Outline Lecture Six—Cultivating Ren: The Life and Times of Confucius

I) Wisdom and Community: Other-centeredness a) What Can Split a Community Apart? i) Competition for available resources ii) Fight among males over control of females iii) Human civilization born thus in the very cradle of violence? b) What Can Keep Us Together? i) Recent research in neuroscience ii) Robert Sapolsky’s study of baboon troops (1) What sets primates like us apart from other species? (2) Abstraction and complexity of empathy c) Wisdom in a Social Context i) Intelligence vs. Wisdom (1) Wisdom seems to be a social quality more adapted to community ii) The Meaning of Ren (1) Goodness? Benevolence? Humaneness? Co-humanity? (2) The Chinese character itself for Ren 仁

II) China’s Philosophical Revolution in 6th century B.C.E. a) The Historical Background i) The Disintegration of Zhou Rule (1) In 771 B.C. E., the Western Zhou capital at Haojing (Xi’an) overrun (2) Eastern Zhou Period (a) Spring and Autumn (722-481) (b) Warring States (403-221) ii) The Symbolic Importance of the State of Lu (1) Observance of ancient Zhou rites (2) Lineage to 11th century icon, the Duke of Zhou (a) Importance to Confucius (b) Why this obsessive nostalgia? iii) The Demise of Rituals (1) Dominance of three powerful barons (2) Confucius appalled by blatant acts of sacrilege and mockery

III) The Dao (Way) of Confucius a) Life of Confucius (551-479) i) Native of Lu, probably from an aristocratic but impoverished family ii) Aspirations as a civil servant iii) A philosophy borne of “grief and frustration” iv) What was so appealing or charismatic about him as a teacher? v) Records in the Analects b) “School of Learners” or Rujia i) Egalitarian roots—non-elitist or cultish orientation ii) Idea of junzi or “gentleman” iii) Egalitarian ideal of “perfectibility through learning” (1) What sets people apart is not birth, intelligence, or nature (2) Confucius’s summary of his own life c) The Confucian Path to a Moral Life i) Transmitter not Inventor ii) Affirmed humanism and rationality in age dominated by superstition and fear (1) Focus on the living, not the dead (XI, 11) iii) Five Relations and Filial Piety (1) Hierarchy and responsibility in a feudal society iv) Why Emphasis on Rites? (1) Rites as means to curb arrogance and egotism (2) Making self-effacement “habitual,” making humility instinctive v) The Ren of Confucius the man (1) Mourning the death of Yen Hui (2) The lover of life (XI, 25)