TSR Confucianism
Discuss the merits and deficiencies of political theories and philosophical questions.
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Re: TSR Confucianism(Original post by D.R.E)
I'm 'interested', what is Confucianism and what does it entail?
Hi there!
Sorry I took so long, I wanted to do some extra reading first!
It's a religion (philospohy IMO) that revolves around the teachings of Confucius. He wrote his most famous teachings "The Analects" in China over a millennium ago. They are about the respect of self, respect of your parents and elders, and the respect of your country (there is a lot of patriotism to ancient china haha!).
Confucius you could say was a people philosopher, and believed greatly in making his writings available to the everyday people of china, sending missionaries out to the smaller villages ti get the message heard (he was employed by the Chinese empire). This is part of the reason why his works have become so timeless. Unlike Christianity and other religions where until relatively recently their scriptures were in an ancient language that nobody really understood. Confucianism was the religion for all.
Confucius' analects are well worth reading just to get a feel for it.
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Re: TSR ConfucianismI am Chinese and let me try to explain this in English
The most important teaching of Confucius is "Ren", "仁",which generally means compassion.
The structure of this Chinese word "仁" is "two people", in my opinion it means the way for people to interact with each other, especially when you find others in danger, you natural instinct of
compassion will try to help him. Like, if you see a little is going to drop into the river, you natural instinct is to save him.
This "ren" is important to build up social order, at Confucius's period, the social order was collapsed The dukes attacked each other and no one respect the centralized dynasty, so he tried to re-emphasise the importance of "Ren" to rebuild "Li"(generally means social order and ceremonies)Last edited by Will_to_power; 11-06-2012 at 08:15. -
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Re: TSR ConfucianismIn the begining he's a teacher and philosopher , like Buddha and Christ. But soon it becomes religion.(Original post by AspiringGenius)
Hi there!
Sorry I took so long, I wanted to do some extra reading first!
It's a religion (philospohy IMO) that revolves around the teachings of Confucius. He wrote his most famous teachings "The Analects" in China over a millennium ago. They are about the respect of self, respect of your parents and elders, and the respect of your country (there is a lot of patriotism to ancient china haha!).
Confucius you could say was a people philosopher, and believed greatly in making his writings available to the everyday people of china, sending missionaries out to the smaller villages ti get the message heard (he was employed by the Chinese empire). This is part of the reason why his works have become so timeless. Unlike Christianity and other religions where until relatively recently their scriptures were in an ancient language that nobody really understood. Confucianism was the religion for all.
Confucius' analects are well worth reading just to get a feel for it.
But the difference is that , ancient Chinese needed to learn and study his saying, went to centralized exams to become a civil servant to serve the king and citizens( which is the ultimate goal of all literatus).
Instead of worship Confucius,ancient Chinese study his saying more.Last edited by Will_to_power; 11-06-2012 at 08:24. -
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Re: TSR ConfucianismThe Confucius subject is very BIG and it's hard to start with small beginnings ! Anyways, does anyone; got any literacy that they can advice the whole group into reading and possibly start discussing within this group ?
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Re: TSR Confucianismwhich documentary is that?(Original post by Mendingteeth)
I'm quite a keen Confucian since seeing his quotes and aphorisms on the web and watching the documentary-film about him (strongly recommend it), but unfortunately I haven't got round to reading his works properly yet! -
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Re: TSR ConfucianismAs I like some quotes of him I would say that I'm interesting in confucianism. Here are two of my favorites:
"It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop",
"Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart". -
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Re: TSR Confucianismhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius_(2010_film)(Original post by Diety)
which documentary is that? I watched it with subtitles.
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Re: TSR ConfucianismConfucianism is difficult to follow, and it isn't a magical solution philosophy. It has a lot of flaws, for example it seemingly allows for sexism / mysogyny (Debateable). It's difficult to follow because it is based on texts which need to be translated, some of which have been lost, or may be tampered with or not even written by Confucious. It is also based around the chinese culture, which is a very difficult culture to understand / be a part of. It is a little ironic that most of the people who kept the texts alive were the educated, literate people who were rich and most probably had many slaves etc. at a time when most people were poor or malnourished. (Spending their time preserving/discussing texts that advocate compassion)
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Re: TSR ConfucianismThe confucianism I understand seems quite different with you guys,
I tried to google some of the quote translated in English and finds that, the translation is quite different with the origin meaning in Chinese...
Like "Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart", in Chinese it's 既來之,則安之, which has completely different meaning to me -
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Re: TSR ConfucianismI would say in it's pure form it's not a religion, it has simply been adopted as such by the state and culture.(Original post by AntisthenesDogger)
It's a religion. Doesn't belong on this sub-forum. Then again people post all type of **** here.
It's primarily a philosophy through and through, in the same way that at it's core so is Taosim and Buddhism. -
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Re: TSR ConfucianismVery good point. I am personally more of a Lao Tsu type of guy.(Original post by Clickety)
Confucianism is difficult to follow, and it isn't a magical solution philosophy. It has a lot of flaws, for example it seemingly allows for sexism / mysogyny (Debateable). It's difficult to follow because it is based on texts which need to be translated, some of which have been lost, or may be tampered with or not even written by Confucious. It is also based around the chinese culture, which is a very difficult culture to understand / be a part of. It is a little ironic that most of the people who kept the texts alive were the educated, literate people who were rich and most probably had many slaves etc. at a time when most people were poor or malnourished. (Spending their time preserving/discussing texts that advocate compassion)
