| Confucianism |
China’s Imperial State PhilosophyOne old Chinese man alone albeit posthumously, affected more human beings throughout recorded history up to the end of the 19th century than any messianic figure or political party; ironically he died believing he had failed in his life’s quest. His only hope at that late stage as he saw it lay in future generations understanding the value of his conclusions and putting them to practice. They did but perhaps not quite in the manner he would have envisaged. To those subsequent generations who wholeheartedly embraced him and venerated his teachings he became known simply as The Sage. From the middle of the Han dynasty (100 B.C.E.) forward it was his teachings that became the foundation upon which all successive Imperial Governments ran, the Imperial Examinations System was based and which was to last 2,000 years until 1905 at the end of the last Dynasty, the Qing. (1644-1911)That man was Kung-fu-tsu, better known to us in the West as Master Kung or Confucius 551 – 479 B.C.E. Born into an impoverished family of noble background in the kingdom of Lu in what is now a part of Shandong province in North China, he believed he could trace his lineage back to the much esteemed Duke of Zhou. (Circa 1036B.C.E.) Fascinated almost to obsession with the Duke who had set a paragon example whilst serving as regent, the young Kung-tsu (as he is most commonly known to modern Chinese) was of the opinion that mankind had since strayed from the path of righteousness and that the only way forward lay in the example and writings of the Golden Age of the Western Zhou Dynasty. Looking back to that period of enlightened peace, he was convinced that if only the current set of rulers (known as the Eastern Zhou) would follow his advice and enact the role of the ‘Gentleman’ all would once again be right in the affairs of men. In his enthusiasm, Kung-tsu more or less single handedly salvaged the ideals and philosophies of the ancient Zhou. Considering himself to be a transmitter and custodian of their wisdom rather than creator of a new philosophy, he systematically formatted the Zhou ideals into books that have been accredited directly to him: The Book of Songs, The Book of Writings and The Spring and Autumn Annals (the first known Chinese history). He is also accredited with adding to the Commentaries of the Yi-Jing (I-Ching), the Chia-yu or Book of Discourses and is thought to have edited The Book of Rites and The Book of Music. These all became known as classical texts in Chinese culture. At the personal level he became a recognized authority on the ceremonies and rites of the Zhou and thus of the court etiquette of his time. This knowledge served as the basis for his burgeoning career as a young scholar and allowed him to spend much of his early life studying and working in positions of minor officialdom during which period he also gathered and taught a significant coterie of students and disciples. However, an unfortunate political intrigue at age fifty forced him to make a hasty and unexpected withdrawal from Lu into a life of exile during which he and a group of his disciples spent the ensuing years roaming from one neighbouring kingdom to another. Obsessed with what he saw as his custodianship of the Western Zhou Dynasty legacy he tried all his adult life to find a ruler who would apply his methods on the populace. This was the time in China’s history known as the Spring and Autumn Period when the disparate fiefdoms that made up the fractious Eastern Zhou world at that time were in constant upheaval and there was frequent conflict between the ruling elite of one fiefdom and another. It was perhaps an ill-fated time to be advocating the theories of peace and prosperity of a once golden age when all the current set of petty rulers were wanting to do was stab one another in the back and lay claim to having the rightful mantle of the idyllic Western Zhou for themselves. The central concepts behind Kung-fu-tsu’s philosophy were the essential goodness of man and the ideals of: Benevolence or love of one’s fellow man, and of Morality or Uprightness. These were, he postulated, the principle virtues of the true Gentleman or Prince. Civil order was only to be brought about and maintained by the correction of names so that then all things might correspond aptly with the qualities ascribed to them in their appellations. Put simply, a Gentleman must be a Gentleman. Reform must start at the top and if the rulers acted in accord with Li – morality, the populace would follow. When asked on one occasion what he would do first if ever he were to be granted the appropriate authority, he replied: Correct the names because if the names are not correct, the words will not be correct either; and if the words are incorrect, the right actions will not be carried out; and if the actions are not conducted properly, rites and music cannot flourish, punishments will not fit the crime; if punishments do not fit the crime, the common people will not know where to put hand and foot. Therefore, a noble person takes care to ensure that