Did Confucius think that if one of us has general virtue, or some particular virtue such as courage or filial piety, that general or particular virtue will have a substantial tendency to spread directly to the people around her, even if she holds no government position?
Here I’ll survey Confucius’ statements in the Analects and conclude that the answer is No. Confucius probably did not hold that view. (I gave the opposite reading in both my published papers on Chinese philosophy.)
In a February 2016 blog post, Bin SONG makes a powerful case for switching from “Confucianism” to “Ruism.” This is not a brand-new idea; for instance, David Elstein has consistently used “Ruism,” including in his posts here at Warp, Weft, and Way, and Robert Eno advocated for such a practice in his 1990 book The Confucian Creation of Heaven (see here for relevant quote). Still, Bin Song raises some new arguments. To some degree, the things that Elstein, Eno, and Song are talking about may not be entirely the same: at least in the first instance, I take them to be referring to a modern philosophical movement, an ancient ritual-cum-philosophical movement, and a modern spiritual or religious movement of potential relevance in the contemporary US, respectively. (Admittedly, the application of these categories to Chinese practices can only be approximate; I just mean to gesture toward some possible distinctions.) Be this as it may, it may be that the arguments for using “Confucianism” in any of these contexts are weaker than many of us have assumed. What do you think: should we abandon the word “Confucianism”?
Issue 9 of 当代儒学 (Contemporary Confucianism) has been published, and the table of contents is available here.
Mat Foust has published a review of Stephen C. Angle and Michael Slote, eds., Virtue Ethics and Confucianism (Routledge, 2013) in the Sungkyun Journal of East Asian Studies. The full text of the review is available on-line here (look for “Book Review 4”). Thanks, Mat!
James A. Flath, Traces of the Sage: Monument, Materiality, and the First Temple of Confucius, Honolulu, University of Hawai’i Press, 2016.
Traces of the Sage is a comprehensive account of the history and material culture of the Temple of Confucius (Kong Temple) in Qufu, Shandong.
Bin Song, a graduate student at BU, writes:
We Boston Ruists will host a Ruist retreat this summer, July 1-3rd, at Boston University. Attached is the schedule, including all details of the retreat and logistics.
The initiative of this retreat was proposed by some friends in the Facebook group ‘Friends from Afar: a Confucianism group.’ I hope the retreat can be organized as a ‘middle’ sort of Ruism, aiming to propagate Ruist wisdom among ordinary American people but still not losing its scholarly virtuosity.
Anyone interested in learning more about the retreat, or in registering, should contact Bin Song (the information is on the attachment). Comments on this undertaking are of course welcome here.
Monday, April 11, 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
The Rise of Confucius and Legends of Abdication in Light of Warring States Period Bamboo Manuscripts
Speaker: Sarah Allan, Burlington Northern Foundation Professor of Asian Studies in honor of Richard M. Dressler at Dartmouth College, chair of the Society for the Study of Early China, and editor of Early China
Sponsored by the Harvard University Fairbanks Center for Chinese Studies
S250, 2nd Floor, CGIS South, 1730, Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA
More information here.
Subscribers to the New York Review of Books can also read Ian Johnson’s “A Revolutionary Discovery in China” in the April 21 issue, which is a review essay based on Sarah Allan’s book Buried Ideas: Legends of Abdication and Ideal Government in Early Chinese Bamboo-Slip Manuscripts.
Good news: Princeton University Press is pleased to present the publication of the paperback edition of Xunzi: The Complete Text by Xunzi, translated and with an introduction by Eric L. Hutton, for course use.
A new book that may be of interest: James Flath, Traces of the Sage: Monument, Materiality, and the First Temple of Confucius (Hawaii, 2016). More information is here.
