Confucianism and Taoism Dynasty - Research Paper Example

Literature research paper Confucianism and Taoism dynasty China stands alone among the countries in the world with the greatest civilization, having developed in total segregation from the rest of the world. Hemmed it by mountains and deserts, isolated by geography, at the extreme eastern end of the ancient euro-Asian world and lying across no routes, china as a country developed by it. The Chinese citizens have traditionally regarded themselves to be at the center of the universe, the Chinese name for china, Chung-kao, means the kingdom in the middle. Three religions have played a crucial role in the three thousand years of history. The three religions are Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. Taoism and Confucianism are indigenous to China. The two religions were in existence for five hundred years before Buddhism was introduced from India. The paper is a discussion based on the two religions, Taoism and Confucianism and how they influenced the culture of the Chinese. The paper will begin with a discussion on Confucianism before discussing Taoism and their influence on the Chinese culture (Lee, 397). Confucianism and its impact on the Chinese culture Confucianism is the cornerstone of Chinese’s traditional culture as well as a complete ideological system that was created by Confucius and based on the traditional culture of the Shang, Xia and Zhou dynasties. Confucianism was able to dominant a feudal society that lasted for over 2000 years and for that reason its influence on the social structure, history and the people of china cannot be overlooked. Confucius was the founder of Confucianism religion and culture. He is believed to have offered the greatest influence on the culture of the people of china. Besides being a greatest thinker, unsuccessful politician and an educationist, he was first considered an intellect with noble morality. He pursued kindness, truth and perfection throughout his life and his failure and success were largely based on his character that presented an impact on the lives and culture of the Chinese. Confucius was born in 551 B.C in the Lu state which is currently known as Qufu in Shandong province. His name among the Chinese population was King Qui. Even though his father died while he was still young, Confucius dedicated his life to studies at the age of fifteen years (Kim, 287). Like socialism, Confucianism promoted community welfare and promoted collective interest among the Chinese people. Both emphasized on the remodeling and educational process in serving the common good and the interests of the Chinese people. The concept of welfare and collective interests are still alive in the current Chinese society. Confucianism is often characterized as a system of ethical and social philosophy rather than a religion. In fact, it is built on an ancient religious foundation to develop transcendent, institutional and social values of the Chinese society. Confucianism possesses a sense of common moral understanding and religious identity of the societies’ central institutions. The Confucius institutions were not separate from the church, but those of family, society, state and school. Its priest was not separate liturgical specialist, but officials, teachers and parents. Confucianism was part of the Chinese way of life and social fabric to Confucians (Kim, 287). Confucius did not intent to develop a new a religion, but to revive and interpreted the unnamed religion that was associated with the Zhou dynasty, under which the Chinese had thought the ancient religious rule was bankrupt and left numerous questions unanswered. The dominant view of the day, espoused by legalists and realist, was that statecraft and strict law were the bases of sound policy. Confucius believed that the basis lay in the Zhou dynasty and religion. He interpreted these as ceremonies performed by human agents and embodied the cultured and civilized patterns of behavior and not as sacrifices asking for god’s blessing. They embodied the ethical core of the Chinese society and embodied for him. Confucius applied the term ritual to action beyond religious ceremonies and formal sacrifices that include social rituals accepted standard of behavior as well as courtesies. He visualized these traditional and time honored rituals as a basis of human civilization. Confucius believed that civilized societies could have an enduring, unified and stable order (Yan, 951). Since the time when Confucianism was initiated by Confucius, it has gone throughout the past dynasties and has been the mainstream of the Chinese politics, ideologies, and culture all through the ages. Yan (951) stated that, “The traditional customs of the Chinese has a long history and Confucianism primarily occupies a backbone position”. As far as growth and development is concerned, pre-Qin Confucianism is the 1st phase of Confucianism, the natural science of mind dynasties and songs, which are Confucianism developed under the impact of native born Taoism and foreign Indian Buddhism. Confucianism has remained strong among despite the impact of western culture. The basic thoughts of Confucianism can be discussed in six aspects. The fist aspect raised by the thoughts is humanity. The aspect focused on advising people on hoe they are supposed to conduct themselves and how they will be able to relate with one another. He stressed that there should be modesty, honesty, leniency, respect and mutual favor among people. Moreover, the aspect taught people to be