The Authentic Confucius a Life of Thought and Politics Review
Meet a Problem?
Thank you for telling us about the trouble.
Friend Reviews
Customs Reviews
His essential argument, at present self axiomatic, was achievement, ability and graphic symbol instead of heredity should determine rank in order. This was a school of thought shared past people of similar station and looked down on past nobles for obvious reasons. He furthered a notion the unscrupulous or incompetent should be demoted regardless of rank, a unsafe idea indeed. It was a concept that would resonate far across his time changing the course of China and globe history. This element is oftentimes lost in the more common perceptions of Confucian family unit loyalty, scholastic cultivation, social conservatism and the gold rule.
An important upshot of his philosophy was the later institution of civil service, examination systems and the idea of meritocracy. Imperfect in execution information technology may have been one of the greatest human aspirations alongside that of western democracy. Both are currently challenged past the notwithstanding more aboriginal systems of privilege and prerogative. While the author offers no anachronistic analogies it is clear that many similar bug faced people 2500 years ago as do today. This book is not a report of future furnishings and their causes however. The focus of the text is concerned with the life and times of Confucius (Chief Kong).
Chin recounts the familiar legends of Kong, his birth out of wedlock from a rustic rendezvous and the loss of his father at two. Exiled from a political career at 55 he gained a philosophical following and posthumous fame. Kong chose a historical character, the Duke of Zhou, from the Autumn and Spring Annals (c. 1000 BC, 500 years earlier) to teach ideals. The Knuckles, credited with writing the I Ching, was regent for a young prince later on the male monarch died. He put downwardly rebellions of nobles and relinquished power peacefully when the prince came of age. Kong used the Knuckles every bit an case of loyalty, piety and governance he saw defective in his 24-hour interval.
The author Annping Chin is a senior history lecturer at Yale, married to Jonathan Spence a prominent historian of modern China. She is a native Chinese speaker and recently translated the Analects. The book is well written intended mayhap for undergraduate students or general readers. At just over 200 pages it's not an bookish tome but a good introduction. The assay of menstruation politics seems somewhat superficial, not uncommon for ancient history. An option is to engage in dubious speculation, thankfully avoided by Chin. Nylan and Wilson's 'Lives of Confucius' follows Confucianism through afterward ages if y'all need more.
...more
It'due south non truthful that Confucius said whatever of the things that came out of Charlie Chan
If I remember correctly, I picked this volume upward on a whim from the biography shelf of the library. Not but a "whim", every bit I have read several histories, biographies and mythology books on China during the past 20 years. I institute the book to be well-written and interesting. I tin't explicate why other reviewers/readers give it such low marks, but I thought that the level of research and writing were ameliorate than merely "ok".It's non true that Confucius said any of the things that came out of Charlie Chan'southward mouth, nor other every bit trite sayings that bladder through the popular culture. But, this man did organize, exemplify and promulgate a body of idea which was adopted and used by the imperial governments of Prc to regulate, normalize, and enforce thought, obligations and the civil and military machine bureaucracies. Like Homer, Socrates, and other historical figures, the fame and prestige of Confucius come non only from his actual life and work, but from the devotion, skill and farther achievements of his followers.
Confucianism was the philosophy and guiding strength of the elite in China even though other systems of beliefs existed meantime: Daoism and Buddhism being ii of most important. Upward until the fall of the Qing dynasty, studying the "classics" was an important role of didactics. Without a great deal of study and memorization, one could not pass the various examinations to enter and accelerate within the authorities.
This book sheds light on the homo, his life, and how his own philosophy was created.
...more
Chin does a sublime task at contextualizing Confucius' political idea. He was born in the time unremarkably referred to equally the Spring and Autumn catamenia, spanning some three-and-a-half centuries, when China was in a state of existential crunch, riven by familial conflict and discord. Matters came to such a caput that he spent 14 years, from 497 to 484 B. C., in exile passing from feudal land to feudal land. Only subsequently does he return to his dwelling house country of Lu every bit a reluctant political counselor. In such a mess, the principle concerns of Confucius' thought make much more than sense. In emphasizing the rites, customs, and social mores that he saw as the fabric of Chinese social club, he thought that he could restore society, propriety, and that piety that had been lost in all of the fighting. These inherently bourgeois ideas (in the purest sense of the discussion) were utterly essential to piece of work one'south style into Chinese civil service upward until the end of the Qian Dynasty, which roughshod in 1912 (with a moribund resurgence five years subsequently). While that is no longer the case, the ripples of his influence are notwithstanding very noticeable Chinese civilisation.
