This paper aims to explore the understanding and evolution of the concept of ‘truth’ (眞 理) in the earliest stages of Chinese history on the basis of oracle bone script zhen (貞) and the inscriptions zhen (眞). It further aims to prove that zhen (貞) and zhen (眞) are cognate words.
‘Truth’ in English is commonly translated as zhen (眞) in Chinese. However, it is not easy to find an intersection between two notions of ‘truth’ in the early stage of Eastern and Western culture in spite of a great deal of controversies over the notions in sinological studies, since there was almost no cultural exchange between the East and the West before the modern era.
After the nineteenth century, with the expansion of the Western power, Westerners attempted to understand the manifold ways of Eastern thought. Thus, many concepts that were dominant in Western thinking were transplanted in many areas of Eastern thinking; the concept of ‘truth’ (眞理) is such a case. The Western concept of ‘truth’ (眞理) pursues correspondence theory, based on the dichotomy of true and false. Based on this idea, many Western scholars still claim that the notion of ‘zhen’ used in Chinese classical texts can not be equated with “truth” used in Europe and Anglo-American dominant philosophy.
Therefore, I would like to return to the primitive sense of truth in the oracle bone script, explore the pre-theoretic understanding of truth before concrete forms of knowledge such as Confucianism and Buddhism were introduced, to show the interconnectedness of zhen (眞) and zhen (貞).
Traditional interpretations of zhen (眞) can be roughly classified into three types: ‘a Daoist ascetic with miraculous powers’ (神仙)(see Xu Shen, Duan Yucai, et al.); ‘treasure’ (see Tang Lan, Ma Xulun, Zhou Fangfu, He Linyi, etc), and ‘death as unchanging status’ (see Shirakawa). Among these, the first version of zhen has been considered most authentic, because Shuowen Jiezi《說文解字》, the first authoritative dictionary of Chinese characters, defines zhen (眞) as “a Daoist hermit transforming shape and ascending into Heaven ( 僊人變形而登天也)” with Daoist connotations. Such interpretations, though dominent, were based on Xiaoshuan and did not seem to include closer investigations of zhen (貞), the older form of zhen (眞), based on recently unearthed literatures. Though contemporary archaeological studies provide evidence of more ancient origins, it is difficult to extract the original sense from the primitive script of zhen (貞), because it was only used as the name of a place or a person.
This paper thus follows several hypotheses: 1. zhen (眞) is cognate with zhen (貞); 2. zhen (貞) in oracle bone script means ‘to ask Heaven questions from signs or omens obtained by burning tortoise shells or animal bones’ and a person in charge of performing a divination rituals’ is known as a diviner(zhenren ‘貞人’); 3. zhen (貞) was specified into zhen (眞); 4. Under the influence of Daoism during the early Han Dynasty, zhen (眞) was defined as ‘a Daoist hermit’ (神仙), and then acquired the meaning of truth after the introduction of Buddhism.
The strategies of the paper are as follows: firstly I will analyze zhen (眞) by breaking it into its component characters and trace back its original forms and senses of zhen in oracle bone scripts; secondly, I will examine its usage in the ancient literatures based on phonetic and semantic patterns; finally I will try to place possible coordinates of ‘truth’ among constellations of various meanings of zhen (貞) and zhen (眞).

摘要：本文以甲骨文“貞”和金文“眞”之構形表意爲分析基礎，證明了“貞”
和“眞”爲同源關係。發掘出中國早期“眞理”概念所指和演變，並訂正了十九世
紀以來，西方學者對中國“眞理”概念認識之偏誤。
中國的“眞”字是否即西方的“眞理（truth）”概念？这在中國學研究上存有
很大爭議，但到目前爲止，中西學者們尚未找到英語“眞理”和漢語“眞理”之間
的意義交叉點。十九世紀以後，隨着西方勢力的擴展，西方人企圖對東方的多樣思
維方式賦予某種意義，因而把西方幾乎所有的支配理念移植於東方，“眞理”概念
也是一樣。西方的“眞理”觀念，是一種以追求眞假二分法的等價性的理論
（correspondence theory）。基於這一理論，西方學者把“眞理”觀念直接套用到“眞”
字，所以很多學者據此批評中國傳統哲學中不存在“眞理”概念。
本人認爲，把於世界某一地區才能有效的“眞理”觀念看成人類固有的、眞
正的“眞理”顯然是不合理的。所以對以往中西“眞理”概念的討論，需要剝離已
有的“眞理”概念進行重新闡釋，即必須回到未受儒家和佛教等意識形態幹預的甲
骨、金文時期，去考察“眞理”的內涵。以往對中國傳統“眞”字的説解，可分爲
如下三類：第一，神仙；第二，寶貴之物；第三，死亡（永恆不變的）。其中，第
一種解釋最有傳統、權威性。譬如，中國最早最有權威的字典《說文解字》云：“僊
人變形而登天也。從𠤎從目從𠃊。八，所乘載也。𠤛，古文眞。”此種解釋帶有明
顯道家色彩，其分析依據是小篆而非金文、甲骨文。當今新發現的各種出土古文字
資料，對“眞”字的字源研究提供了很多條件，但從“眞理根源”立場上追求“眞”
字的字源，絕非易事。因爲甲金文裏的“眞”字，只用於地名和人名，其本義並不
明確。
基于以上，本文採用了以下研究方案：第一，設定“眞是從貞字演變而分化
來的”假說。第二，分析了兩字之間字形、字義、字音關係的緊密性，以證明貞和
眞字的同源關係。第三，分析了《說文》所見“眞”族字（共24 字）的意義取向，
歸納出秦漢以前傳世文獻所見“眞”字的用法，並推測“眞”字的本義。第四，從甲骨文時代貞人的地位和角色來分析“眞理”概念的來源，以證“貞、眞同源”。
最後得出如下結論：“眞”是由“貞”字分化而來的；“眞”和“貞”(“鼎”)字
爲同源關系；“仙人”、“眞人”和“眞理”等概念，也是由商代貞人演變過來的。

1. Introduction
 2. The Character Form of zhen (貞) and zhen (眞)
  2.1. Character Forms of zhen (眞)
  2.2. Character Forms of zhen (貞)
   3.1. The semantic interpretation of zhen(眞) in Shuowen Jiezi(《說文解字》)I
   3.2. The Usage of zhen (眞) in Ancient Literatures
 3. The Compounds with zhen(眞)
 4. Final Remarks on zhen (貞) and zhen (眞)
 References
 <中文摘要>

• Youngsam HA(Chief, Center for the Study of Chinese Characters in Korea Professor, College of Chinese Studies, Kyungsung University) | 河永三