Self-Realization through Confucian Learning

Self-Realization through Confucian Learning PDF

Author: Siufu Tang

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2016-07-29

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13: 143846150X

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Confucian philosopher Xunzi’s moral thought is considered in light of the modern focus on self-realization. Self-Realization through Confucian Learning reconstructs Confucian thinker Xunzi’s moral philosophy in response to the modern focus on self-realization. Xunzi (born around 310 BCE) claims that human xing (“nature” or “native conditions”) is without an ethical framework and has a tendency to dominate, leading to bad judgments and bad behavior. Confucian ritual propriety (li) is needed to transform these human native conditions. Through li, people become self-directing: in control of feelings and desires and in command of their own lives. Siufu Tang explicates Xunzi’s understanding of the hierarchical structure of human agency to articulate why and how li is essential to self-realization. Ritual propriety also structures relationships to make a harmonious communal life possible. Tang’s focus on self-realization highlights how Confucianism can address the individual as well as the communal and serve as a philosophy for contemporary times. Siufu Tang is Associate Professor in the School of Chinese at the University of Hong Kong.

Self-Realization through Confucian Learning

Self-Realization through Confucian Learning PDF

Author: Siufu Tang

Publisher: SUNY Press

Published: 2016-07-29

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13: 1438461496

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Confucian philosopher Xunzi’s moral thought is considered in light of the modern focus on self-realization. Self-Realization through Confucian Learning reconstructs Confucian thinker Xunzi’s moral philosophy in response to the modern focus on self-realization. Xunzi (born around 310 BCE) claims that human xing (“nature” or “native conditions”) is without an ethical framework and has a tendency to dominate, leading to bad judgments and bad behavior. Confucian ritual propriety (li) is needed to transform these human native conditions. Through li, people become self-directing: in control of feelings and desires and in command of their own lives. Siufu Tang explicates Xunzi’s understanding of the hierarchical structure of human agency to articulate why and how li is essential to self-realization. Ritual propriety also structures relationships to make a harmonious communal life possible. Tang’s focus on self-realization highlights how Confucianism can address the individual as well as the communal and serve as a philosophy for contemporary times.

Confucian Perspectives on Learning and Self-Transformation

Confucian Perspectives on Learning and Self-Transformation PDF

Author: Roland Reichenbach

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2021-05-19

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 9783030400804

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This book bridges the regions of East Asia and the West by offering a detailed and critical inquiry of educational concepts of the East Asian tradition. It provides educational thinkers and practitioners with alternative resources and perspectives for their educational thinking, to enrich their educational languages and to promote the recognition of educational thoughts from different cultures and traditions across a global world. The key notions of Confucian and Neo-Confucian philosophy directly concern the ideals, processes and challenges of learning, education and self-transformation, which can be seen as the western equivalences of liberal education, including the German concept of Bildung. All the topics in the book are of fundamental interest across diverse cultures, giving a voice to a set of long-lasting and yet differentiated cultural traditions of learning and education, and thereby creating a common space for critical philosophical reflection of one's own educational tradition and practice. The book is especially timely, given that the vocabularies in educational discourse today have been dominantly “West centred” for a long time, even while the whole world has become more and more diverse across races, religions and cultures. It offers a great opportunity to philosophers of education for their cross-cultural understanding and self-understanding of educational ideas and practices on both personal and institutional levels.

Xunzi And Early Chinese Naturalism

Xunzi And Early Chinese Naturalism PDF

Author: Janghee Lee

Publisher: SUNY Press

Published: 2005-01-01

Total Pages: 152

ISBN-13: 9780791461976

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Explores Xunzi's thought in relation to the early Chinese philosophical context that relied on the natural world.

Learning of the Way (Daoxue):

Learning of the Way (Daoxue): PDF

Author: John E. Young, PhD

Publisher: Archway Publishing

Published: 2016-05-18

Total Pages: 164

ISBN-13: 1480830496

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Over two thousand years ago, the Chinese sage Confucius proposed that learning, and putting persistent learning into practice, is a great joy or pleasure. In Learning of the Way (Daoxue), Dr. John E. Young presents, from a Confucian perspective, the rationale for engaging in traditional Chinese arts and practices. Dr. Young relies on his experience as a Chinese martial arts expert and professor emeritus to share the results of his comprehensive examination of the concept of Confucian learning that explores self-cultivation, introduces the era of Neo-Confucianism, investigates the practices of jing and gewu, examines the Zhu Xi approach, applies Confucian and Neo-Confucian concepts specifically to the art and practice of wushu, and scrutinizes the traditional aspects of wushu as understood and practiced by Chinese grandmasters. Included is a description of the state of enlightenment that suggests this level of consciousness--guantong--is identical to integral consciousness and is urgently needed in todays increasingly complex, interconnected environments. Learning of the Way (Daoxue) is a comprehensive guidebook that examines and teaches Westerners about traditional Chinese arts and practices.

