Compare And Contrast The Ideas, Background, And Philosophies Of Confucius And Buddha - Essay Example

Compare and Contrast the Ideas, background, and Philosophies of Confucius and Buddha Buddha and Confucius are considered two of the most influential men in history. While Buddha was more of a religious thinker, Confucius was more in his thinking. Confucius was born in china in 551 BC. He was an editor, teacher, politician, and a social philosopher of Chinese history autumn and spring period. His philosophy laid emphasis on government and personal morality, sincerity, justice, and social relationship correctness. While his followers were successful in competitions with rival schools, Qin Dynasty’s legalists suppressed them. However, his thoughts were granted official sanction after Qin’s fall following Han’s victory over Chu. Gautama Buddha was of learning that was more religious and was born on the Indian subcontinent. As a spiritual leader, his teachings were the foundation of Buddhism. Buddha means the enlightened one or the awakened one. Buddha discovered the middle way, which improved on extreme asceticism present in religions of Sramana. He is Buddhism’s primary figure, with his followers believing that his monastic rules, discourses, and life accounts have been summarized following his demise and put to memory by followers. This paper seeks to compare and contrast the to men’s backgrounds, ideas, and philosophies. Both Buddha and Confucius were of noble birth, but while Buddha was a rich prince, Confucius came from a family that had experienced hard times, and thus they poor. Buddha was born in northeast India in Lumbini. His father ruled the city of Kapilavastu and attempted to prevent Buddha from turning into a holy man wandering, rather willing for him to succeed him as a ruler (Fowler 236). He kept Buddha in the palaces owned by his family and surrounded him with luxury and comfort. Buddha was married at sixteen, and his first child was born when he was twenty-nine. Taking a ride one day outside the gardens of the palace, he met an old man. On subsequent rides, he encountered a deceased body and a sick one. It was at this point that he became aware of the suffering of humans. Even the wealthy, he realized, were unhappy and frustrated, with all men susceptible to disease and death from disease. This led him to believe that there existed more in life than pleasures of a transitory nature. Becoming disturbed by all that he had seen, he left the palace, bidding his family farewell and leaving his possessions. He was penniless, as he wandered and made attempts at asceticism, which he later abandoned (Fowler 236). It was at this point that, upon deep reflection, he became convinced that he was the enlightened one, Buddha. Confucius, on the other hand, although, of noble birth, was born to a poor family (Yao 190). Born in the state of LU, his father passed away when he was young, leaving him under the care of a poor mother. He was in minor government service as an official during his youth, resigning the position later. Aged nineteen, he married Qi Quan, and he had a child by her at twenty, named Kong Li. Confucius then spent his next sixteen years as a teacher and his philosophy attracted quite a few disciples. The government of Lu granted him a high position when he was in his fifties, but court enemies brought about his dismissal after four years. Leaving the state, he became an itinerary teacher for thirteen years, before returning to Lu for the final 5 years. In his earlier life, he was reported to been a bookkeeper, clerk, cowherd, and a shepherd (Yao 190). After his court dismissal, he embarked on a winding journey that covered Cai, Chen, Song, Wei, and other states in central and northeast China where he articulated political beliefs in their courts, which he did not see implemented. Both Buddha and Confucius challenged authority. Buddha had quite a different view to religion as compared to his native Hinduism (Fowler 240). He felt that Hinduism had begun to degenerate into superstition, magic, rituals, polytheism, and empty philosophical disputes and speculations. The highest caste, he felt, held the authority to the truth as an exclusive right. Therefore, he launched attacks on the system of caste hierarchy, rejecting all forms of occultism, rituals, and speculation, which they held (Fowler 240). Buddha is also portrayed in literature ridiculing the Brahman’s sacrificial rituals. He accused the priests of making them up in order to profit from wealthy believers and better manipulate powerful believers. This eventually led to challenging of Vedic literature authority, which was a sacred text. Buddha also questioned authoritarianism held by other teachers. Confucius laid challenges to the local governments which he visited, on his journeys to repair their ways and be adherent to traditions followed by their ancestors (Yao 120). He believed that the powerful needed to be benevolent when dealing with the weak, and that the weak needed to be wise in their dealings with rich citizens. He espoused the belief that the government’s purpose was to keep their citizens happy and that, unlike in the past, the government ought to rule its people, not by force, but by moral example. The government, he said, should govern, with the people’s benefit in mind to reduce taxes and recruit men form any origins that were superior to the rest into their ranks. He championed for the promotion of straight dealings to toss out twisted deals, which would keep the populace in order. Confucius implored the government, which was not ready to implement his ideas, that a better society needed to be created that would be based on a system aimed at educating and defining leaders able to lead. He defined this new breed of leaders as benevolent leaders with the major aim of benefiting the populace with virtues of wisdom, fairness, patience, fearlessness, and competence (Yao 120). He argued for the replacement of ineffective leaders with superior leaders who would be just and set commendable examples. These men did not achieve the positions solely via noble birth or good fortune. This, he hoped, would help the leaders gain the populace’s obedience and trust. Both Buddha and Confucius identified with human nature, which transmitted itself to their followers. Buddha rejected the notion held by Hinduism that atman, or the soul, was a spiritual substance that existed externally and moved to another body at rebirth (Fowler 274). Buddha instead taught that all issues involving consciousness, thoughts, feelings, and sensations were impermanent. This became one of Buddhism’s central concepts. In his view, human existence is an aggregate of five composites. These are physical forms, sensations, ideations, mental dispositions, and consciousness. At birth, the three composites come together forming a human. The human is a self since they are true subjects of karmic accumulation and moral action, not because they have an unchanging or enduring soul. While Buddha himself was evasive on the nature of reincarnation in