The Case in the Vase： What Can a Ming Novel Tell Us about Traditional Chinese Legal Culture？  

作　　者：Michael Szonyi 

机构地区：[1]Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA

出　　处：《Frontiers of History in China》2017年第4期621-625,共5页中国历史学前沿（英文版）

摘　　要：The more than thirty legal disputes and cases mentioned in The Plum in the Golden Vase （Jinpingmei） make this late Ming novel an invaluable source for the study of law and legal culture in premodern China. This lecture illustrates that the cases in the novel describe in considerable detail each of the formal steps in the Ming process of legal adjudication. But the work also conveys the message that despite the formal process, the legal system does not deliver justice. However, an alternative system of justice that is mostly implicit in the text, the justice of a disinterested and moral Heaven, ultimately prevails. Finally, the contemporary implications of this traditional understanding of law and justice are explored.The more than thirty legal disputes and cases mentioned in The Plum in the Golden Vase （Jinpingmei） make this late Ming novel an invaluable source for the study of law and legal culture in premodern China. This lecture illustrates that the cases in the novel describe in considerable detail each of the formal steps in the Ming process of legal adjudication. But the work also conveys the message that despite the formal process, the legal system does not deliver justice. However, an alternative system of justice that is mostly implicit in the text, the justice of a disinterested and moral Heaven, ultimately prevails. Finally, the contemporary implications of this traditional understanding of law and justice are explored.

关 键 词：Jinpingrnei Ming dynasty  legal history  legal process  corruption  gong＇an （case） literature 

分 类 号：TP393.092[自动化与计算机技术—计算机应用技术] I207.42[自动化与计算机技术—计算机科学与技术]