What enlightenment does Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism have on the construction of advanced socialist culture?

1. The thoughts of Confucian philosophy, such as humanism, people-oriented, vigor and vitality, self-improvement, courage to innovate, respect for morality and justice, benevolence and love for others, harmony but difference, and harmony between man and nature, are worth explaining and carrying forward. Another example is Taoism and Taoism's Taoist utensils, nature, respect for Taoism, respect for morality, the unity of man and nature, the love of the same people, and self-cultivation, which all show the wisdom of life and have important value.

Confucian culture is the most important part of China culture. To understand the history and reality of China and build a new socialist culture with China characteristics, we must objectively understand and grasp the basic spirit and modern value of Confucian culture. The consciousness of harmony, humanity, hardship, morality and practice in Confucian culture has a profound influence on the formation of national character and national spirit in China society.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Confucianism founded by Confucius was called "outstanding learning". After the Han Dynasty, Confucianism gained the legal status of "national consciousness". In the long historical development, Confucianism has exerted a great and far-reaching influence on the formation of China's national character and national spirit. It can be said that Confucian culture is the most important part of China culture. To understand the history and reality of China and build a new socialist culture with China style and China style, we must have an objective understanding and overall grasp of the basic spirit of Confucian culture and its modern value.

The sense of harmony in Confucian culture contains two meanings: harmony between man and nature and harmony between people. Regarding the unity of heaven and man, Confucianism advocates "the unity of heaven and man". Confucius advocates that heaven is contained in human nature, and the unity of heaven should be seen in the unity of human nature. Therefore, he not only talks about "Heaven knows man", but also personifies and moralizes Heaven. He also talked about "man knows his destiny" and stressed that man is not passive in the face of fate. Mencius linked heaven with human nature, advocating "dedication", "intellectuality" and "knowing heaven", taking human nature as the intermediary to communicate and unify heaven and man. Regarding the harmony of interpersonal relationships, Confucianism advocates the "golden mean". The doctrine of the mean, also known as "neutralization", "Bank of China" and "middle way", all have the same meaning, that is, "harmony without difference" and "going too far". The so-called "harmony without difference" means whether or not to affirm or deny. This is in line with dialectics and the same view. The so-called "too much is not enough" means that everything has a boundary and scale, and it is not advisable to reach or exceed this boundary and scale. The essence of "harmony without difference" and "too much is not enough" is to emphasize the unity and balance of contradictions, grasp the degree of things to achieve harmony in interpersonal relationships, and avoid and overcome the opposition and conflict between people, people and society, and even countries and nations.

Today's era is an era of peace and development. Peace and development are inseparable from the harmony between man and nature, and also from the harmony of interpersonal relationships. The same is true of the development from a small family to a country, a nation and even all mankind. It is conceivable that if we blindly copy the western idea of "conquering heaven" and exploit nature in a predatory way, the result will only destroy the balance of natural ecology and eventually lead to punishment and revenge from nature.

The so-called humanistic consciousness is to respect and admire people, to enhance the meaning of human life and the value of independent consciousness of the subject. And this is exactly what Confucianism relishes and pursues. There is no doubt that Confucianism does not emphasize the freedom and liberation of human personality and the independent development of individuals like thinkers in the Western Renaissance. But this is only relative. First, Confucianism did not completely obliterate the function and value of human individual subject, and obliterate the independence and initiative of human individual subject. Confucius said that "benevolence depends on oneself", and the realization of benevolence depends on one's own efforts; He also said that "if you want to make a career, you must become a success", and both "career" and "success" should be based on "career" and "success". Mencius said that "Tao only adapts itself", and there is no other way to seek Tao, which depends on one's own practice and understanding. This is an affirmation of the independence and initiative of human individual subjects. Secondly, subject should include individual subject and quasi-subject, and subject consciousness should include individual subject consciousness and quasi-subject consciousness. As far as quasi-subject and quasi-subject consciousness are concerned, Confucianism not only never ignores it, but attaches great importance to it. On the one hand, starting from the universality of human nature, Confucianism regards man as a social class existence, and as a class existence, man occupies a special position in nature and the universe. On the other hand, Confucianism is based on people's family and blood relationship, and people's world and society are the fundamental support for people's survival and development, so people's social value or quasi-subject value is more important than people's self-value or individual value. It is in this sense that Confucianism emphasizes that "people are expensive and things are cheap" and thinks that people are different from other things and have incomparable value; Emphasize that "the people are the foundation of the country" and think that the people constitute the foundation of national politics. With a solid foundation, national peace can be guaranteed and national development can be possible; It emphasizes that "the people are more important than the monarch" and holds that the people, the country and the monarch are important, and the people are the first. The gains and losses in the world depend on the opposition of the people.

