Culture and Family

Culture (Wen) and family are very important in Confucianism. I thought about the importance of these when I read this quote in the New York Times from the author Tom Perrotta (an old article, not a recent one):

Perrotta: "Speaking as a former teenage guy, the fact that you might someday get lucky was like the only thing getting you through those years. If you take that away I don't know what's left. It was the basic narrative of male adolescence."

Perrotta was expressing surprise that some teenagers today make an effort to be chaste.

A well educated and cultured young person has many sources of inspiration. The base life described by Perrotta is the result of a lack of culture. Culture enriches our lives. Fine music, poetry, good books, stimulating philosophy, and stimulating
conversation enlarge our humanity and expand our vistas.

A strong, loving family grounds a young person emotionally so he or she is not desperately seeking love and becoming misled by sexual passion.

I try hard to be a good parent and I believe the lessons of Kongzi and his students help me be a better father.

I see many applications of Kongzi's lessons in contemporary American life.

Robert

The article was "A writer's search for the sex in abstinence"
by Motoko Rich, Sunday Oct. 14, 2007, the Arts & Leisure section.

Wang Yangming's Community Compact

Bill Cosby in his book "Come on People" offered no new ideas for helping communities struggling with poor education, drugs, and poverty. I have started studying Confucian community compacts to look for ideas to help struggling communities.

If an American community wanted to write a compact, the following text from Wang Yangming would be a great preamble.

"The responsibility for all this should be shared by...government officials and all of you, old and young.

Alas! Nothing can be done to change what has already gone by, but something can still be done in the future. Therefore a community compact is now specially prepared to unite and harmonize all of you. From now on, all of you who enter into this compact should be filial to your parents and respectful to your elders, teach your children, live in harmony with your fellow villagers, help one another when there is death in the family and assist one another in times of difficulty, encourage one another to do good and warn one another not to do evil, stop litigations and rivalry, cultivate faithfulness and promote harmony, and be sure to be good citizens so that together you may establish the custom of humanity and kindness....

All of you, both old and young, do not remember the former evil deeds of the new citizens and ignore their good deeds. As long as they have a single thought to do good, they are already good people. Do not be proud that you are good citizens and neglect to cultivate your personal life. As long as you have a single thought to do evil, you are already evil people. Whether people are good or evil depends on a single instant of thought. You should think over my words carefully. Don't forget...."

Wang Yangming, 1472-1529

This is a brilliant exposition of the right attitude to have going into a community compact. I am too humbled by Wang's brilliance to try to add anything to what he said. I will only mention American historical context: during his lifetime Columbus discovered the New World (1492) and the Jamestown colony was started in Virginia (1508).

Robert

Chess or Sports as Ritual

Ritual is a big deal in Confucianism, but what rituals so we really have in America?

The New York Times, Sunday Jan. 12, 2008, had an article: "The Ritual of Chess, a Decoder of Life" by Dorothy Spears

There is this interesting sentence in the article:

"...the sense of chess as ritual. With continued focus and awareness, chess seductively suggests, we can decipher our chaotic landscape."

There are certain ritualistic aspects of chess, but ritual is supposed to bind a community together. High school football games are more effective at that than chess.

Our high school football team went pretty far in the state championship cycle this year. Not that I'm a football fan, but because I wanted to be a supportive member of the community, I went to all the playoff games, even traveling hours out of town.

The parents and alumni were very supportive and enthusiastic. I truly felt a part of something when I joined in with their ritualistic cheers. It was a very good experience.

We do have rituals in America, we just do not think of them that way.

And sports like football or baseball are more effective as community rituals than chess, which is very individualistic.

Robert

More on Economics and Confucianism

I've been thinking more about the application of Confucianism to economics.

Here's what the Confucian scholar Yan Yuan (a.k.a. Yan Xizhai, 1635 - 1704) wrote:

"...culture is not just the Odes, History, and the Six Arts; an impressive personal presence, clear speech, the military, farming, hydraulics, the use of fire, finance, grain, labor, and risk -- anything that can refine who I am and embellish
the fundamental forces in the universe -- all are part of culture."

Finance, labor, and risk are part of economics!

There is definitely a connection between economics and Confucianism.

Robert

The quote is from page 79, "Confucian Moral Self Cultivation,
2nd Ed." by Philip J. Ivanhoe (2000)