the absence of the soul, later literature attributed to him analogizes fire (Fowler 276). When a candle is utilized to light yet another candle, the second flame is different from the first but is directly caused by the first. Just as, this is true, so is human life’s accumulation of karma, which causes the rise of another life, despite the fact that no soul crosses over. Confucius debated for a long while on the essential nature of humans. He concluded that the main purpose for the existence of human beings was to achieve the highest possible potential they could (Yao 78). Via a process of rigorous self-cultivation, which could last for one’s lifetime, an individual may well become perfect. Tian’s dependence on human agents for their plans to be executed accounts for his insistence on social, political, and moral activism, which has been transmitted to his followers. Virtue’s relentless quest starts with one’s mindful direction of action, speech, hearing, and sight (Covell 10). According to Confucian philosophy, two types of people are opposed in this world. These are the junzi or gentlemen, and xiaoren or small people. The junzi manifest the co-humanity quality in their person and display righteousness qualities, in their actions, while the xiaoren is a person who has not practiced ren, and may eventually become a junzi. Confucius explained that the character of ren was composed of two elements. The first was representative of a human being while the other represented number two (Yao 78). Ren thus has a meaning of the manner in which two individuals may treat each other. In virtue cultivation and ethics maintenance, one must uphold righteousness and be disposed to doing good, yi, and act properly within the community setting following li, a system of propriety and norms. Confucius held it of necessity for a person to give up their life to uphold ren and yi actively or passively. His ideology could be considered non-theistic and humanistic, not believing in supernatural beings. While Buddha believed in re-incarnation, Confucius believed that the human person was an entity where lives interacted, with the person as an intersection. Buddha was clear in his belief that a permanent consciousness did not exist that migrated from one life to another life (Fowler 280). He taught that rebirth was constrained by anatta concepts with no self or atman that ties these two lives to each other. According to Buddha, evolving consciousness upon death is a major contributor of new aggregation arising. When one personality dies, another comes to life like a candle with a dying flame lighting another flame. The new person’s consciousness is not completely different or very similar to the earlier persons. Karma causes this transmigration. The cause of this migration is consciousness abiding in ignorance. Once all ignorance is uprooted, there is the cessation of rebirth (Fowler 280). Consciousness can be referred to a birth that is continuous while rebirth is this processes’ persistence. Confucius, on the other hand, was discouraging to his students as when it came to the afterlife (Yao 81). He instead encouraged them to exist in peace and to aid others via being good family people, teaching, or service to the government. Confucius preferred to focus on morality and secular ethics, tying it up with religious, philosophical, political, social, and moral thought. Confucius did not dwell on life after death, rather transcendence linked nature, tian, and man. For humans to become one with ren and the cosmos, they must cultivate virtues and extend these values to others. Humans should become moral teachers to their fellow men. Ren has the ability to convert man from the secondary capability to perform bad deeds to their primary capability to perform good deeds and show human love. Transcendence is the achievement of greater unity between humankind, nature, and tian. Life after death, according to the philosophies of Confucius, is secondary (Yao 82). Instead of placing great emphasis on it, man’s main purpose should be becoming sages and sharing the ren. While Buddha used isolated methods of meditation, Confucius was not a believer in meditation. Buddha investigated his own psyche until he finally achieved spiritual awakening (Fowler 290). Buddha taught that the reason for man’s unhappiness is their lack of understanding on their potential and true identity. Since man is taught, about whom they are and how to think and act from birth, he has come to the belief that he actually is this limited self. During meditation, Buddha said, thoughts, which are centred invariably on the self, are stilled. He thus came to understand that the small self was a concept that was limiting and this brought understanding, joy, lightness, and peace in abundance. Buddha referred to meditation as a way to still the mind. According to Buddha, contextualization of meditation can be done following the noble eightfold plan (Fowler 291). This regards explicitly to right mindfulness, which is exemplified by his four mindfulness foundations, right concentration that ends in absorptions of jihan via Samantha meditative development, and right view, which embodies wisdom, attained traditionally via vipassana meditative development. Confucius, on the other hand, did not believe in meditation. He was not of the idea that an individual could become a great, all rounded person by meditating alone to a supernatural god (Yao 100). Confucius believed that an individual could only achieve greatness by upholding their responsibilities via interactions with friends, teachers, family members, and government officials. This meant that the improvement of social problems improved better when one spent time working with the other people rather than meditating by themselves. Rather than looking for supernatural intervention for social problems, the person should understand their social responsibilities and work them. Confucius understood that a person’s self was the relationship centre and that isolation was not the answer to the solution of social problems (Yao 100). Both Buddha and Confucius did accept the existence of some sort of heaven. Buddha talked of the goal of life, or Nirvana, which comes when the finite soul’s boundaries are extinguished. Literature suggests that Buddha’s idea of Nirvana was a happy, powerful, blissful, deathless, ageless, immovable, imperishable, stable, permanent, and secure shelter (Fowler 292). While Confucius did also believe in the existence of a heaven, his idea of heaven was a meeting place where the ancestors and ancestors lounge and keep an eye out for the living. According to Confucius, earth and heaven are in contact on a constant basis. Works Cited Covell R R. Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ : a history of the Gospel in Chinese. Eugene, Ore: Wipf & Stoc, 2004. Print. Fowler, Merv. Buddhism : beliefs and practices. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2009. Print. Yao X. An introduction to Confucianism. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2005. Print. Read More