Confucian humanistic consciousness emphasizes human subjectivity, and advocates treating people as human beings, attaching importance to public opinion and having fun with the people. This is the embodiment of respecting human nature and people, and it is also the bud of ancient democratic thought. Of course, Confucian people-oriented or people-oriented thought is different from modern western democratic thought. People-oriented or people-oriented concept shows personal dignity by affirming human nature, and democratic concept moves towards personal equality by affirming human rights. Human nature and human rights, people-oriented and democracy are interlinked, but they cannot be equated. But people-oriented or people-oriented thought can still be the basis of democratic thought. To build a socialist democratic politics with China characteristics, it is necessary to draw useful nutrients from Confucian people-oriented thought.

Different from the Taoist tradition of advocating nature, the Confucian tradition advocates morality. Confucianism is fully aware of the importance of morality to society and life. First of all, the existence of virtue constitutes the direct basis for people's personality evaluation. If a person has no lofty morality, even if he is a prince, he will not be respected by everyone; On the contrary, with lofty morality, no matter how poor you are, you can get the praise of the whole people and be immortal. Secondly, morality is the code of conduct for people to put themselves in their shoes. Confucianism believes that the heart of benevolence and righteousness is the foundation of human life, and without it, the foundation of life will be lost. Therefore, they stressed that we should proceed from benevolence and righteousness, do nothing wrong, do not take ill-gotten gains, even if we get along with others, we should have a choice and get along with others with benevolence and righteousness. Third, morality is the core content of cultural education. Confucianism attaches importance to education, but what they talk about is not knowledge education, but ethics education and how to be a man. The desire of Confucianism is to cultivate the ideal personality of people with ideals and benevolence through moral education. Finally, morality is also an important symbol of the rise and fall of a country. The rise and fall of a country is closely related to the moral status and standards of the country from the monarch to the people. Benevolence survives and benevolence dies.

Confucianism has left us a tradition of advocating morality. Strictly speaking, there is no contradiction between moral consciousness and rule of law consciousness. A person with high moral cultivation and awareness, that is, a law-abiding person, can naturally be honest and trustworthy in economic activities. Therefore, we believe that although the Confucian moral principles and codes of conduct may not conform to the modern society and economy, China, as a civilized country, must not give up its fine tradition of advocating morality in the development of market economy and modernization.

In Confucianism's view, the realization of harmonious realm, the promotion of humanistic spirit, the escape of suffering realm and the improvement of moral quality can not be separated from people's efforts and actions to devote themselves to reality and forge ahead. Therefore, most Confucian classics emphasize practice, and most Confucian figures are practitioners. Confucius said, "A scholar who lives in a house is not enough to be a scholar." . It means that as an intellectual with ideals and ambitions, when he has endless responsibilities and undertakings, he should serve the society. Otherwise, it is shameful to be a scholar, and he is not worthy to be an intellectual. Moral cultivation or moral practice is to achieve its "inner saint" goal through self-cultivation or self-transformation; Social and political practice is to achieve its goal of "being king outside" through meritorious service or social transformation. "Inner Sage" depends on "Lide", that is, paying attention to people's physical and mental cultivation to establish moral personality; The "foreign king" relies on "meritorious service", that is, making great achievements in society to stand up for political personality. Therefore, while emphasizing "self-cultivation", universities immediately talked about "governing the country and leveling the world", believing that these two aspects are very important and cannot be neglected. Therefore, Confucianism is against empty talk, against words and deeds, and especially emphasizes the importance of practice. "Yi Zhuan" also said: "Heaven is strong, and gentlemen are constantly striving for self-improvement." People are required to imitate the vigorous style of the operation of heaven and earth, face the reality, transform themselves and society, and are not afraid of any difficulties and obstacles; People are required to persevere, make progress despite difficulties, strive for progress, rely on the strength of the subject, and improve themselves and society through the practice of the subject.

