-- Annika (Jiachen) Xu, Steven (Xu) Liu, Makayla (Tingyue) Ren, Owen (Zeqi) Wang
Our Motives
Throughout the semester, we've studied a variety of reading materials and learnt about a variety of early China society's ideas. Confucianism is one of China's most significant theological doctrines, having flourished for more than 2,500 years. It is concerned with personal virtue, morality, and a sense of community and shared ideals. Even now, Confucius' thoughts remain relevant to our lives because they speak directly to us and our quest for a happier, more fulfilled existence. The teachings of Confucius can provide us with guidance on how to conduct our lives and respect others. Confucius will continue to have an effect on our lives for the foreseeable future. Therefore, we would like to conduct the final project with a focus on this significant figure -- Confucius.
Confucius
Kong Qiu (Confucius) (September 28, 551 B. C. - April 11, 479 B. C.), was given the surname Kong, the given name is Qiu and the courtesy name Zhongni, later known as Kong Zi or Kong Fuzi. He was born in Zouyi of the state of Lu, and his ancestral home was the State of Song. Kong Zi is an educator and philosopher in the State of Lu in the late Spring and Autumn period. Born an aristocrat, he understood the etiquette from an early age and took Confucianism as his profession. In his middle age, Kong Zi began to engage in giving lectures and recruit disciples. Later, he held the posts of Duzai and Sikou in the State of Lu, but soon resigned. Kong Zi organized people's scattered and simple world outlook into a discipline, and put forward a theoretical system centered on "benevolence", changing people's overall and fundamental views on the whole world and their relationship with the world. As the founder of Confucianism, Kong Zihas always been a mysterious and unfathomable man. Although he wrote nothing, he is considered one of the few Confucian philosophers who changed the way the masses conceived. He is widely regarded not only as a model of Confucianism, but more generally as a model that anyone should emulate. In the era of a hundred schools of thought, his influence went far beyond Confucianism itself.
Reference:
Confucius. (2021, November 23). Retrieved December 05, 2021, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius
What We Will Analyze
Intrigued by the book Confucius Beyond the Analects by Michael Hunter, we are interested in how the image of Confucius is analyzed and interpreted through various sources. Based on the analysis the author made in the book, we took four perspectives/sources to analyze Confucius in early literature. The first is Analects, which is considered a major collection of Confucius quotes. The rest all come from Maters’ texts, which specifically are Mengzi, Zhuangzi, and Mozi. This help us better understand not only the historical figure of Confucius, but also his status as an authority.
