Confucianism will never be religion Huang QingChina Daily Updated: 2006-01-06 06:17
A man named Jiang Qing recently made himself a target of criticism by
advocating reviving Confucianism as a religion.
Known as a conservative Confucian, Jiang retired from his teaching post in
Shenzhen four years ago, and now focuses on Confucianism in mountainous Guizhou
Province.
Jiang has astonished many of his opponents, and supporters as well, with his
recent actions.
His idea of reviving Chinese "Rujiao" (literally translated as Confucian
religion) has been rubbished by many as going against the trends of the times.
In his recently published article on Confucian religion, he did not hesitate
to state Confucian religion is the core of Chinese civilization, including
political, cultural and religious aspects.
As a State religion, he stresses, it should be the cultural consensus and
spiritual belief of the whole nation.
It is his hypothesis that, challenged by Western civilization in its broadest
sense, China's current political and social problems should be, and could be,
solved by Confucian religion.
Along American scholar Samuel Huntington's line that the fundamental source
of conflict in this new world will not be primarily ideological or primarily
economic, but civilizations (although Huntington defines his use of civilization
as a cultural entity), Jiang believes remaking the Confucian religion will
enable Chinese people to launch a "dialogue between Chinese civilization and
Western civilization." To be specific, it is a dialogue between the so-called
Confucian religion and Christian religion.
By choosing the word "dialogue" he distances himself somewhat from Huntington
as the latter believes in clashes of civilizations. According to Huntington,
differences do not necessarily mean conflict and conflict does not necessarily
mean violence. But over the centuries, differences between civilizations have
generated the most prolonged and violent conflicts.
Jiang is true to his title of "daru" (big shot Confucian) since he has
followed Confucius' teaching by being non-confrontational and pursuing the
peaceful approach of dialogue in international interactions between different
civilizations.
Westerners can easily label Jiang a nationalist as his outlook has been
shaped largely by cultural fault lines separating Chinese and Christian
civilizations.
But his idea of shaping China and the Chinese in a Confucian mould will never
happen in reality. There are far too many opponents not willing to see Confucian
religion in this land.
An apologist for autocratic monarchy, Confucius and his doctrine has always
been explored by the elites and the ruling class to defend the established
system of rule by man in feudal China.
Historically China has been strongly influenced by Confucianism. But to claim
there was a Confucian religion is nonsense.
In feudal China, there were times when efforts were made by elites to shape
Confucianism into a state religion, unfortunately, to no avail.
Chinese history, long as it is, has shown there has never been a Confucian
religious set-up, or clergy, or rite none at all.
Above all, Confucius himself did not aspire to be a god.
Jiang advocates the integration of Confucian religion and politics, and the
empowerment of such a religion.
Almost without exception, modern countries have separated the church from the
state. This has been the case in China.
But we are dealing with a man standing on his head looking at our secular
present as irrelevant.
He is deeply bound up in his fallacy and churns out programmes to realize his
dream.
His desire and design for the future China is but an attempt to restore the
feudal order and the relationship between the ruler and the subjects of the
ruler.
But among all his ideas there is one exception that he has not received from
his master but borrowed from the mundane world.
He has called for taxing anything relating to Confucius such as temples,
teachings, relics and so on. This, of course, runs counter to Confucian
teachings.
The more I read his writing, the more I become shocked. I cannot but agree
with the saying that this indeed is the climax of the two debates that took
place in 2004 and 2005 respectively.
The 2004 debate centred on "dujing" (the study of Confucian classics). The
2005 episode started when Renmin University of China set up a school especially
for "guoxue" (the study of classics by Chinese masters in its history), sparking
controversy.
The debates revolved around conservative Confucians, such as Jiang, that have
gone to the extreme.
We are facing a trend far transcending academic studies, it seems. Religious
fervour is heating up.
Religion as a personal belief is a constitutional human right no more than
that.
Religion as a state power, as Jiang advocates, should never be allowed, not
in this country.
To call Jiang and his theory fundamentalist disgraces the name of Confucius.
After all, Confucius has left the Chinese a set of values, one of the traits
that make us Chinese and distinguishes us from the rest of the world.
Confucius has also enriched us with his wisdom, which has helped our people
withstand many ups and downs.
His ethical principles in particular are what mainstream society wants to be
reintroduced.
We never know whether Jiang's intention is to raise alarm about foreign
influence or to raise his image as a staunch defender of Confucianism.
But we know Confucius' teachings have contributed a great deal to Chinese
civilization. His wisdom and ethics offer some help, but do not meet all of our
needs.
Confucianism has survived different schools of thought for centuries and the
legacy should be passed on. But the only way to carry on his legacy is to make
his teachings relevant to modern China.
(China Daily 01/06/2006 page4)
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