Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No.8, 2017

Historical Facts and Historical Evaluation in Historical Interpretation: A Basic Theory and Method Based on Marx’s Historical Materialism

(Abstract)

Tu Chenglin

Historical facts and historical evaluation are an important topic in historical interpretation, one that is permanent and always fresh, and a basic prerequisite for our present construction of Marxist historical hermeneutics. The formation of historical hermeneutics involves not the ontological interaction between historical interpretation subjects and objects, but also the epistemological approach to historical facts, logic and value, and the internal tension and dynamic balance of the confirmation of historical facts and construction of historical estimates. To construct historical hermeneutics from the angle of historical materialism, we must first stick to the objectivity and anteriority of historical facts, then take care to overcome subjectivity, relativity and pluralism in historical evaluation, and seek for the possibility of constructing man’s common historical values and discovering man’s common history. Therefore, historical interpretation is a cognitive process that indefinitely approaches historical truth and a social process of building up our spiritual home together. It will ultimately affirm a common standard for man’s knowledge and evaluation of history and seek for the greatest common divisor of the value of the shared future of mankind.