names are correctly used in speech and that what he says will always be correct. A Gentleman will not tolerate disorder in his words. This is what matters!Although Kung-tsu did not gain the opportunities or achieve the recognition he sought so avidly during his life time, on his death a dedicated group of devoted students collected many of his sayings and put them into an anthology known to us today as the Analects. Another concept at the heart of what developed into Confucianism was the idea of the scholar administrator. Master Kung advocated emperors hire scholars such as he, well versed in the ethics of the earlier Zhou Dynasty to run the day to day administration of the country. This in effect was the logic behind the later establishment of the Imperial Examination system under the Han Dynasty. The Spring and Autumn Period was followed by the time of the Warring States era which in turn was eclipsed by the tornado that was the coming of the Qin when all the kingdoms were amalgamated under the auspices of one man, a fearsome, tyrannical, megalomaniac. Qin Shi-huang the emperor of Great Wall and Terracotta Warrior fame and the man who was ultimately to unite the feuding fiefdoms into one great empire and so found the place we recognize today as China (Qin). During both the Warring States Period and the reign of Qin Shi-huang which eclipsed the more peaceful Spring and Autumn Period of Kung-tsu’s own life, his teachings were abjured. In fact much to the horror of the Zhou traditionalists, under the trenchant Legalism of Qin Shihuang’s reign many books were burned and all scholars who advocated any views other than those of the incoming Qin were executed -– many being simply buried alive! However, the enlightenment of the Han Dynasty that eventually eclipsed the turmoil of the Qin, introduced Confucian ethics as the lodestone of it’s state scholarship, based the Imperial Examinations on them and thus set in place the system for governance and civilian advancement through the imperial bureaucracy that was to last throughout all the succeeding dynasties for the following 2,000 years. State sponsored Confucianism had finally arrived! One cannot help but wonder what the old fellow would have thought if he knew the half of what was to come in his name in the proceeding two millennia. Although more is known of Kung-tsu’s personal story than that of Lao-tsu’s or Chuang-tsu’s much is still conjecture and myth. Nevertheless, from the Analects it is possible to catch glimpses of a very human figure embroiled in all the drama and tragicomedy of a life lived to the full. The quotes and insights written within are not in any given chronological order and are therefore somewhat confusing but a clear sense of a very warm hearted if somewhat irascible character emerges. Having himself been born into gentile poverty Kung-tsu did not believe that penury alone ought to keep a man from the opportunity for social advancement. Education and diligent scholarship he believed ought to be a gate through which one might pass from poverty to success by service to the wider community and promotion in the state apparatus. This allowed in theory at least, for an upwardly mobile society where even a beggar’s child, given the opportunity to gain an education and with diligence in study could feasibly become a magistrate, a provincial administrator or maybe even something higher within the imperial bureaucracy. It was Kung-tsu’s emphasis on education and thus for social advancement which was to lie at the root of the respect and esteem that subsequent generations of Chinese would develop for education and those who impart it. This popular veneration would over time spread to those other kingdoms under China’s suzerainty and have immense and direct effect on their populations and political systems as well. To this day the effects of state sponsored Confucianism can still be detected in the cultures of China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam and of course throughout the vast Chinese Diaspora. In the modern world however, his primary philosophies tend to be confined to the realm of history books rather than government policies and it is in this deeply held esteem for education within these societies that we can perhaps best see his still active legacy. Post ScriptIn 1988 I had the chance to visit Qufu, Confucius’s home town and the site of the Mansions, Grave and Temple of Confucius. After his death, his descendants became the first family of China, regardless of the dynasty in power; even the emperors paid their respects at the Temple in Qufu, several more than once. The compounds are huge and very impressive in spite of the obvious damage wreaked by the Red Guards during the appalling ravages of Mao’s Cultural Revolution. One interesting story related to the feng shui of the site tells that when railways were first built in China the Kung family, direct descendants of The Sage, refused to allow the railways to be laid anywhere within a 100 mile parameter of the family’s estates as the vibrations of the passing trains would disturb the feng shui. |
