Confucianism: The Giant of Chinese thought

I'm sure we have all heard the beauty pageant's clockwork response to their one true wish for the future of society: “World Peace”. But what if they were onto something? What if there was a way to achieve global harmony? For human beings, the fundamental ultimate goal is individual happiness. The necessary condition to achieve happiness is through peace, and through Confucious’ work, he set out a clear path to fulfilling humanities requirements for happiness.

For many people, knowledge of Confucianism is limited to bits of paper inside the odd fortune cookie, but it should be known that his teachings had almost the same impact as the works and teachings of Jesus Christ and Christianity on the Western world. Confucius, or sometimes known as “Master Kong”, was the first early philosopher in the tradition. A figure who opened up the set of debates that would launch the Chinese philosophy tradition. His beliefs, widely known as Confucianism, revolved mainly around ancestor worship and humancentred virtues for living a peaceful life. The golden rule of Confucianism is: “Do not do unto others what you would not want others to do unto you.” - an aphorism quoted hundreds of times by droning teachers. But Confucius was convinced of the importance of living an ethical and moral life, imparting this good character onto others with the hope of creating a “cosmic harmony”.

So, how does one truly live an ethical life? What does it mean to be ‘good’, and what kind of human do we become if we achieve this? Confucius hoped that people would bring out different responses, and change the degree and ways in which they act in the world. One begins to self consciously change their view of the world; not fall into the usual defining emotions of anger, spite and sadness. Mankind’s curse of the original sin of Adam and Eve explains our inability to refrain from sin, leading us to live overall unethical and immoral lives, and ‘submitting’ to these defining emotions. Confucius posed the idea that we should challenge the habits, notions, interactions and lifestyles that our environment has inflicted onto us and define our life trajectory and human ‘self’. These habits, he argued, cause us to be passive in the world, shaping us according to what we encounter. This response sets into our fundamental experience of the world and the person we become. To Confucius this was wrong, an abomination, and a waste of precious time on earth. So how does one counteract these indoctrinations?

Rituals take these customs we are born into, and turn them into an opportunity to change yourself from the inside out, to become the ‘ideal person’. For example, instead of being rude and blunt to your parents after a long day at school when they ask you how your day was, you act with kindness and maturity and form a response more expressive than just ‘fine’. Tough, but achievable. This ritual practice requires us to take on different roles and emotions during customary events and happenings, occurrences that we have been environmentally indoctrinated into, in this example, with the aim of becoming the loving child your parents long for! For instance, we have been drilled into always saying “please and thank you”, out of politeness and due to societal expectations. Confucius would want us to refrain from expressing our gratitude not because we have been forced to, in a habitual way of acting, but from a point of view of someone who is genuinely grateful and wishes to undergo a positive interaction with those around us.

Confucius became ‘good’ through this ritual practice. Frequently described as a joyous figure, who is truly ‘alive’, as he senses situations, people, ruts and interaction playing out around him, turning them and reframing them into the better. Therefore, people feel joyous by being around him, and others who follow his teachings, as they are always attentive to altering situations into the better. He is joyous because he responds contrary to what he was taught.

So what can we really take from ‘Master Kong’ and his life of questioning? Are any of his teachings applicable in a modern day world where most people are too busy to spend time rethinking the ways they have been brought up in? On the whole, he can influence us on our intentions in the world. The way we react, respond, treat others and most of all, how we treat ourselves. Confucius argues that his teachings help us to become the good people we have been prevented from becoming; the type of people society restricts and holds back; forcing us to act in a certain way simply because we have been told to. The people of the world, the beauty pageants and the idealists would get their overarching goal of world peace and harmony.