Professor Zhiping Liang offers a new understanding of Chinese legal tradition in this profoundly influential book. Unlike the available literature using the usual method of legal history research, this book attempts to illustrate ancient Chinese legal tradition through cultural interpretation. The author holds that both the concept and practice of law are meaningful cultural symbols. The law reveals not only the life pattern in a specific time and space but also the world of the mind of a specific group of people. Therefore, just as cultures have different types, laws embedded in different societies and cultures also have different characters and spirits.

Believing that human experience is often condensed into concepts, categories, and classifications, the author begins his discussion with the analysis of relevant terms and then seeks to understand history by interpreting the interaction and interconnectedness of the words, ideas, and practices. Based on the same understanding, the author uses modern concepts reflectively and critically, consciously exploiting the differences between ancient and contemporary Chinese and Western concepts to achieve a more realistic understanding of history while avoiding the ethnocentrism and modern-centrism common in historical studies.