­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Chinese Philosophy

The philosophy that is tracked from Yi Jing written in the tradition of Chinese thought is referred to as Chinese philosophy. Yi jing is referred as the book of changes and guides action using a system of 64 hexagrams. King Wen of Zhou is the main contributor of this system whose work reflects the approaches of the Chinese philosophy and the characteristic concepts of it.

Sixth century BCE has been the century for the appearance of the Analects of Confucius, Tao Te ching and Lao Tzu. These philosophies were just after the pre-Socratic philosophy in Ancient Greece and slightly earlier to the Buddhist philosophy in the Northern part of India.

The Chinese sage Confucius who lived between 551 and 479 BCE has rooted the Confucianism which concerned basically the ethics and politics. It has also emphasized on the governmental and personal morality and the traditionalism, correctness of social relationship, and justice. The importance of ritual and the importance of the human heartedness which is translated from the word ‘ren’ are stressed in this philosophy. The world’s first meritocracy is off spring of Confucianism along with Legalism. The state of China including the surrounding areas of Southeast Asia was addicted to Confucianism which has got a permanent place in the minds of Chinese.

The Chinese schools were basically designed and molded to meet the needs of the prevailing circumstance in China and the different schools of thought. Though the Chinese schools of philosophy were critical they were relatively tolerant of each other except during the time of Qin Dynasty. Though there were competition and debates between these schools of thoughts they were able to share ideas and concept which are incorporated into their schools. One good example is Neo-Confucianism which was the amalgamation of the Old Confucian principles with the Legalist, Buddhist and Toist features around the Song Dynasty.

Even the western philosophy has been integrated into the Chinese philosophy during the Industrial and Modern Ages. Sun Yat-Sen has made several contributions in incorporating industrialism, democracy, and republicanism into the Chinese philosophy at the beginning of the 20^th century. On the other hand the philosophies of Taoism, Marxism, and Confucianism were blended into the Chinese philosophy by Mao Zednog. Even the communist thoughts were adopted by the Chinese philosophy. All of these philosophies grouped together to bring out the Maoism of today. The Socialism with Chinese characteristics was encouraged by the government of the People’s Republic of China.

Questions:

• What is the origin of Confucianism?
• What is the contribution of Sun Yat-Sen in the Chinese philosophy?