Words to Live By

The Four Books of Confucianism was a collection designated by Song dynasty intellectual Zhu Xi as the foundation of Confucianism and the basis for the civil service examinations. It contained the words of Confucius and his closest disciples (and later commentators), including his famed successor Mencius. The Four Books include: The Great Learning, The Golden Mean, The Analects and The Mencius.

The first two are actually chapters from the classical text, The Book of Rites, purportedly written by Confucius himself. The Great Learning and The Golden Mean place learning, virtue, and self-cultivation well within the scope of the interests of society and the pursuit of ideas of dialectical and social harmony. In a sense, unlike a radical Grecian or Christian truth that promises to destabilize society, a Confucian truth tends to harmonize all facets of personal and collective existence. The last two books, The Analects and The Mencius, are the Chinese equivalents of Platonic dialogues in which the master Confucius and his disciples (principally Mencius) are shown conversing with important political leaders and their own followers in which they convey proper behavioral and ethical codes. These books were the cornerstones of learning, ethics and courtesy in China for millenia. Their wisdom and stories are part of the Chinese collective memory and still on the tip of many tongues.

Readings:
The Great Learning
The Golden Mean
The Analects
The Mencius

Questions:
(1) Find evidences where personal cultivation and social harmony meet.
(2) How do you negotiate the dynamic between the wisdom of tradition and the virtue brought to bear by the individual?
(3) What does a web of learning look like? And what is meant by man's resting place within it?
(4) What are the attributes of a learned, virtuous man as defined by these texts?

Links:
(1) The Classic of Poetry as the anchor of Confucianism (LiJi 29)


Secondary readings:
*Wing-Tsit Chan. "Neo-Confucianism: New Ideas on Old Terminology" Philosophy East and West vol.17, no. 1/4 (1967): 15-35.