吴起杀妻论-《南京师大学报》（社会科学版）

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摘要:: 吴起曾经在鲁国、魏国经历行政军事实践,后来主持楚国变法取得显著成功。吴起成就了改革胜利,也有兵学论著存世,但是他的人生经历中有“杀妻以求将”的道德污点,引致后世“残忍薄行”的批判。考察吴起“杀妻”事件的历史文化影响,应当注意性别关系在这一历史阶段的特殊表现,也应当重视古代士人为了政治进取不惜牺牲亲情乃至家人生命的特殊心境。事业追求的极端表现竟然致使人性泯灭,而传统中国女性就是在这样的文化舞台上演出着她们的人生悲剧。古史所见多种“杀妻”案例,女性作为弱者,不能决定自己的命运,甚至连姓名都没有留下来,许多只是作为“忠义”“英雄”的陪衬,默然无言地走向人生的终结。

Abstract:: After a series of political and military practices in States of Lu and Wei, Wu Qi made remarkable achievements in leading reform in the State of Chu. Despite his success in reform and production of a masterpiece on military strategy, he has been accused of being “a threat to humanity”, because in order to win the trust from the ruler of the State of Lu he once murdered his wife who was the daughter of their enemy. When talking about Wu’s killing of his wife, we should take into consideration the historical context of the incident as well as the rationale behind men’s pursuing political success at the expense of the love for or even the lives of their family members at that time. The pursuit of success, when going to extremes, would lead to actions against humanity. This is the cause for life tragedies of numerous women in ancient China. The various cases of wife-killing in Chinese ancient history indicate that as victims of the patriarchal system, women were usually victimized and deprived of basic human rights. Without leaving their names in history, a lot of women were reduced to playing an ornamental role to adding glory to heroes and the notion of loyalty and came to the end of their life invisibly.