Judging from the history of China, the pragmatic tendency and vigorous spirit of Confucian culture have played a positive role in promoting the formation of the patriotic tradition, the tradition of pursuing truth and the tradition of fighting evil forces of outstanding intellectuals and people with lofty ideals in China. These fine traditions are obviously not out of date today, and we still have to carry them forward. We have reason to get useful enlightenment from the practice of Confucianism and make innovations.

2. Buddhism, its origin, causality, equality, compassion, the middle way, tolerance, harmony, liberation and a series of ideas, are also worthy of our attention. We should "make use of some positive factors in religious doctrines, canons and religious morality to serve socialism".

Second, the basic idea of China's Buddhist philosophy.

(a) origin

(2) Causality

(3) Equality

(4) Compassion

(5) the middle road

(6) Harmony

The Modern Significance of China's Buddhist Philosophy

The above discussion shows that the forms of the three basic contradictions between man and himself, man and man, and man and nature have changed in contemporary human society, while others have become more acute. The modern significance of China's Buddhist philosophy lies in that its important principles have been fully expounded day by day, and its role has begun to appear after creative interpretation; Using Buddhist philosophy to alleviate the basic contradictions of human society will certainly help to improve the spiritual quality of human beings, reduce the real pain of human beings, meet the new needs of human beings, and further promote the peace, harmony and common development of human society.

(1) Pay attention to the contradiction between people and themselves and improve people's spiritual realm.

(b) Coordinate contradictions among people and safeguard world peace.

(3) Adjust the contradiction between man and nature, and promote harmonious and sustainable development.

In a word, the modernization of today's human society and the change of its basic contradictions are related to the fate of the whole human race and the development of the world, which deserves our great attention. How to deal with the relationship between good people and themselves and between man and nature involves not only society, economy and system, but also science and technology and human mind. Buddhism has its fallacy of following myths and penetrating persistence. Buddhist philosophy can't solve the basic contradictions and many specific problems in human society, but it can provide some solutions that secular society lacks in politics, economy and law, that is, attach great importance to people's own spiritual construction, so as to adjust people's value orientation, change people's mentality, transform people's consciousness and enhance people's wisdom, thus making contributions to solving many contradictions and problems in human society. Therefore, we should emphasize once again that in order to give full play to its social functions, Buddhist philosophy needs to dig deep into its own ideological resources and make timely explanations, constantly strengthen its concern and contact with modern society, and make timely responses to emerging major social problems. We believe that Buddhist philosophy undoubtedly has modern value, and the real implementation and full display of Buddhist philosophy value in modern society depends on human efforts and also needs human efforts.

3. The philosophical thoughts of Taoism and Buddhism also contain positive factors, which need to be well explored and utilized to serve socialism and promote social progress and development.

Taoism is an inherent religion in China, with immortality as its highest belief. It persuades people to live forever through health care and moral cultivation, and finally get rid of death and seek eternity. Taoism has inherited and transformed Taoism in many aspects, showing its connection with Taoism, while the transformation shows differences. There are both connections and differences between them. After Wei and Jin Dynasties, Taoism replaced Taoism and played a role and function in society. The book Introduction to China Thought, edited by Professor Donald Bishop, an American scholar, points out that it is unreasonable to think that Taoism is the product of the general corruption of Taoist thought; The ideological system of Taoism contains factors that Taoism lacks, but these factors are very important to people in real life. For example, Taoism appeals to mind or reason, while Taoism appeals to people's emotions, emotions or tastes. Taoism makes full use of people's feelings of fear, mystery and surprise, but Taoism turns a blind eye to it. (See China Culture and China Philosophy 1987, p. 479, Sanlian Bookstore 1988). The author tries to explain that Taoist culture has some special significance for people's real life. The more important question is, is Taoist culture still valuable in contemporary society? Is Taoist culture a museum culture, just displayed for people to visit, just like we watch cultural relics exhibitions? The author didn't ask or answer.

Our answer is: Taoist culture is not a fossil or a cultural relic, but a living existence in modern China society. It is still active and trying to express itself. Why are you still alive and appreciated by some people? Because it has its own practical significance and value, people think that we can still find a magic formula to cure the ills of modern society. I can still feel the harmonious heartbeat of The Holy Unicorn, which is instructive for contemporary people to solve these problems.