Confucian Propriety and Ritual Learning

Confucian Propriety and Ritual Learning PDF

Author: Geir Sigurðsson

Publisher: SUNY Press

Published: 2015-01-08

Total Pages: 188

ISBN-13: 1438454414

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A reconsideration of the Confucian concept li (ritual or ritual propriety), one that references Western philosophers as well as the Chinese context. Geir Sigurðsson offers a reconsideration of li, often translated as “ritual” or “ritual propriety,” one of the most controversial concepts in Confucian philosophy. Strong associations with the Zhou period during which Confucius lived have put this concept at odds with modernity’s emphasis on progressive rationality and liberation from the yoke of tradition. Sigurðsson notes how the Confucian perspective on learning provides a more balanced understanding of li. He goes on to discuss the limitations of the critique of tradition and of rationality’s claim to authority, referencing several Western sources, notably Hans-Georg Gadamer, John Dewey, and Pierre Bourdieu. An exposition of the ancient Chinese worldview of time and continuous change further points to the inevitability of li’s adaptable and flexible nature. Sigurðsson argues that Confucius and his immediate followers did not endorse a program of returning to the Zhou tradition, but rather of reviving the spirit of Zhou culture, involving active and personalized participation in tradition’s sustention and evolution.

Way, Learning, and Politics

Way, Learning, and Politics PDF

Author: Tu Wei-ming

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 1993-07-01

Total Pages: 230

ISBN-13: 1438422415

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The emergence of New Confucian Humanism as a major intellectual and spiritual tradition in the Chinese cultural area since the Second World War is a phenomenon vitally important and intriguing to students of history, philosophy, and religion. The Confucian vision, rooted in the Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Japanese civilizations, has been sustained through more than two millennia of constant social change and holds special meaning for both industrial and socialist East Asia today. Indeed, as a living force defining our humanity and exploring our human potential for authentic self-realization, it addresses evolving concerns of East Asian civilizations with profound implications for the post-modernized world. This book, by a leading scholar and thinker of the New Confucian Humanism, offers a panoramic view of the core values of the Confucian intellectual from historical and comparative cultural perspectives. Grounded in sound sinological scholarship, it brilliantly interprets the Confucian project: the formation of a moral community and the embodiment of the Mandate of Heaven in ordinary human existence through authentic self-realization. In the words of the eminent Princeton sinologist, Fritz Mote, through Tu Wei-ming's thought-provoking ideas, "we are shown what has constituted the life-blood of Confucianism throughout its history, and are led to understand how it still lives. We are made to see where it resides in the world today, especially within the consciousness of modern East Asians (whether or not so identified by them) and increasingly, in the awareness of philosophers and historians of thought everywhere." Like Professor Tu's earlier book, Confucian Thought: Selfhood as Creative Transformation, this book will stir modern minds and evoke powerful responses from scholars in ethics, religion, history, and philosophy as well as those in East Asian studies.

Confucian Perspectives on Learning and Self-Transformation

Confucian Perspectives on Learning and Self-Transformation PDF

Author: Roland Reichenbach

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-05-18

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 3030400786

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This book bridges the regions of East Asia and the West by offering a detailed and critical inquiry of educational concepts of the East Asian tradition. It provides educational thinkers and practitioners with alternative resources and perspectives for their educational thinking, to enrich their educational languages and to promote the recognition of educational thoughts from different cultures and traditions across a global world. The key notions of Confucian and Neo-Confucian philosophy directly concern the ideals, processes and challenges of learning, education and self-transformation, which can be seen as the western equivalences of liberal education, including the German concept of Bildung. All the topics in the book are of fundamental interest across diverse cultures, giving a voice to a set of long-lasting and yet differentiated cultural traditions of learning and education, and thereby creating a common space for critical philosophical reflection of one's own educational tradition and practice. The book is especially timely, given that the vocabularies in educational discourse today have been dominantly “West centred” for a long time, even while the whole world has become more and more diverse across races, religions and cultures. It offers a great opportunity to philosophers of education for their cross-cultural understanding and self-understanding of educational ideas and practices on both personal and institutional levels.