Category Archives: Neo-Confucianism

This Is the Way: Live Show in San Francisco (Pacific Division meeting of the APA)

Update (17 April): Despite what the APA app might have told you, the live session will be in the Sussex Room, which is on the 2nd floor of the hotel. Looking forward to a lively discussion today at 4:00pm PST.

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This Is the Way will record an episode in person, with a live audience, at the next meeting of the American Philosophical Association (Pacific Division)!

Time:
4:00-6:00pm
Thursday, April 17, 2025

Location:
Sussex Room
The Westin St. Francis Hotel (next to Union Square)
San Francisco, California, USA Continue reading →

On-cho Ng on “Dai Zhen’s Hermeneutics” in Neo-Confucian Studies Seminar at Columbia on May 2

On Friday, May 2, 3:30-5:30pm, On-cho Ng will present a paper, “Dai Zhen’s Hermeneutics” in the Neo-Confucian Studies Seminar at Columbia University. We will meet at our regular location, The Heyman Center for the Humanities (74 Morningside Dr, New York, NY 10027). On-cho Ng is Professor of Asian Studies and Philosophy, and Founding Head of the Asian Studies Department (2012-2021), at the Pennsylvania State University. Primarily a specialist in late imperial Chinese intellectual history, he has published on a wide range of topics, such as Confucian hermeneutics, religiosity, ethics, and historiography. His books include Cheng-Zhu Confucianism in the Early Qing, Mirroring the Past, The Imperative of Understanding, and Theory and Practice of Zen. His dozens of articles have appeared in venues such as the Journal of Chinese Religions, Dao, Philosophy East and West, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, Journal of World History, and the Journal of the History of Ideas. He is editor of the Book Series on Chinese intellectual history (National Taiwan University) and associate editor of the Journal of Chinese Philosophy. He has been chair/co-chair of the Neo-Confucian Studies Seminar for two decades.

Important: for non-Columbia guests, please RSVP by emailing Sapphire Qiaochu Tang at qt2154@columbia.edu no later than Wednesday, April 23, to be granted access to the campus. Once the registration email is sent, please expect an email with a QR code to access campus. The email will come from: CU Guest Access <caladminnoreply@columbia.edu. Please make sure to bring a valid ID, and please arrive early. You can also request the pre-circulated paper from Sapphire.

Episode 19 of “This Is the Way”: Zhu Xi on the Unity of the Virtues

This episode is really about two things. First, it’s about the claim that many instantiations of one virtue necessarily come packaged with other virtues. For example, you can’t have great humaneness or benevolence in your charitable giving to other people unless you also show a certain amount of ritual respect to them. Second, it’s about the view that one virtue in particular — the virtue of humaneness or good caring (ren 仁) — is more central or fundamental than the others.  The Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi (1130-1200) proposes that we can understand both the unity of virtues and the central importance of humaneness (ren) by thinking about the unity of the seasons and the central importance of the spring for the other seasons. We attempt to unpack these ideas (and some of the relevant seasonal associations) as they are presented by one of the Confucian tradition’s most subtle and complicated philosophers. Continue reading →

Episode 18 of “This Is the Way”: Neo-Confucian Metaphysics

Much of the technical philosophy of Confucianism was developed by sophisticated thinkers that came well after the time of Confucius, starting in the Song dynasty. This episode is our first devoted to the foremost of these “Neo-Confucians,” Zhu Xi 朱熹 (1130-1200 CE). To help us with this introduction, we are joined by special guest Stephen C. Angle, one of the leading scholars of Neo-Confucianism. Continue reading →

Post-doctoral fellowship at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

The Philosophy and Religion Program in the Division of Humanities at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology invites expressions of interest for the RGC Junior Research Fellow Scheme (JRFS). The scheme provides funding to cover up to 36 months full-time post-doctoral fellowship. The starting date of the fellowship is usually 1 July 2025 the earliest, 31 January 2026 the latest, and is negotiable.

The annual stipend is around HK$420,000 (inclusive of travel allowance at around HK$13,300).
Research Interests: Chinese Philosophy, Buddhism, Comparative/Intercultural Philosophy

Please read below for details regarding the application.
Continue reading →

Episode 8 of “This Is the Way”: The Golden Rule

Across different religious and moral traditions we often find some version of the Golden Rule. In this episode we explore the Golden Rule as formulated in the Analects and explore questions such as how fundamental it is to the Confucian ethical framework, how it is supposed to work in actual practice, and how it connects with issues about self-centeredness. We also examine how it might apply differently to ordinary people and sages, focusing on Analects 15.24 and Analects 6.30. Continue reading →

OUP Highlights Korean Women Philosophers

This March, Oxford Universty Press is focused on ‘Women in the History of Philosophy’ and have made the following chapter Introduction | Korean Women Philosophers and the Ideal of a Female Sage: Essential Writings of Im Yungjidang and Gang Jeongildang | Oxford Academic (oup.com) free to read. Congrats to the editors/translators, P. J. Ivanhoe and Hwa Yeong Wang!

How much historical context when teaching topically?

A colleague recently wrote to me saying that he was:

…inspired by the topical discussion in the Neo-Confucianism book you co-authored and so I decided to structure my course on Neo-Confucianism according to a thematic/topical discussion instead of the usual historical or thinker structure. However, how does one mitigate the pitfalls of sacrificing historicity? Specifically, how much context or historicity should I provide?

I would love to hear any thoughts that folks out there have, either as it relates to teaching Neo-Confucianism or any other relevant subject. Justin Tiwald and I share some thoughts here about why we prefer to teach in a thematic way, and have collected a few teaching ideas here, but I am sure there are some great ideas out there. Please share!

Episode 3 of “This Is the Way”: Oneness

In the third episode of This Is the Way we explore the topic of oneness with our guest Philip J. Ivanhoe, a distinguished scholar and translator of East Asian philosophy. In part I, Justin gives a quick overview of Neo-Confucian philosophy and its connection to oneness. In part II, we talk with Ivanhoe about his book, Oneness: East Asian Conceptions of Virtue, Happiness, and How We Are All Connected. Some issues that we discuss include the following: the truth value of oneness (neither “strictly true” nor a groundless and pointless hallucination), the benefits of oneness (security, spontaneity, and metaphysical comfort), and the sense in which we are the minds of Heaven, Earth and the myriad things (Wang Yangming was right after all!).

Below you will find a more detailed accounting of topics, some specific passages and books or articles mentioned in the episode, and an opportunity to “weigh in” and share your views about the topic (or about the hosts’ wild claims about oneness or Chinese philosophy).

Your feedback is very welcome! Please leave a comment below, mail the hosts at ChinesePhilosophyPodcast@gmail.com, or follow them on X @ChinesePhilPod.

Continue reading →

Columbia Neo-C Seminar: Wong on Wang Yangming

The next session of the Columbia Neo-Confucianism seminar will convene on Friday 2/2 from 3:30-5:30 pm in the Heyman Center on Columbia’s campus. The guest speaker will be Professor Baldwin Wong of Hong Kong Baptist University. Professor Wong will present his draft “To Confucianism, are Perfectionist Policies a Help or a Trap? Lessons from Wang Yangming’s Moral Psychology”. The draft will be circulated a week before the talk. To be on the list, please RSVP to Weiling Kong at wk2363@columbia.edu before 1/31.