Abstract:
Temporal and spatial distance is an internal contradiction of history itself and also one of the problems which hinder the feasibility of Chinese-European history comparison. The perceptions of mutual understanding and historical effects in philosophic hermeneutics define temporal distance as a prerequisite of historical study and comparison, offering a new significant notion to an active comprehension of temporal and spatial distance. Meanwhile, the idea and means of philosophic hermeneutics incorporate spatial distance into temporal notion by desalting the former to solve the contradiction between time and space, which is a weak point in it and may lead to some relativistic tendency. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary to re-interpret the temporal-spatial notion of hermeneutics by means of modern philosophic and historical theories. This will organically unify the notions of time and space which stand polar apart in reality and finally make them agree in a reality-dependent course of development and change of social history. The above approach is of active significance to enriching and perfecting the theoretical methodology of Chinese-European history comparison.
