Is Confucianism synonymous with Chinese culture? While it may be an overstatement to equate the two, there is little doubt that Confucianism pervades every level of Chinese culture and society. To be sure, other traditions such as Daoism and Buddhism have also left an indelible mark; nevertheless, Confucianism remains central to the shaping of the Chinese imagination. The influence of Confucianism extends beyond China to East Asia and through migration and cultural diffusion, other parts of the world. Confucianism traces its origins to the teachings of Confucius. What makes Confucius so special and what did he teach? This course will explore some of the key concepts in Confucian philosophy. Much of the discussion will centre on the Analects of Confucius, the foundational text of Confucian wisdom, although attention will also be given to the subsequent unfolding of the Confucian tradition. We will attempt to situate Confucian philosophy in its own context and to bring out its contemporary significance. Confucianism is a living tradition. Its vitality hinges on not only its continuing relevance in Chinese society but also its contribution to meeting the global challenges confronting the world today. There are no prerequisites for this course, other than a keen interest in Chinese tradition and culture, and the willingness to engage the Analects of Confucius.
L4.10 - Concluding Remarks
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Del curso dictado por Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Explorations in Confucian Philosophy
8 calificaciones
De la lección
Part 4 - Confucianism in the World Today
The influence of Confucianism on Chinese culture is one important issue, but equally important would be the potential contribution of Confucian philosophy to global dialogue. Is Confucianism still relevant today? What does Confucianism have to offer to contemporary society, which must confront a host of complex challenges? What can we learn from it? Rather than presenting a single point of view, this part of the course will be based on a series of interviews, with scholars of Confucianism, as well as students and alumni of NTU Singapore.
Conoce a los instructores
Alan K. L. ChanToh Puan Mahani Idris Daim Chair Professor of Humanities & Dean
College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
We have now come to the end of this course.
I hope you have gained a sense of the general contours
of Confucian philosophy and more importantly,
a sense of its richness and continued influence on Chinese culture.
From our interviews, it is apparent that there is
both consensus as well as disagreement about,
one, the key concepts and, two,
contemporary significance of Confucian philosophy.
Now let's take these two points one by one.
On the key concepts of Confucian hilosophy,
there is consensus that the concepts of Ren,
humanity or humaneness, Li,
structured or ritualised proper conduct,
and Xiao, filial piety,
are all very important.
But, there is disagreement as to which is more basic or fundamental.
Now, I won't summarise all the views expressed by our wonderful students.
For us, I would suggest that we look at
the basic Confucian concepts as key ingredients in an ethical and cultural soup.
This metaphor should be helpful in addressing
the universality and cultural distinctiveness or
specificity of basic ethical concepts and in
bringing out the central concept of harmony in Confucian thinking.
Consider the example of chicken soup.
Most cultures, of course, have chicken soup,
but it does not follow that all chicken soups are the same.
Now, they may share certain core ingredients,
water of course, chicken, yes,
but they acquire their own distinctive taste
in the way the different ingredients are fused together.
Now look at the ethical soup.
It may be the case that all cultures have a concept
of humanity or of filial care and concern,
harmony arguably is a universal concept,
but the core ethical values always function in
a network of values that give them their distinctive meaning and expression.
In this way, universality and
cultural distinctiveness need not be seen as mutually exclusive.
A general ethical concept like harmony may be found in all cultures, yes,
but it gains cultural specificity in the way it finds expression in diverse cultures.
In the Confucian case,
Ren and Xiao, clearly form an integral whole.
Philosophers may find ways to distinguish them,
and we have seen how Zhu Xi, for example,
devised a careful explanation distinguishing
Ren as principle and Ren as ethical practice.
Whereas Ren as principle is pure, so to speak,
entirely conceptual in ethical practice however,
it stems from filial love and radiate outwards to reach all under Heaven.
That is to say, wider and wider networks of relationships.
But if we set all these explanations aside,
what remains is a relational value network in
which the different values interpenetrate and shape one another,
so that in the end,
Xiao always reflects a deep humaneness and finds
expression in ritually structured and habituated Li proper conduct just as,
let's say, ginseng chicken soup in Korean cuisine touches us with this unique taste.
Take this one step further and we get a sense of
the workings of harmony in Confucian philosophy.
Harmony is not a simple concept.
It is usually associated with music,
but that is not the only interpretation.
If we think of musical harmony,
we may picture a well-scripted score in which
all the different instruments perform in unison.
You can still hear the violin or the cello clearly, for example,
if we think of an orchestral piece,
but it works in harmony with the other instruments.
