What kind of thinking is Confucianism?

Confucianism basically adheres to the legislative principles of "kinship" and "respect", upholds the "rule of etiquette", advocates the "rule of virtue", and emphasizes the "rule of man". It upholds the "rule of propriety", advocates the "rule of virtue" and emphasizes the "rule of man". Confucianism has had a great influence on feudal society and has long been regarded as the orthodoxy by feudal rulers. ......

------- Zhuge Changqing (Haitao)

Confucianism, also known as Confucianism or Confucianism, was founded by Confucius (551 BC-479 BC, name Qiu, character Zhongni, a native of the state of Lu during the Spring and Autumn Period), initially referred to as the Secretary of State, and then gradually developed into a system of thought centered on the hierarchical benevolence of the hierarchy of inferiority and superiority, and Confucianism is referred to as Confucianism, which is the most influential school in China. and is also the dominant consciousness of ancient China. Confucianism has had a profound impact on China, East Asia and even the whole world.

Confucianism basically adheres to the legislative principles of "kinship" and "respect", upholds the "rule of etiquette", advocates the "rule of virtue", and emphasizes the "rule of the world". Confucianism basically adheres to the legislative principles of "pro-religion" and "respect", upholds the "rule of propriety", advocates the "rule of virtue" and emphasizes the "rule of man". Confucianism had a great influence on feudal society and was long regarded as orthodox by feudal rulers. The rule of the state depends on the stability of the hierarchical order. Confucian "ritual" is also a form of law. It is centered on the maintenance of the patriarchal hierarchy, and violating the norms of the rites will be punished by the penalty.

The Confucian doctrine of "virtue" is the idea of moralizing and educating people. Confucianism believes that no matter whether human nature is good or evil, it is possible to use morality to educate people. This kind of indoctrination is a kind of psychological transformation, which makes the human heart good and good, knowing shame but not evil. This is the most thorough, fundamental, and positive approach, and it cannot be achieved by legal sanctions.

Confucianism's "rule of man" is to emphasize the specialization of human beings, the possible moral development of human beings, and human sympathy, and to treat human beings as "human beings" who are capable of change and who can have very complex choices, initiative, and ethical nature, in order to manage and rule. The idea of "human being". From this point of view, there is a strong connection between "rule by virtue" and "rule by man". While "rule by virtue" emphasized the process of indoctrination, "rule by man" was a kind of politics of the virtuous, which emphasized the person who indoctrinated himself. Since Confucianism believes that "personality" has an overwhelming power of inspiration, it has developed on this basis into such extremes as "government by men" and "rule by men, not by law". The "rule of man" doctrine.

Background of the emergence of Confucianism

Confucianism refers to the thinking of the Confucian school of thought. It was founded by Confucius, a thinker at the end of the Spring and Autumn period, after the history of Chinese civilization had gone through the Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties for thousands of years. Confucianism, founded by Confucius, is a complete system of thought formed on the basis of summarizing, generalizing and inheriting the traditional culture of the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties of respect and kinship. Sima Qian said in the "Records of the Grand Historian - The Family of Confucius", "Confucius made the Spring and Autumn Annals because of the Records of the Grand Historian, from Duke Hidden, down to the 14th year of Duke Lamenting, and the 12th year of the Grand Historian. According to Lu, pro-Zhou, so Yin, transported three generations." Confucius, the founder of the Confucian school, said: "The narrative is not made, the letter and good old days" ("Analects - Shu而") is his own ideological nature.

During the Eastern Zhou period, Chinese society was undergoing an epochal change in history, with the Zhou royal family in decline, the lords sitting on the throne, and the maintenance of the feudal patriarchal hierarchical system of the "Zhou Rites" being greatly damaged, with the lords fighting for supremacy, and the society was in a state of turmoil. At this time, the intellectuals representing the interests of various classes were exceptionally active, becoming an important social force, they have ascended to the stage of history, writing books and proposing solutions to social problems, forming a prosperous situation of the hundred schools of thought. Among them, the most influential are Confucianism, Legalism, Taoism, each of them designed a set of new landlord class to end the division, realize the unity of the governance of the country, for the Qin and Han after the choice of social governance ideas laid the foundation.

During the Spring and Autumn period, the deep crisis caused by the irreconcilable contradictions within the society shook the authority of traditional culture, and the skepticism and criticism of traditional culture increased day by day, so that even Confucius, who was an "ancestor of Yao, Shun, and the Charter of the Literature and the Martial Arts," could not help but infuse his own ideology with the spirit of the times. Even Confucius could not help injecting the spirit of the times into his own system of thought and appropriately transforming traditional culture in order to establish a new order of harmony and psychological balance in social practice. This situation was particularly prominent during the Warring States period, when great changes were taking place, because people could vaguely see the dawn of a new era breaking through the old hierarchical bonds of inferiority and superiority on the ruins of the old world that had collapsed.

Formation of Confucianism

Before Confucianism, the aristocrats and the free people of the ancient society received the traditional six virtues (wisdom, faith, holiness, benevolence, righteousness, loyalty), six conducts (filial piety, friendliness, harmony, marriage, responsibility, compassion), six arts (piety, friendliness, harmony, marriage, compassion), six skills (piety, friendliness, harmony, marriage, compassion), and six skills (piety, friendliness, harmony, marriage, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion, compassion). ), and the six arts (rites, music, archery, imperialism, calligraphy, and mathematics) were socialized and educated. In terms of the content of the instruction given, social education in ancient China was based entirely on cultural elements such as values, habits, practices, behavioral norms and guidelines that had been formed over time by the Huaxia people in their specific living environment. Confucianism absorbed these cultural elements wholesale and raised them to the height of systematic theory.

