[Academic News]Michael Szonyi, a Professor at Harvard University, Talks about the Legal History of the Ming Dynasty

On December 4th, at the 276th lecture of Luojia Forum, Professor of Harvard University Michael Szonyi brought an academic report entitled "The Case inJin Ping Mei: Looking at the Legal History of the Ming Dynasty from Literary Works”.

With the research method of "seeking legal history in literature", Professor Szonyi studied the Ming Dynasty scholars' cognition of judicial procedure, common sense of legal reasoning and the concept of justice from 30 public cases originating fromJin Ping Mei. Traditional culture has the desire of "judicial independence", which can be one of the historical resources for building a country governed by law.

Professor Szonyi believes that the laws of the Ming and Qing Dynasties in China are equivalent to the "civil law". The judicial procedures of the Ming Dynasty "prosecution, arrest, trial, trial level, judgment, punishment" can be found in the public case inJin Ping Mei. Taking “extorting confessions by torture” as an example, he illustrated the gap between judicial ideals and practice in the Ming Dynasty. At the same time, there is a profound sense of justice inJin Ping Mei. There is a judicial system that beyond human world, that is, hell justice and heaven justice. This is the yearning for judicial independence in Chinese traditional culture. Therefore, it can be said that judicial independence is also part of Chinese traditional culture. In the process of advancing the rule of law, we can absorb the excellent nutrients.

Subsequently, Professor Szonyi discussed the ideality and reality of the judicial process in the Ming Dynasty, the credibility of the history of literary works, and the similarities and differences between Chinese and Western studies of Chinese legal history.