Now, think of harmony in a culinary sense which is quite different.
In our hypothetical chicken soup,
the chicken and other ingredients dissolve into a unified taste.
It is the cooking that generates the harmonious effect.
Ethical self-cultivation then can be likened to the process of cooking,
which integrates the conceptually distinct virtues such as sincerity and
trustworthiness into an ethical compound that defines the being of the ideal Junzi.
This seems to me to offer a good outline of Confucian philosophy,
how it sees virtues as being embedded in a network of values and how
they become embodied in the person of the Junzi through learning and self-cultivation.
Now, these two concepts,
embeddedness and embodiment I think,
are useful to understanding the ethical life.
In terms of the place of Confucian philosophy in the world today,
again, there is consensus as well as disagreement.
There is consensus that Confucian tradition
remains very much alive in Chinese society today.
However, there is disagreement whether it should be regarded, for example,
as a religion or whether it is
the dominant tradition in contemporary China and overseas Chinese communities.
Confucianism does not have membership requirements.
And if we just ask people in Beijing or Taipei today whether they are Confucians,
they might just be at a loss as to how to answer the question.
This is very much unlike, for example, Buddhism.
If you ask someone whether he or she is a Buddhist,
the reply should come quite readily,
whether it's a yes or no.
In the Confucian case,
there is clear recognition that Chinese culture and
society is still heavily influenced by Confucian values,
but it is of course,
no longer an institutionalised religion of the state as it was in pre-modern China.
For example, the emphasis on family values and education
cooked together in the Confucian way is still very much evident.
But even though they are still Confucian temples,
and we have visited one in the birthplace of Confucius,
Confucianism is not an institutionalised religion
with a defined membership or prescribed adherences.
This is the Confucian temple in Hanoi,
Vietnam which is today a major tourist attraction.
What remains, I would argue,
is a sense of spirituality that informs Confucian ethics that there is purpose,
dignity, and meaning to human existence beyond
any mere utilitarian understanding of ethics and the human condition.
It may be possible to reinterpret Confucian philosophy
today as a form of secular humanism.
But in my view, that would not do sufficient justice to
the Confucian understanding of the potential nobility of being human,
the potential of human beings broadening the Dao or Way,
extending the ideal harmony that is understood to be the very work of Heaven itself.
Today, China is a socialist country with a market economy.
Socialism with Chinese characteristics as it has been described.
Leaving that aside, there is still every indication that
Confucian tradition continues to shape the ongoing evolution of Chinese society.
At the political level,
the present Chinese leadership emphasises the need to
contextualise socialism in Chinese culture and society.
I still recall a speech given by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2014.
In which he said to the effect,
"That the Chinese Communist Party does not subscribe to any form of cultural nihilism,
but recognises the need to adapt the basic tenets of Marxism to the reality of China."
In this context, the Confucian tradition has an important role to
play in helping to realise what President Xi calls the Chinese Dream.
Giving some concrete shape to this ideal,
the Chinese leader has also called for the realisation of the two centenary goals.
In 2021, China will be celebrating
the centenary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.
The first centenary goal is to establish comprehensively a moderately prosperous society,
doubling the 2010 GDP,
and per capita income for both urban and rural residents by that time.
The idea of a moderately prosperous society can be traced to the Confucian classic,
The Book of Rites or Rituals.
It is not only about the level of economic development however,
but rather in the Confusion formulation,
it also entails well-established social order governed by proper conduct.
This is a step below the even higher ideal of Grand Harmony,
but nonetheless, a significant sociopolitical ideal.
The second centenary refers to
the anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
And this will be in 2049,
by then, in the official language of the Chinese government,
the goal is to develop China into a prosperous,
strong, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious modern socialist country.
On the social level,
Confucian enrichment classes for children are
enjoying a tremendous revival in urban centers throughout China.
The emphasis on education and Li proper conduct,
can hardly be understood without reference to the Confucian tradition.
There may be a certain romanticised picture of the Confucian past,
all Confucianism is seen to have certain value in promoting social cohesion.
Huge figures of Confucius now appear all over China.
And yes, perhaps there was profit motive in building some of these,
but regardless of the motive,
there is ample evidence of
the continued influence of Confucianism in contemporary Chinese society.
Let me cite just one more example.
In traditional China, the concept of filial piety spread beyond
the educated elite to all levels of society through story telling,
drama, paintings, and other art forms.
A set of stories and visual representations called the
"Twenty-Four Paragons of Filial Piety" were especially popular.
