraints of the things of the world. The polarity of opposites such as the big and small, long and short, the good and bad, the one and many, the useful and the useless all add to these confusions. The ideas in the Zhuang Zi offer a remedy for these confusions, allowing the thinker to overcome the limits and constraints of a conventional world.
“The complete person cares for no self, the holy man cares for no merit, and the sage cares for no reputation” allows one to transcend the self and the devices of convention in giving the practitioner the ability to roam in the realm of internal freedom. Zhuang Zi contends that in keeping a certain distance from the secular world, the person is able to exist authentically. Yet in roaming through the world with no intentionality, the complete person is thus able to naturally develop exceptional talents.
This dissertation takes the philosophical connotations of the Zhuang Zi in building an educational ideal; a complete hermeneutic that allows Zhuang Zi to represent Daoist educational philosophy. In reflecting on the aim of education, an educator can “empty oneself” in choosing to become a sagacious edifier and guide. Education should not merely involve molding a person, but in helping the younger generations find the Dao in making their own self transformations.