Many scholars have discussed the modern significance of Taoist culture. The History of Science and Technology in China by Dr Joseph Needham, a British historian of science, points out: "Without Taoism, China is like a rotten tree with some deep roots. These roots are still full of vitality today. " (Volume II, page 178, Science Press, Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1990) Dong Guangbi's article "Modernity and World Significance of Taoist Thought" holds that "in the social crisis of contemporary science and technology, the modern significance of Taoist thought has been rediscovered by scientific humanists. Joseph Needham, Hideki Yukawa, capra and others discovered some characteristics of the return of modern scientific world outlook to Taoist thought, and took this opportunity to try to construct a new world cultural model with a balance between scientific culture and humanistic culture, and between western culture and eastern culture. Ge found: "In all fields of contemporary society, the soul of Laozi and his Taoist thoughts still plays a role in one way or another, permeating all fields of life and academic fields, and has important social value." (Introduction to Taoist Culture and Modern Civilization, page 1, Renmin University of China Press, 199 1 Edition) From the perspective that Taoism is the inheritance, transformation and extension of Taoism, some contents in Taoism also have its modern value and some similarities with Taoism. In my opinion, the modern significance of Taoist culture is at least manifested in the following four aspects:

First, it is enlightening to the development of contemporary science, from which we can "review the past and learn new things". Taoism's exploration of nature and human body itself produced a series of scientific and technological achievements in ancient China. In this sense, it can be said that Taoism contains ancient scientific elements and has made important contributions to the development of ancient science and technology in China. Taoist primitive scientism can be linked with contemporary science, thus building a new science hall. In fact, some contemporary natural scientists have discovered some similarities between Taoism and the latest science, and used these methods to explain the new problems faced by contemporary science. In the theoretical crisis of contemporary science and technology, some famous scientists use the concept of "Tao" to reconstruct the scientific theoretical model. Hideki Yukawa of Japan believes that the concept of Tao is constantly updated with the development of physics, and in the process of exploring the latest physical concepts, Laozi's Tao will gain extraordinary new ideas. Capra, an American physicist, believes that Tao is very similar to the concept of field in modern physics. It can be said that "Tao" has reference significance for contemporary chemistry, physics, cosmology and human life science. Taoism has made many creative developments in the interpretation of "Tao" of Laozi and Zhuangzi, enriching the content of "Tao". Unfortunately, contemporary scientists only pay attention to Taoism, and the "Tao" evolved from Taoism has not been developed and applied by contemporary science. I believe that we can explore the treasure from it and bring new wealth to contemporary science.

Second, the enlightenment of Taoist philosophy of life to contemporary longevity. Taoism attaches great importance to life, advocates people's subjective initiative in life issues, and emphasizes that "my life lies in my absence", relying on people's cultivation to change fate and improve the quantity and quality of life. According to the life law of "Tao", Taoism puts forward "the unity of life and Tao", and holds that if a monk can practice and be in harmony with Tao, he will transcend the boundary between life and death. In the Taoist view, anyone who loves his own life, cares about the lives of others, and then loves the lives of all things will be connected with the Tao, and will "die without dying" and make his life immortal. From now to the future, people will find some valuable things in Taoist philosophy of life, especially some of its operating methods such as qigong and meditation. Taoism's various health-keeping methods have become popular, forming a large-scale and continuous qigong health-keeping fever. The reason is that Taoist qigong and health preservation methods can eliminate diseases, optimize people's physiological functions, purify people's souls, improve the relationship between people, and make individual life vigorous and lasting. Taoist psychotherapy is undoubtedly an effective prescription for contemporary people. Throughout today's commercial society, fierce competition makes people feel nervous and anxious, and psychological patients increase. If we can learn from Taoist psychotherapy and take time off from work, we can alleviate personal anxiety, reduce psychological pressure and maintain a good attitude, thus promoting the healthy development of psychology. In addition, some Taoist ceremonies have also alleviated the psychological burden of contemporary people to varying degrees and met people's psychological needs of predicting their fate. It is a very obvious fact that Taoist culture is helpful to the physical and mental health of contemporary people.