Confucius, the founder of Confucianism, for the first time broke the monopoly of the old ruling class on education, changing "learning in the government" to "teaching without prejudice", and spreading traditional culture and education to the whole nation. In this way, Confucianism had a solid national psychological foundation, and was accepted by the whole society and gradually Confucianized the whole society. However, the Confucian school of thought insists on the principle that "the way is not limited to three generations, and the law is not limited to two kings" (Xunzi - The System of Kings). The connotation of Confucianism is rich and complex, and the feudal imperial power gradually developed the basic theories and ideas, that is, to speak of unity, to speak of the ruler and subject, father and son, and to speak of the distinction between Chinese and barbarians.

On the issue of attitude towards ancient Chinese traditional culture, there have been two opposing ideological tendencies since modern times: one is the nationalist school, which believes that everything is good in Chinese traditional culture, and even the twenty-four filial piety is also fully affirmed without criticism: one is the Westernization school, which attributes all the root causes of China's backwardness to its cultural traditions, and advocates completely abandoning the traditional culture of China and the wholesale Westernization. These two views are wrong, our scientific attitude and approach to traditional culture should be to use the past for the present, critical inheritance.

But how to "use the past for the present and critically inherit"? We believe that:

(1) the excellent value principles that have been formed in the long-term historical practice can be transformed into the spirit of the times to inherit. For example, the spirit of "heavenly health, the gentleman to self-improvement" in the "Zhouyi Dazhuan", the "Analects of Confucius" advocated the sacrifice of life for righteousness, to see the benefits of righteousness, to see the danger of authorization, "three armies can take the marshal, but not to take the will of the horseman," the quality, as well as "A scholar must not fail to be resolute and resolute, and he has a heavy load and a long way to go", the independent personality of "the rich and the noble must not be obscene, the poor and the lowly must not be moved, and the mighty and the powerful must not be subjugated", and the sense of sorrow and danger "to enjoy the world and to worry about it", and the sense of anxiety "to be happy and to worry about it" advocated in The Analects of Confucius. "The sense of anxiety in Mencius and the idea of the unity of the world emphasized in the Spring and Autumn Annals of the Gongyangs can be easily transformed into a new era. In particular, the ideological tradition emphasizing unity is more relevant.

(2) Some of the contents can be extracted from their feudalistic ideological kernel, and their useful spiritual factors can be extracted, so that they can become useful ideological elements for the construction of a new culture today. For example, the idea of "people-oriented". From the "respect for heaven and protection of the people" of the early Western Zhou Dynasty to Mencius' "the people are the most important thing, the gods of earth and grain come second, and the ruler is the least important thing" to Xunzi's "the ruler is the boat; the common people are the water. Water carries the boat, water overturns the boat", the people-oriented thinking constitutes an important part of ancient Chinese political thought. Of course, the real connotation of "people-oriented" in ancient times was not and could not be the interests of the people. Today, if we remove its feudal core, we can transform the ancient people-oriented thinking from the perspective of the people being the masters of their own house, and develop it into a socialist concept in which the interests of the people are above all. The Confucian propositions of "cultivating oneself and placing others in peace" and "correcting the mind and cultivating the body" are still relevant today with the establishment of a socialist market economy. Today we still need to promote self-cultivation and dedication to socialism.

(3) The dregs of traditional culture must be rejected and discarded. For example, the female concept of "three from four virtues", the natural concept of "Heaven is unchanged, and the Tao is unchanged", and the feudal concept of hierarchy of "differentiation between inferiority and superiority, and the noble and the lowly", etc.

Confucianism is the most important of all.

The modern significance of Confucianism

Confucius had 3,000 disciples under his tutelage, and thus summarized many effective educational methods, such as "Learning from the past to understand the new," "Three people walking together must be my teacher," "Learning without thinking is confusing, thinking without thinking is confusing, and thinking without thinking is confusing. If you learn without thinking, you will be confused; if you think without learning, you will be negligent" and so on. Confucius was honored as the "Teacher of the World", and in some areas, the Confucius Christmas was designated as the "Teacher's Day".

Since the Chinese began to pursue modernization, the status of Confucianism in Chinese culture has changed dramatically. The status of Confucianism in Chinese culture has changed very much since the Ming and Qing dynasties. Everyone should have the opportunity to refer to the resources provided by the Confucian tradition. Especially Chinese and East Asians should have this opportunity. But just as with other cultural traditions, the Confucian tradition belongs to all of humanity, and so the literature of Confucian thought should be translated into as many languages as possible and made available to everyone.

From the beginning Confucianism has embodied a universal worldview and outlook on life. In today's terms, in ancient China Confucianism was understood to be the core of human civilization. As a result, at least in China, Confucianism was seen as an integral part of civilization or culture. Confucianism has provided modern man with very rich resources. In the face of these resources, modern people have a freedom of choice, and can either absorb some of the components or discard some of them. Confucianism is the kernel of traditional Chinese culture and the theoretical basis for upholding the rule of the feudal monarchy. Confucianism and the monarchical dictatorship constitute the two main elements of ancient Chinese political history.

But no matter what choice you make, Confucianism belongs to the treasury of cultural heritage of all mankind. Preserving and interpreting the literature of Confucianism and enhancing people's understanding of it is an important task for us as scholars interested in Confucianism. Regardless of your opinion of Confucianism, learning about this extremely colorful tradition will certainly make your life richer.