Ping's power to marshal the gaps in ancient Confucian historiography is just as remarkable. Her primary sources are small in number, near wholly limited to the Analects, the Zuo Zhuan, and Sima Qian's biography, all of which date anywhere from i hundred to five hundred years after the Confucius' death. The hagiographic nature of a lot of these materials, specially those written by his students, makes painting an accurate portrait even more difficult. Ping uses these sources non only to create a biography, but to provide illustrative vignettes that shed a lot of insight into what Confucius considered the about important in both the individual and the state.
This is a highly reliable introduction to the history, thought, and influence of Confucius, all couched nicely within the political context he was continually at odds with, and should come highly recommended for anyone interested in the historical Confucius or the history of the Warring States menstruation.
...more than
Also, I have to say I was pretty unimpressed past the figure of Confucius generally. For someone who is largely seen as the founder of one of the great world socio-religious (if not spiritual) traditions, Confucius seems not to have been a particularly influential person in his ain time - indeed, he was basically a counselor to a regional potentate, and for a expert clamper of his career was floating around as a kind of consigliere-at-large. I besides wasn't peculiarly taken by his teachings as they were highlighted in the book, though to be off-white I don't think I have anything like a thorough understanding of what they were (that wasn't the chief thrust of the book, which focused largely on his life).
Two main Confucian themes that the author did return to again and again were 1) the importance of respect for and adherence to "the rites", which I accept to be a set of rituals focused on central events (sacrifices, burials, etc.), and the relative nature of all acts - Confucius was not one to identify k principles of ethics by which one could guide carry. That's as may exist (I actually recall always and never are pretty tough words when applied to ethics myself), only his opinion on any given ethical question largely seemed to be, "I'll look at the specifics, and then wing it." That doesn't strike me as the ground for a society-ordering upstanding structure. Confucius in this book struck me as a rather traditionalist version of Machiavelli, minus about a 1000 years. (Once again, it's probable I'm missing fundamental info about his teachings.)
I did not dearest the way the writer structured the volume, insofar as it presumes a lot of pre-existing cognition near the structure of "Spring and Autumn" China, the flow in which Confucius lived, which was about contemporaneous with the height of classical Greek culture I think? Confucius traveled in relatively rarefied circles of power, but it was difficult for me to go on those power structures straight, in terms of the difference between male monarch and emperor, and what levels of powers interacted and clashed with each other. I'd guess that someone who grew up in China or had a deeper grounding in its history would find the book much easier to interpret - for me information technology was a claiming to go on the different actors referenced directly.
As far as the philosophical schoolhouse that rose up later Confucius, it seemed to me from this book that it was more than due to the piece of work of his disciples, almost of whom appear to have written hundreds of years afterwards him. That'southward certainly not a knock on the system itself, since many other traditions (notably Christianity) have much the same character. It'due south merely interesting.
And so, I did learn some things well-nigh Confucius. But I tin can't really say I enjoyed the book. It did take the virtue of being relatively brusque, just since those are nearly the simply good things I can say about information technology, it just gets two stars. It didn't change the style I call up nigh the earth (one hopes a book virtually a philosopher and his teachings would), and I can't say it really helped me to sympathise the culture and society that draws its inspiration from him much better. Maybe there's a improve book on Confucius out there for me. This i was just OK.
...more
It's an interesting book, only I just tin can't seem to really read through the whole book. I just browse and read a page or two at present and and so.
...more
News & Interviews
Welcome dorsum. Just a moment while nosotros sign you lot in to your Goodreads account.
Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/712838.The_Authentic_Confucius