humane and of loving hearts towards each other. People were also supposed to stress on filial piety in order to practice humanity. Confucius described humanity as the highest standard, principle and mode of conducting oneself and as an object towards optimizing the relationship between human beings (Yan, 956). The second aspect was “rite”, which is closely linked to humanity. Rite is the intention and norm of practicing humanity as well as a form of humanity. He advised people to devote their lives wholeheartedly to humanity and not to speak, listen, look or act against or contrary to propriety. The approach was aimed at promoting social stability, distinguishing status and forbidding ranking. The third aspect that he generated was neutrality. It is a standard that is aimed at practicing humanity. It stresses on the need for individuals to follow their doctrine. In case of anything, individuals are supposed to determine the mean, take hold of their extremes, and utilize it in leadership. People were encouraged to deal with all problems and challenges that they were experiencing with reasoning. He asserted that there should be no falling short or excessiveness (Yan, 958). This is the thought of social philosophy and Confucianism. The fourth aspect is virtue and refers to humanitarian rule and virtuous governing in the strategies of criticizing and managing the affairs of the state. Confucius proposes that leaders themselves should command one and cultivate virtue as well as rule by virtue. He believed that people who are governed by virtues will become good and will have a sense of shame. He advocated for moderate utilization of people’s resources and argued against collection of heavy taxes from the people. He proposed thoughts such as reducing taxes, economizing resource use, saving penalty and loving the people as well as creating timely employment. He stressed that people should be in a position to respect authority and the elderly and that those who are unable to respect others be punished and corrected. The fifth aspect that was emphasized among the Chinese society was education. He not only developed thoughts of educating people without distinction, establishment of private institutions, and teaching students in accordance with their aptitude, but also spread them. He advocates providing education for contends and people that can be educated. The sixth aspects were cultivation. He stressed on the need to strengthen cultivation of the minds of people and the cultivation of one’s morality to enhance the consciousness associated with the implementation virtue and humanity and perfect and cultivate the interpersonal relationship that is considered ideal. Since it attaches extreme importance to politics and leadership, it is identified as the science of leading and conquering the world (Yan, 958). In fact, Confucianism can be divided into two aspects of outer kingliness and inner sageliness. Individual cultivation can lead to people becoming a sage. People should realize national and individual ideal through such ideal and efforts. Outer kingliness targets leadership and governing of institutions and country as well as conquering the world. Therefore, Confucianism has been has been associated with the cultivation of one’s morality, conquering the world, governing the country, building family relationships and the doctrines of outer kingliness and inner sageliness. The culture and the ideology of Confucianism have the effect on regulating confliction, maintaining kinship and stabilizing society. Confucianism has been considered as a magical weapon of administration and a classical weapon that can be applied by all the federal rulers of the many dynasties and has became the spiritual backbone and dominating thought of the Chinese society. The influence of Confucianism is so intense in the Chinese society and can be identified among the Chinese in the current world. Confucianism has existed in the Chinese society for thousands of years. It has continued to influence all aspects of economy and politics in china. The culture has been the mainstream values for most Chinese citizens. The basic thoughts of justice, rite, humanity, shame, honesty and filial piety are the values and rules of consciousness that guides the conduct of most of the Chinese citizens. The friendly, courteous, honest, industrial temperament, earnest, tolerant of the Chinese nation has gradually been enhanced through education (Yan, 960) Taoism dynasty and its impact on the culture of the Chinese people Modern china is a pulsating, writhing and ever expanding country that is on the brink of world economic domination and socio-political upheaval. Economic openness has led to greater social mobility and increased the standards of living with the communist party losing its philosophical justification to rule. What is known of Chinese culture is seemed to be made of western fear of communism and cinematic stereotypes both of which are based on narrow sighted understanding. Tao has played a major role in various areas of Taoism. The assessment of Taoism is quite challenging. This is as a result of china’s lack of authorship regarding the development of their languages especially the written one. The development of Taoism is traced back to around a 6th century B.C philosopher known as Lao Tzu and a collection of information that was credited to him and referred to as Tao Te Ching. Some people believe that Tao Te Cheng was a collection of poems of different authors and was collected under the name of Lao Tzu with other