Confucius (c. 551-479 BCE) [confucius.gif] Better known in China as "Master Kong" (Chinese: [2]Kongzi), Confucius ironic that so little can be known about Confucius. The tradition that Confucius himself, scholars disagree about the origins and character about Confucius' life and teaching. Most scholars remain confident metaphysical in nature, and include Confucius' claim that Tian [4]1. The Confucius of History [5]2. The Confucius of the Analects [10]7. The Confucius of Myth [11]8. The Confucius of the State [12]9. Key Interpreters of Confucius 1. The Confucius of History Sources for the historical recovery of Confucius' life and thought are by a few decades at least and several centuries at most. Confucius' The historical Confucius, born in the small state of Lu on the hundred years after the alleged year of Confucius' birth, the Chinese or knight) class, from which Confucius himself arose. As feudal lords various patron states ebbed and flowed. Confucius is said to have held exchanges between Confucius and his students that the Analects claims 2. The Confucius of the Analects Above all else, the Analects depicts Confucius as someone who "transmits, but does not innovate" (7.1). What Confucius claimed to that Confucius' views are presented as a coherent and consistent Confucius as an austere humanist who did not discuss the supernatural understanding Confucius' philosophical concerns. Confucius record of 7.21, 11.12). In fact, as a child of the late Zhou world, Confucius By the time of Confucius, the concept of Tian appears to have changed Confucius appears to uphold sacrifices to "gods and ghosts" as new aspect of Tian emerges. For the Confucius of the Analects, abandoned this culture, what can the men of Guang [Confucius' As A. C. Graham has noted, Confucius seems to be of two minds about deity. What remains consistent throughout Confucius' discourses on Thus, to the extent that the Confucius of the Analects is concerned helps account for Confucius' insistence on moral, political, social, and even religious activism. In one passage (17.19), Confucius seems government service. At any rate, much of Confucius' teaching is In this passage, Confucius underscores the crucial importance of Confucius, the paramount example of harmonious social order seems to Confucius (and all of his Chinese contemporaries), what is below takes women, charismatic leaders, etc. For Confucius, de seems to be just as pleasure of Tian, which for Confucius is resolutely allied with Confucius' vision of order unites aesthetic concerns for harmony and in terms of basic potential (for, in 17.2, Confucius says all human however, highlights Confucius' fundamentally hierarchical model of toward self-cultivation that Confucius taught would-be junzi in fifth Confucius teaches only "other-regard" (zhong) and self-reflection minister. In the Analects, Confucius extends the meaning of the term betters. "Self-reflection" (shu) is explained by Confucius as a self as conceptualized by Confucius is a deeply relational self that Similarly, the self that Confucius wishes to cultivate in his own junzi. Because Confucius (and early Chinese thought in general) does 7. The Confucius of Myth the reconstruction of Confucius' thought, it is far from being the numerous hagiographical accounts of Confucius' origins and deeds were Analects. According to various texts, Confucius was a superhuman suggested that, had these Han images of Confucius prevailed, Confucius Confucius should be added more recent myths about the sage that date the early modern period. The Latinization of Kong(fu)zi to "Confucius" critics. Jesuits steeped in Renaissance humanism saw in Confucius a recognized in him an Enlightenment sage. Hegel condemned Confucius for castigated Confucius for imprisoning China in a cage of feudal archaism and oppression. Each remade Confucius in his own image for creating great heat and little light where the historical Confucius himself is concerned. Each mythologizer has seen Confucius as a symbol it, once a figure like Confucius has become a cultural hero, stories Confucius himself. 8. The Confucius of the State their ministers seized upon Confucius as a vehicle for the The "Five Classics" - five ancient texts associated with Confucius - affair with Confucius carried on through the end of the Han in 220 CE, after which Confucius fell out of official favor as a series of dynasty (618-907 CE), however, the future of Confucius as a symbol of Confucius also fell from his position of state-imposed grandeur - but regime in mainland China and later in Taiwan has promoted Confucius has bowed reverentially to Confucius on occasion, although not without Confucius across the country, and has even erected many new statues of Confucius in areas likely to be frequented by tourists from overseas. Predictably, Confucius, as a philosopher, has been rehabilitated by Confucius seems far from dead, although one wonders if the authentic 9. Key Interpreters of Confucius Detailed discussion of Confucius' key interpreters is best reserved The two best known early interpreters of Confucius' thought - besides the time of Confucius' death until sometime during the former Han knew Confucius personally, nor did they know one another, except disagreement over human nature - a subject on which Confucius was Mencius illustrates a pattern typical of Confucius' interpreters in that he claims to be doing nothing more than "transmitting" Confucius' through neglect or negative environmental influence. Confucius does of Confucius thought - especially after the ascendancy of Zhu Xi's Like Mencius, Xunzi claims to interpret Confucius' thought assumptions, including one that links each to Confucius: the Later interpreters of Confucius' thought between the Tang and Ming agree on the primacy of Confucius as the fountainhead of the Confucian Confucius as authoritative sources for standards of ritual, moral, and cosmological and metaphysical which isolates them from the Confucius - two movements with little or no popular following in Confucius' This cursory review of some seminal interpreters of Confucius' thought understanding Confucius' philosophical views: suspicion of the sources. All sources for reconstructing Confucius' views, from the Confucius: A Philosophical Translation. New York: Ballatine, 1998. of Confucius and His Successors. New York: Columbia University Press, Creel, Herrlee G. Confucius and the Chinese Way. New York: Harper and _____. "Was Confucius Agnostic?" T'oung Pao 29 (1935): 55-99. Csikszentmihalyi, Mark. "Confucius and the Analects in the Hàn," in Confucius and the Analects: New Essays, ed. Bryan W. Van Norden Fingarette, Herbert. Confucius -- The Secular as Sacred. New York: Hall, David L., and Roger T. Ames. Thinking Through Confucius. Albany: Ivanhoe, Philip J. "Whose Confucius? Which Analects?" in Confucius and Lau, D.C., trans. Confucius -- The Analects. 2nd ed. Hong Kong: Legge, James, trans. Confucius -- Confucian Analects, The Great Confucius. New York: Century Company, 1932. Van Norden, Bryan W. "Introduction," in Confucius and the Analects: Waley, Arthur, trans. The Analects of Confucius. New York: The