EAST 211 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Filial Piety, Sympathetic Resonance, Analects
15 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Filial Piety and the Han Dynasty: Confucianism
Confucian morality
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Analects of Confucius (6th-5th C. BCE)
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benevolence (ren 仁) and ritual (li 禮)
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Han Dynasty “Confucianism” (206 BCE -220 BCE)
○
Key tenants: filial piety, loyalty, chastity
Q: Why is filial piety so central to Chinese culture and its values?
Five Basic (“Confucian”) Relationships
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father-son (filial piety)
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husband-wife (chastity)
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older brother-younger brother
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ruler-minister (loyalty)
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friend-friend
Sympathetic resonance (ganying
感應
) and the Five Phases
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If you develop this filial piety, this will resonate with other values (like loyalty to
the state and empire)
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5 relationships are associated with 5 phases in correlative cosmology
Filial Piety Literature
Twenty Four Filial Exemplars (Ershisi xiao 二十四孝)
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24 stories about what it means to be filial
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genre began in the 9th. C. (Late Tang Dynasty)
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based on Han Dynasty Accounts of Filial Offspring
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most popular book in Late Imperial China (Ming and Qing Dynasties)
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Significance of Han Dynasty Filial Piety Tales
gender: mother-son; daughters (in-law)
○
Isn't only a father-son relationship; the most important relationship in
these tales is the mother-son relationship
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audience: images, stories vs. classical literature
○Texts are meant for a broader audience
-ethics: filial piety over benevolence (ren 仁) and ritual (li 禮)
-filial piety’s magic power
Tales of Filial Piety
-Sage King Virtuous Emperor Shun
○Family kept trying to kill him but he survived. He was very filial; belief that
filial piety protects you because it resonates with heaven and heaven
responds
○'Rags to riches tale' - poor farmer become emperor
-Dysfunctional family; Chosen by Virtuous Emperor Yao; Refused to choose his
son successor and chose Yu instead (heredity v. virtue)
'He buried his son for his mother'
-Poor family with a 3 year old; mother is getting sick, there isn't a lot of food and
the son is eating food that the mother needs. When they are digging the hole,
there is a pot of gold under the ground and they become rich
-Act out of filial piety and you will be rewarded by heaven because filial piety is
part of the morality of the cosmos
-Burying the son is actually not the Confucian thing to do - the whole point of
marriage is to continue the patrilineage
'He concealed oranges to present to his Mother'
-Young boy steals oranges from a general and is caught. Usually, his hands would
be cut off but he said "I'm stealing them for my mom" and the general lets him
go because he is filial
-Filial piety trumps all other values; even if you break a law, filial piety is supreme
'He wept till the bamboo sprouted'
-Mother is sick and needs bamboo to be healed. There is no bamboo because it
is winter but when the son cries (expresses his filial piety), heaven rewards him
with bamboo and his mom gets better
'She sucked her Mother-in-law'
-Mother-in-law is old and has no teeth, so the daughter-in-law breastfeeds her
mother-in-law. Does this in sacrifice of her own son's interests
'He tasted dung with an anxious heart'
-Son tastes father's dung to see if he is ill
'He let mosquitoes consume his blood'
-Son is concerned that his parents are getting bit my mosquitoes at night. He
bares his bodies so the mosquitoes bite him and his parents are okay
'He amused his parents with play and glad clothes'
-70 year-old man wants his parents (90 years old) to think they are young so he
dresses up like a baby, crawls around and plays with toys
Socio-Political Function of Filial Tales
-Reinforcing social structure and legitimizing elite families
Socio-Political Function of Filial Tales
-Sacredness of hierarchy
-Filial piety = loyalty = devotion to hierarchy
-Themes:
1. filial piety as supreme virtue
2. self-sacrifice
§Sacrifice individual/family interests for the interests of others.
Sacrifice all for the dynasty (filial piety could be a threat if they
weren't willing to do this)
-Theme: Filial piety’s magic power
○Heaven sanctions socio-political order = “natural”
§Order is natural, virtuous, valid… why you get rewards from
heavens for doing something virtuous
○Heaven rewards self-sacrifice
§Sacrifice for parents/states => rewards
Socio-Political Function of Filial Tales
Legitimization of aristocracy as meritocracy
-elite families as virtuous and deserving
-extension of Mandate of Heaven
○Mandate of heaven is giving its mandate to elite families/aristocracy
because they are Confucian, virtuous, filial
-Themes:
1. commoners (rags-to-riches)
§Suggests that commoners can be rich if they are just a bit more filial
§Also says the elite manifest filial piety more than anyone else
2. magic power of filial piety
Socio-Political Function of Filial Tales
-Gender: Expanding or reinforcing traditional social hierarchy?
-Themes:
1. Mother-son relationship: positive or negative?
§Mothers are dependent on sons; father is patriarch, don't want to
portray him as vulnerable/weak
2. Dutiful daughter-in-law (chastity)
9: Filial Piety in the Han Dynasty
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
8:34 AM
Document Summary
Benevolence (ren ) and ritual (li ) Han dynasty confucianism (206 bce -220 bce) Sympathetic resonance (ganying ) and the five phases. If you develop this filial piety, this will resonate with other values (like loyalty to the state and empire) 5 relationships are associated with 5 phases in correlative cosmology. 24 stories about what it means to be filial. Based on han dynasty accounts of filial offspring. Most popular book in late imperial china (ming and qing dynasties) Significance of han dynasty filial piety tales gender: mother-son; daughters (in-law) Isn"t only a father-son relationship; the most important relationship in these tales is the mother-son relationship audience: images, stories vs. classical literature audience: images, stories vs. classical literature. Texts are meant for a broader audience. Ethics: filial piety over benevolence (ren ) and ritual (li ) filial piety"s magic power. Family kept trying to kill him but he survived.