One of the stories tells of a man who sold himself into
servitude in order to raise money to bury his father.
Another tells of a poor scholar who stripped himself
bare in the depths of winter and lay on the frozen lake,
melting the ice with his body heat so as to catch fish for his stepmother.
I won't go through these stories here,
some are still quite well known but the majority I
suspect are unlikely to resonate among modern readers.
To update so to speak the practice of filial piety,
the Chinese government has actually come up with
a new set of new 24 acts of filial piety.
Now these are not stories but advice on filial conduct in the modern world.
These include spending time with one's parents during holidays as much as possible,
hosting birthday parties for parents,
cooking for them personally,
calling them over the phone every week,
teaching them to use the internet,
verbalising one's love for them,
purchasing suitable insurance policies for them,
and doing physical exercises with them.
It's difficult really to gauge the effectiveness of such civic campaigns.
Nevertheless, the point here is that the Confucian roots
run deep in Chinese society and will continue to shape its development.
The influence of Confucian values extends beyond mainland China to Taiwan,
Hong Kong, Japan, Korea,
Singapore, and other Southeast Asian communities.
Here are some Japanese paintings, for example,
of the 24 Paragons of Filial Piety.
And there are some very nicely done Korean ones as well.
I should perhaps add that Confucius stands on the East pediment of
the US Supreme Court building as an emblem of justice.
Now this is not widely known,
and so the next time you're in Washington D.C.,
make sure you take a look.
In recent years, China of course is actively
setting up Confucius Institutes all over the world.
While they don't teach Confucianism as such,
the introduction of Chinese language and culture in other countries
plays a role in raising awareness of traditional Chinese culture,
both within China and abroad.
Confucianism is a living tradition.
It has gone through a tumultuous history from being the star of
Chinese civilisation to the condemned villain that led to China's decline,
and now back to the fore again.
The Confucian Analects remains a source of inspiration for millions of people.
To some it still has canonical if not scriptural status,
but what is more pertinent is that many of its sayings have become
a part of everyday language diffused into everyday Chinese culture.
To take by one example,
there's a saying in the Analects attributed to one of
Confucius main disciples that suggests that to the Junzi and gentleman,
everyone within the Four Seas will be his brothers.
This has since taken on a wider meaning in the sense that
within the Four Seas that is to say in the whole world,
all men are brothers.
Speakers of Chinese would know this phrase,
although not everyone would know that it came from the Analects.
It is important to have a good sense of the basic tenets of Confucian philosophy,
how it envisions a better world through self-cultivation,
a world marked by harmony that is anchored by
certain key ethical and spiritual ingredients.
New cultural ingredients need not be rejected because
the idea is that in the process of cultural appropriation,
they will be infused with the spirit of humanity, propriety,
and rightness and in the end,
these new ingredients will add to the flavour of the cultural soup.
This is I think an important point.
Rather than imposing a set of values on other traditions,
Confucianism it seems to me holds a more inclusive view,
in the belief that ethical excellence will transform relationships and behaviour.
Looking at cultural influence and interaction from the other end,
globalisation may be introducing many new elements into Chinese culture today,
but they will not be immune to Confucian influence.
I suppose it is possible that a new ingredient could
totally overwhelm the taste of the original dish.
Like adding say a tone of chili pepper to a soup.
But in cultural interaction,
the dominant tradition is not so easily dislodged.
Confucian philosophy will continue to evolve,
coming to better terms with modern challenges such as gender equality,
climate change, and democratic governance.
But its core ideal of harmony and the belief in the transforming power of virtue,
not abstract principles but embodied by
the ideal Junzi and expressed in real human relationships.
These will continue to shape the future development of Confucian thinking.
In the final analysis,
we should be thankful that we have so many different varieties of cultural soup,
each with its own distinct way of integrating the key ethical and spiritual ingredients.
If there is to be genuine progress in
addressing the global challenges of the 21st century,
intercultural dialogue and engagement must be encouraged.
And it is through dialogue and engagement that we can then learn from one another.
The Analects has another well-known and well-loved passage
attributed to Confucius that says,
"With just myself and two others walking together,
though the number may be small,
I will always find a teacher
(which is to say to be able to learn from them)."
And this is the intent of this course.
To prepare you for a fruitful engagement with Confucianism and Chinese culture,
as opposed to an apprehensive encounter when the opportunity arises.
I hope you have enjoyed this course.
Thank you once again for joining me.
Till we meet again. Take care. Xie Xie. Zai Jian.
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