Eastern Philosophy On Man

1. Eastern Philosophy On Man Notes on Confucianism: • Confucianism is concerned with the principles of good conduct, practical wisdom, and proper social relation-ships. One of the maxims of Confucius is regarding the nature of Man.

2. The nature of man is called jen. Jen is humanity and morality in one. It is also translated as “love.” To be human means to be in communication. A true man is a noble man, a superior man and a noble man of jen. • The nature of man is as follows: the elucidation of what he is and should be and the account of the diversity of his existence.

3. Mencius Mencius believed that humans are naturally good; nevertheless, this goodness is such a small part of humanity that it must be carefully identified and nurtured. It starts with the most natural love known to humankind, the mutual love between parent and child, and builds from this.

4. Human nature is good, in the sense that it contains predispositions to feel and act in morally appropriate ways and to make intuitive normative judgments that can with the right nurturing conditions give human beings guidance as to the proper emphasis to be given to the desires of the senses.

5. Concept of Benevolent Heart Mencius recognizes that the parent’s love is eternal; however, the child’s love can become clouded as he grows and pursues other desires. He, therefore, constantly stresses the necessity for the child to honor and love his parents. The benevolent heart depends on this mutual love.

6. The other three pillars of Mencius’s “faith” are dutifulness, propriety (keeping the rites) and wisdom (capacity to distinguish right from wrong), which make a quartet of interdependent characteristics, each bolstering the others.

7. Without dutifulness, propriety and the wisdom to choose right from wrong we have chaos because individuals will not have the necessary knowledge to perform righteous acts in the proper manner.

8. Mencius believes that love only makes sense if it has a hierarchy to it. We must love some people more than others. This is his argument against the Moists who believe in love without favouritism. Mencius states we must not love everyone equally. We need to love our family the greatest since the source of benevolence cannot be diffused.

9. Another reason for creating this supreme family bond is so the individual will experience shame when neglecting his duty. So not only does duty cultivate a benevolent mind, but the very source of the benevolent mind, the family, promotes the duty.uty.

10. Hsün Tzu (Xunzi) • He teaches that man is by nature evil. However, it is not in any metaphysical way, but in the practical sense that without proper education people cannot rise to full participation in culture and society.

11. Hsün Tzu (Xunzi) • It starts out with a love of profit, with feelings of envy and hatred, and desires of the senses. • Thus, human nature is evil, and that human goodness is the result of conscious activity.

12. At the root of this doctrine is a distinction between human ‘nature’ (hsing, ‘that which cannot be learned or acquired by effort’) and ‘conscious activity’ (wei, ‘that which can be acquired by learning and brought to completion by effort).

13. He stresses the importance of wei: people are not fully human until they have become imbued with a sense of moral and ritual propriety, and they are not born with that sense but must be taught it.

14. In order to attain a oneness with the Way, a dedication to morality, Xunzi argued for the guidance of a proper teacher: only this would allow one to become morally upright. A proper teacher would have been trained in the teachings of the ancient sage kings who saw that human nature was inherently immoral and thus wrong.

15. From this realization, the sage kings developed rituals and regulations to shape people into accordance with the Way. Thus the process of following the teachings of the sage kings (and a teacher who can teach them) equates a renunciation of one's evil nature and a commitment to conscious activity (conscious activity because one must deliberately and willingly change their actions in order to overstep their evils which would otherwise occur naturally, without conscious thought).