What are women's three obedience and four virtues?

"Three obedience" means that a woman does not marry from her father, but from her husband, and her husband dies; "Four virtues" refer to women's virtue, women's words, women's appearance and women's merits.

1, three slaves

"Obey" has multiple meanings-obey, follow, obey and follow. Women who are required to abide by the morality of "three obedience" cannot be independent (objectifying women), but must act according to their father's orders, husband's orders and son's wishes, so as to be filial to women, virtuous to their wives and virtuous to their mothers.

2. Four virtues

At first, it was the training and cultivation of the four necessary qualities of court women-morality, speech, appearance and skill, which included the four traditional educational contents of "women's studies", so Confucianism called them "four teachings" and "four lines".

Originated from the education of women in the court, it belongs to "Yin Li" (the etiquette that women abide by) and "Yin Duty" (the responsibility that women bear), and soon expanded to the upper-class families to undertake the cultivation of women's roles.

Moral evaluation from three aspects to four aspects:

In feudal society, three obedience and four virtues have a very important binding force on women, which is an important criterion for men to choose women. However, it restricted the narrow-minded behavior of women, and the status of men and women should be treated equally, abandoning the feudal thought that men were superior to women in feudal society.

According to the principle of "men are superior to women", it is feudal ethics that oppresses and binds women. It is to meet the needs of patriarchal families, safeguard patriarchy, husband's rights and family interests, and excessively require women to strictly abide by the constraints of feudal ethics in terms of thought, morality, speech, manners and appearance.

Men and women should be based on equal treatment, so that they can live in harmony in family life. The society is developing and progressing, abandoning the old ethics and absorbing good moral cultivation.

Baidu encyclopedia-three obedience and four virtues