Confucianism-Great Learning part 3
The End
In part 1, we talked extensively about the origin. Yet, we never really discuss the “end”. Although Great Learning is categorized as a Confucianism text, only the “end” is distinctively Confucianism with the least outside influence.
End
While is quite clear what optimum kindness means, it comes in different flavors depends on our role in society. We are now cutting deep into the core of Confucianism, social structure via social roles.
“Shi-Jing states: ‘solemn king Wen, ends up at gathering bright dignity’, ‘As a Jun, ends at benevolence; as an advisor, ends at respect; as a son, ends at filial piety; as a father, ends at merciful; when interacting with countryman, ends at honestly…’”
Shi-Jing is a collection of poems and songs from folks culture, it sums to the bottom illustration.
Chinese laws are flexible, but its social roles are absolute. This idea of clear social structural does not sit well with modern audience. But it brought 600 years of peace to Zhou dynasty. Essentially it is a way to maintain order to achieve a utilitarian society. The west believes written rules are the best way to achieve that, while the east believes human interpretation. Both system has pros and cons, one can game a system just as much as another. While the west believes in self determination, in the east you are born with a purpose .
“Shi-Jing states: ‘1000 Li around the capital, but civilians know where they want to end up at’, ‘chirping yellow birds ends up at the corner of the hill’. Confucius states: ‘in terms of ending-up, are people not as good as birds?…’”
Nearly all Chinese philosophy appeals to nature to justify its claim. You can disagree with the conclusion, but you can’t ignore its methods. It believes people are born with certain presets of virtuous, such as benevolence, and puts that at the very top, intelligence second, and everything else on 3rd. It advocates all of us to thrive for benevolence. What does a person thriving for such goal look like?
“Shi-Jing states: ‘gaze another water bay, full of green bamboos. An elegant JunZhi, like cutting like polishing. Se(music instrument) and righteousness. Powerful and clear-voiced. An elegant Junzhi, cannot forget(also means fabricate). Whom relentless cutting and polishing, a student of Dao. Whom relentless cutting and polishing, a self cultivator. Whom occupies Se and righteousness, confidence and trembles you. Whom powerful and clear-voiced, virtuous and intimidates the wrong. A JunZhi cannot be forgotten, full of Dao virtuously optimizes kindness. It’s hard to forget the virtuous king. JunZhi respect the wise and close to close-ones, immature ones happy for the sake of happy and profit for the sake of profit. These will never be forgotten’”
Here, Jun-Zhi is described in painstaking details for the sake of providing a clear role model. This is the most concrete definition of a Jun-Zhi in Great Learning. These hard criteria have largely influenced later Chinese scholars, and branched off to variations such as Korean Yangban and the Japanese Samurai class. The unifying theme is relentless focus for their craft. It is only with this relentless focus, we would not be misguided by falsehood.
Confucius said, ‘When listening to court trial, like everyone, the goal is to prevent the dispute from happening again. Apathetic people cannot exhaust their words. Dignify the will of the people. This is the meaning of understanding the origin
Here, I daringly advocate to change the word origin to end because it makes more sense, and it fits in the overall Confucianism idea better. I’m not the only rebel wanting to adjust such respected work. We will see how Zhu Xi’s made his master touch on Great Learning in the next section.
Conclusion
It’s impossible to be unbias towards such ancient idea, that would suggest no improvements has been made. The major take-away is whether if we extract its essence, and adjusted to our time, because our goal is Confucianism, not historical texts.
All the Confucius interpretations are a new philosophy of their own, what unites them is the way of thinking. Master scholars have debated fiercely amongst each other over every word. One of them whom left a mark came a few hundred years after Zheng Zhi is Zhu Xi. He will be the next to carry out the Confucianism baton.
In truth, progress did not stop after Zheng Zhi. Zhu Xi is akin to the single piece of rice that tips the scale. His elevated perspective came from masters whom came before him. He lives in a time where all those built up is ready for an avalanche. So Zhu Xi didn’t disappoint, he brought those ideas down into writings, and compiled Four Books that became the standard testing material for empires to select ministers until 1905. Before we take a short detour to Zhu Xi, there is a missing logic we need to explain.