scholars believing that Lao Tzu was the older contemporary to Confucius. The story of Lao Tzu’s life is far-fetched and fascinating it (Burnet,10). According to a legend, Lao was carried in his mother’s womb for over 82 years and was born with haggard face and long white beards yet he was just an infant. Lao Tzu was always disillusioned and saddened by the unwillingness of mankind to follow the way of goodness. Taoism as developed by Lao is a mystical and individualistic philosophy that has been influenced by nature. He believed that natural society existed in an order that was considered perfect and that human and men’s activities were observed as blight to this harmony. An aspect that is often identified in Taoism was a kind of existential skepticism. According to Lao, people are expected to have a natural state and accepted conventions of man. Central to Taoism thought is his belief that all straining and straining is not only counterproductive and not in vain. Taoism culture has one core, Taoism god belief. Taoism has its own theology and theories and has been considered a mature religion. The religious belief aims at attracting the pursuit of people. The belief is that people can become omnipotent and immortal gods through great efforts. Taoism absorbed a lot of ingredients from ancient health exercise, religions and ancient philosophy to form its behavior and theory of God belief which led to the development of Taoism. Taoism was able to develop activities of development and absorption to create a complex and vast system of Taoist culture (Burnett, 13). Taoist critical thinking reflects Taoism discipline and culture. Moral and ethical concepts of the Taoism absorb both the moral and ethical values of Taoism as well as well as absorbing the moral and ethical values of Buddhism and Confucianism. This approach resulted to its content becoming increasingly complex among the people. The implementation of Taoism ethics was done by the power of the gods. Taoism, on one hand guided the people towards focusing on doing what was considered right as well as generating the beautiful illusion of immortality longevity. The spirit of power of good and blessing as well as punishing the evil forces that forced the people to comply with the ethics (Burnett, 15). The combination of negative and positive guidance makes ethical and moral standards to impact positively to the society. Taoist more books brought its moral and ethical thinking more systematic, more popularized and more focused. Taoism philosophy and culture was considered to be a low level of religions that was popular to only a few witch craft, science instruments , vegetarian education an without philosophical speculations. Majority of the current scholars believe that Taoism possessed philosophical contents that were essential in shaping the cultures of the people in china. Taoism philosophy is a theoretical and ideological foundation of teaching. Taoism utilizes important rational argument to ensure that it contains epistemology, world view, life view and ethics and such contents are composition and basic scope of Taoism philosophy (Lee, 397). Lao’s revelation that gods are immortal is the central category of the Taoism culture. The ability of the people to become immortal and the existence of the gods is basic preposition, the argument about how people become gods and whether people become gods is the major side of the ideology. Conclusion The Taoist religion and philosophy, and the subsequence influence on the culture of the Chinese offers insights offer a deeper understanding of china. By understanding and appreciating such developments in relation to various histories helps to draw similarities and comparisons and the basis that forms mutual peace and respect among the people. The influence of Confucianism is so intense in the Chinese society and can be identified among the Chinese in the current world. Confucianism has existed in the Chinese society for thousands of years. It has continued to influence all aspects of economy and politics in china. The culture has been the mainstream values for most Chinese citizens. The basic thoughts of justice, rite, humanity, shame, honesty and filial piety are the values and rules of consciousness that guides the conduct of most of the Chinese citizens. The friendly, courteous, honest, industrial temperament, earnest, tolerant of the Chinese nation has gradually been enhanced through education. Both Confucianism and Taoist impacted on the culture of the Chinese (Lee, 397). China stands alone among the countries in the world with the greatest civilization, having developed in total segregation from the rest of the world. Chinese citizens have traditionally regarded themselves to be at the center of the universe, the Chinese name for china, Chung-kao, means the kingdom in the middle. Like socialism, Confucianism promoted community welfare and promoted collective interest among the Chinese people. Both emphasized on the remodeling and educational process in serving the common good and the interests of the Chinese people. Work cited Burnett, Katharine. Katharine P. Burnett. Review Of "Taoism And The Arts Of China" By Stephen Little.. caa.reviews (2010): 10-20. Web. Kim, Mi-Jeong. Confucianism And Enlightenment. st 24 (2014): 287. Web. Lee, Shu-Ching. Book Review:The Religion Of China: Confucianism And Taoism. Max Weber, Hans H. Gerth. American Journal of Sociology 57.4 (2008): 397. Web. Yan, Zhonghu. Ultimate Reality In Confucianism. Religion Compass 3.6 (2009): 951-960. Web. Read More