Confucius孔子介绍

1 CONFUCIUS (551-476B.C.) His life: His father showed his courage in two battles and was well known among dukes. When he retired from a victorious war, he was about 63. He was married and his wife bore him nine daughters but without a son. In feudal society, only sons were allowed to inherit the family’s legacy. So his father got married again and this time his wife bore him a son, but a lame one. His father felt ashamed of his lame son and desired for a healthy one. Therefore he asked for the hand of one of the girls, surnamed Yan. There were three girls in that family. The eldest two refused the proposal, but the youngest one agreed to marry him. So when Confucius’s father was about 66, he married Confucius’s mother. It was considered improper at that time. Soon after their marriage, they came to Mountain Tai to pray the God of the mountains for a son. On their way home they took a rest in a cave because of the rain. That cave got the name of Confucius’ cave. When he was three years’ old, his father died. He lived a poor life with his mother. It was said that he had dexterous hands and could do many hand jobs. When Confucius was about 16, his mother died. He wanted to bury his mother in his father’s tomb, but no one told him where the tomb was. Finally he had to stop his mother’s coffin at the crossroad 2

in the hope of getting help from the passers-by. He was helped by an old-time neighbor of his mother and buried his mother together with his father. From then on he lived an independent life. With good reputation of his parents, and with his own efforts, he impressed others (including noble families) deeply. However, when he was present at the banquet held by one noble family, he was turned down. He was asked by a retainer of that family: Why are you here? Who invited you? This humiliation, serious as it was, did not dishearten young Confucius, but stimulated him to improve himself. He was excellent in many areas: ritual, music, archery, riding, calligraphy, and math. He was a versatile man. He did not look down upon the jobs of the small men. He was once the storekeeper, the accountant and was in charge of sheep and cattle. When he was 55 years old, he visited from one district to another to propagate his political ideas and asked for a position. He lived like this for more than ten years. He was turned down everywhere. Once he was compared to a lost dog. Hearing this, he was not angry at all. His humanistic philosophical thought of Benevolence or Goodness: Near the end of Spring and Autumn times, many people fled from their home to avoid high taxes or being recruited as soldiers. How to attract peasants to return to their homes? He put forward the idea of Benevolence and it became the core of his philosophy. 3

Some of his sayings: 1. The Master said, To prefer it is better than only to know it. To delight in it is better than merely to prefer it. 2. The Master said, A true gentleman is calm and at ease; the Small Man is fretful and ill at ease. 3. The Master said, ‘He who learns but does not think, is lost.’ He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger. 4. The Master said, The wise man delights in water, the Good man delights in mountains. For the wise move; but the Good stay still. The wise are happy; but the Good, secure. 5. The Master said, Only when the year grows cold do we see that the pine and cypress are the last to fade. 6. Never do to others what you would not like them to do to you.

A Brief Introduction to Confucius Is Confucius your God? No, he is not our God. He is one of our forefathers, the Sage and an ordinary person as well. He is like a teacher around us, kind and cordial. Analects, a book edited by his disciples, never discusses afterlife. He thought that a wise man should respect the spirits but keep them at a 4

distance. He never talked of prodigies, feats of strength, disorders or spirits. In fact, the Book focuses on that a man should accept his responsibility and make contributions to the society. It is a book about the philosophy of life----how to conduct oneself in society. Confucius set standards for being a man. What are they? There are two levels of standards; one is for the ruler of a state, the other for the ordinary man. A ruler should rule by moral force (te), which means that he should be benevolent towards his subjects. In this way, his subjects would respect him and certainly behave well. An ideal society is a society of great harmony. As for an ordinary person, Confucius thought that the character of an ideal man embodies the virtue of benevolence. The gentleman understands what is moral. The small man understands what is profitable. What is the golden mean? It is the way of dealing with things. According to Confucius, going too far is as bad as not going far enough. Therefore one should opt for the Golden Mean. Note 1: In the past 2500 years, Confucianism has been interpreted and reinterpreted or misinterpreted by many people, so it is no longer the exact thing of the Confucius age. Now it is the mixture of Confucianism, Taoism, and the Buddhism. Note 2: Confucius emphasized the individuality and one should display