Thirdly, there are many life experiences in Taoism that can be used for reference by modern people. Taoism gives people a kind of wisdom to settle down. It teaches people that the value and meaning of life lies in returning to simplicity. In order to settle our lives, we should live a quiet life. This is a detached outlook on life, a comfortable outlook on life, and it yearns for a natural, simple, self-sufficient and harmonious life. The philosopher Heidegger quoted Holdrin's later poems and said, "Man has made great achievements, but he lives poetically in this land." (Collection of Heidegger's Poems, page 194, Huazhong Normal University Press, 1992) It is also the ideal of Taoism to live poetically on the earth, lead a poetic life and enjoy life freely and contentedly. This artistic life is a wake-up call to the materialistic and flood-ridden contemporary society and some contemporary people who are greedy for money and hunt for wealth by hook or by crook. The fierce competition in contemporary society has brought some new losses to people's spirit, and the value orientation of returning to nature may make people get a more humanized life experience to some extent. People usually think that Taoist philosophy is the philosophy of life of losers. Lin Yutang's "My Country and My People" holds that "all China people are Confucianism if they succeed, and Taoism if they fail". (China Drama Publishing House, 1990, p. 107) Chapter 10 of Joseph Needham's History of Science and Technology in China quotes a passage: "Confucianism has always been the philosophy of' winners' or people who want to succeed. Taoist thought is the philosophy of' losers' or people who have tasted the pain of' success'. (Science Press, Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1990, p. 178) Yes, Taoist philosophy of life can comfort people's disillusionment and pain, just like taking painkillers, which makes people treat failure with an open-minded and calm mind and maintain the balance of life. However, Taoist philosophy can also be the philosophy of successful people. Successful people take this philosophy of life as a mirror, and always remind themselves that "there is no double blessing", not to be overbearing, not to live in success, and to maintain the strength and length of success. In fact, successful people need the guidance of Taoist philosophy of life, which is called: "Although a saint is above a temple, his heart is no different from a mountain forest". (Guo Xiang's Notes on Zhuangzi's Happy Travel) The Taoist philosophy of life with great wisdom and wisdom is of guiding significance for contemporary people to correctly and calmly handle the success or failure of life, maintain a harmonious and balanced living atmosphere, and rejuvenate their lives. No matter the loser or the winner of life, you can use it to live poetically in this land.

Fourthly, the ecological ethics in Taoism, the spirit of attaching importance to the ecological environment and the consciousness of nature protectionism are all worth learning from modern people. Our earth is like a huge spaceship, carrying the residents of the global village into space. This ship, which we can name "Avenue", has 5 billion passengers. The problem is that the spaceship avenue is being vandalized and the environment is seriously polluted. Ozone, the protective layer of spacecraft, is decreasing, and the ecological imbalance is endangering the safety of passengers. These are all caused by people's endless destructive plunder of the earth's resources. Faced with such a serious problem, it may be very beneficial to recall some ancient teachings of Taoism and summarize the ecological ethics of Taoism. Taoism believes that man and nature are an organic whole, isomorphic and inductive, and should live in harmony. The development of nature should abide by certain moral standards and fully understand the laws of nature. If we do the opposite, it will certainly hurt human beings themselves. People as a small universe and nature as a big universe are constantly exchanging materials and energy. Once this kind of communication is artificially destroyed and loses harmony and balance, then people can't get peace. From the Taoist point of view, the imbalance of contemporary ecological balance is actually because people forget their biological relationship with mother nature and think that they can grab what they need from their mother at will, regardless of the harm to their mother's body. Taoist ecological ethics advocates showing kindness to all things in the universe, respecting the attributes of all things in nature, and making all things in the universe self-sufficient and develop naturally without interference. In the Taoist view, there is a causal relationship between man and everything in the natural world, and man and everything in the universe are mutually inductive. The basis of induction is that people and everything are spiritual, and people and things have the same information. Comparatively speaking, man is the most spiritual of all things. He belongs to nature and is different from nature, but he must rely on nature to survive, so he should love and respect nature. As long as human beings exist, the relationship between man and nature is an eternal theme. In the process of human facing new development and moving towards the future, the Taoist ideas of respecting, obeying and praising nature and its ecological view are thought-provoking, which is of modern significance to solving the crisis of human existence.

In a word, some problems raised by Taoism are similar to the life problems, social problems and environmental problems faced by contemporary people, and the methods to solve these problems are also of reference value to contemporary people. The modern significance of Taoism is self-evident.