儒家思想英文介绍

Name: Jiawen Chen

Confucianism

Confucianism is created by Confucius. He is a great thinker, educator, and politician in ancient China between BC 551 to BC 479. However, he is not someone god, son of god, or prophet. He is only an ordinary people who has hundreds of thousand student in China. And he created the Confucianism theory which is the most influential theory in China and it continue to effect most Chinese in now a day. Some cities in China has the Confucius temple to worship him and regard him as sage. But Confucius was not his real name. It was a courtesy title, a Latinized form of “Kong Fuzi”, meaning “Master Kong”. His family name was Kong and his given name is Qiu. And he styled himself Zhongni. He was born at Zouyi, the State of Lu in ancient China. As one of the greatest thinkers and educators in the history of Ch ina, Confucius’legacy lies in the following three aspects: Firstly,

he compiled and preserved the literary works, The Six Classics, in cluding Shi, Shu, Li, Yue, Yi and Chun Qiu, which are regarded as

the classics of Confucianism. The accomplishment makes a large impa

ct on the succession and development of the traditional Chinese cult ure.

The Confucianism started at middle China. And it happened in the Spring and Autumn Period or Warring State Period. During that time, there are some states separated from the Zhou dynasty, and they fight each other year by year. And that division time, it caused too many great thinker exist and all of these great thinker wanted to introduce and spread out there theory to one of

those kings and hope one of kings would like their theory and finally to conquer other states, and rule the whole China. Confucianism is one of the famous theory existed in that time. Even the Qin state conquer all other states without using the Confucianism. But after Qin dynasty, Confucianism has become the mainstream theory for emperor used to rule China and educate Chinese, until today, Chinese people is still educated and effected by Confucianism.

Confucius built up a system of philosophical thoughts with Ren as its basic virtue, and Ren is core theory in Confucianism and this is what Chinses want to believe. First, Ren theory can be humanity, benevolence, humanness and selflessness, and Ren is the virtue of perfectly fulfilling one's responsibilities toward others. Secondly, Confucius built up a system of philosophical thoughts with Ren as its basic virtue. This virtue is the central theme of his Analects9. He considered Ren as the first and highest criterion of man’s behavior and the core of morality. Ren meant to “love other men”；to help others to be established when one wished to be established oneself; and help others to be successful when one wished to be successful oneself. Confucius’ concept of Li refers to a set of ritual and musical systems, with the hierarchical system as its core. Ren and Li are complementary: Li is the exterior principle of Ren while Ren is Li’s intrinsic guiding power. To accomplish Ren, one must abide by Li, and Ren will be naturally generated in the process of practicing Li. Fundamentally, the purpose of Confucius’ Li is to restore the traditional rites of the Zhou Dynasty.