As all humans are God’s creation, it stands to reason that God not only guided people in the Middle East through Abraham, Isaac, David, Solomon, Jeremiah, John the Baptist and Jesus, but, He also guided other people through prophets like Confucius, Buddha and Zoroaster. If this be true there should be some common theme between their teachings, a common thread, a clue that these teachings are all emanating from a common source, the same glacier feeds all these rivers of wisdom. The gulf between Pauline Christianity and all the other world religions is an illuminating testimony to the fact that St. Paul changed Christianity from the religion of Jesus to a religion about his death and imagined resurrection.

There is a concept in Buddhism of countless Buddha.  Encyclopedia Britannica states, “According to the various traditions of Buddhism, there have been buddhas in the past and there will be buddhas in the future.”[1]  This resonates with the Islamic teaching that there have been 124,000 prophets in different times and different parts of the world.

The testimony of One God is everywhere and Trinity is no where to be seen in our universe. The universe and all life forms on our planet earth speak of One God and not three.

Historically also other than the Christians we find no testimony of Trinity in other regions of the earth and other religions. Even looking at the local population of the Middle East, Jews are strict monotheists. Even among the Christians we still have a sect named Unitarians.

The word Trinity is not even mentioned in the New Testament. It is stated in 1890 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica, “The Trinitarians and the Unitarians continued to confront each other, the latter at the beginning of the third century still forming the large majority.”

With a little effort One God can be traced in all religions, but the three persons and one substance of Trinity is nowhere to be seen, except in Pauline dogma.

The concept of there being prophets in all regions of the world, is self evident to the Muslims who grow up with the Quranic teachings, “Indeed, We have sent thee with the truth, as a bearer of glad tidings and as a Warner; and there is no people on earth in any age who did not receive a Warner from God.”  (Al Quran: 35:25) This is not just a Muslim paradigm but some Christian missionaries have yielded to this frame of reasoning as well, the case in point is a Christian missionary and Islamophobe Don Richardson.  I borrow the description of his concept of ‘Redemptive Analogies’ from wikipedia here.

Richardson studied at the Prairie Bible Institute and the Summer Institute of Linguistics. In 1962, he and his wife Carol went to work among the Sawi tribe of what was then Dutch New Guinea in the service of the Regions Beyond Missionary Union. The Sawi were known to be cannibalistic headhunters. In their new home in the jungle, the Richardsons set about learning the native Sawi language which was daunting in its complexity. There are 19 tenses for every verb. Don was soon able to become proficient in the dialect after a schedule of 8-10 hours daily learning sessions.

Richardson labored to show the villagers a way that they could comprehend Jesus from the Bible, but the cultural barriers to understanding and accepting this teaching seemed impossible until an unlikely event brought the concept of the substitutionary atonement of Christ into immediate relevance for the Sawi.

Missionary historian Ruth A. Tucker writes:

“As he learned the language and lived with the people, he became more aware of the gulf that separated his Christian worldview from the worldview of the Sawi: ‘In their eyes, Judas, not Jesus, was the hero of the Gospels, Jesus was just the dupe to be laughed at.’ Eventually Richardson discovered what he referred to as a Redemptive Analogy that pointed to the Incarnate Christ far more clearly than any biblical passage alone could have done. What he discovered was the Sawi concept of the Peace Child.”[2]

Three tribal villages were in constant battle at this time. The Richardsons were considering leaving the area, so to keep them there, the Sawi people in the embattled villages came together and decided that they would make peace with their hated enemies. Ceremonies commenced that saw young children being exchanged between opposing villages. One man in particular ran toward his enemy’s camp and literally gave his son to his hated foe. Observing this, Richardson wrote: “if a man would actually give his own son to his enemies, that man could be trusted!” From this rare picture came the analogy of God’s sacrifice of his own Son. The Sawi began to understand the teaching of the incarnation of Christ in the Gospel after Richardson explained God to them in this way.

Following this event many villagers converted to Christianity, a translation of the New Testament in Sawi was published, and nearly 2,500 Sawi patients were treated by Carol. The world’s largest circular building made strictly from un-milled poles was constructed in 1972 as a Christian meeting place by the Sawi.

This time Don Richardson following in the footsteps of Judas had duped them into a different irrationality, this was another case of bait and switch, whcih is commonly employed consciously or unconsciously by the Christian apologists to defend all their dogma, they present the proofs and need of One God and then sell to the naive three persons in one being of Trinity, without offering any proof for the Triune God. Here Richardson exploited the Peace Child to sell the Christian dogma of substitution atonement, emphasis being on substitution in atonement as well as in bait and switch.  Peace Child was no out of this world phenomenon like the Christian atonement, there was a common practice of intermarriages in the medieval Indian states to ensure peace, the premise was that if your daughter was in a certain state or province you are not going to attack that state.  This has little if any commonality with God killing his own son for the redemption of mankind.  Analogy would be befitting if God leaves mankind with his living son as insurance or assurance against any plan of punishment on His part so that humans feel safe from any negative intervention from the Almighty!

Was the Sawi conversion due to the powerful reasoning of ‘Redemptive Analogy,’ or the economic considerations of the medicines and the large church building?  In the case of Sawi we will never know, but if we apply the principles of ‘Redemptive Analogy’ to larger well documented religions and reformers and prophets like Confucius, Buddha and Zoroaster, we will realize quickly that Unitarianism is the way to go, feel free to choose between Judaism, Unitarian Christianity or Islam!

Richardson has covered his experiences and his scholarship in his books Eternity in Their Hearts: Startling Evidence of Belief in the One True God in Hundreds of Cultures Throughout the World and Peace Child.  However, a more critical reading of the materials that he presents and supplementing information on the topic from other sources actually argues the Muslim position that with a little effort One God can be traced in all religions, but the three persons and one substance of Trinity is no where to be seen, except in Pauline dogma.

This time Richardson had duped them into a different irrationality, which has no basis in any other religious tradition.  It was a false analogy.  No Sawi was sacrificing his son for the sins of anyone else.  Some Sawi fathers had only offered their sons as a collateral or a human shields to avoid war but Richardson in his obesession with the person of Jesus of Nazareth imagined that there was some redemptive analogy here.  Christian atonement is a contradiction that is not found in any other religious tradition.  It is very concisely explained by one of the Founding Fathers of USA, Thomas Paine:

From the time I was capable of conceiving an idea, and acting upon it by reflection, I either doubted the truth of the Christian system, or thought it to be a strange affair; I scarcely knew which it was: but I well remember, when about seven or eight years of age, hearing a sermon read by a relation of mine, who was a great devotee of the church, upon the subject of what is called Redemption by the death of the Son of God. After the sermon was ended, I went into the garden, and as I was going down the garden steps (for I perfectly recollect the spot) I revolted at the recollection of what I had heard, and thought to myself that it was making God Almighty act like a passionate man, that killed his son, when he could not revenge himself any other way; and as I was sure a man would be hanged that did such a thing, I could not see for what purpose they preached such sermons. This was not one of those kind of thoughts that had anything in it of childish levity; it was to me a serious reflection, arising from the idea I had that God was too good to do such an action, and also too almighty to be under any necessity of doing it. I believe in the same manner to this moment; and I moreover believe, that any system of religion that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child, cannot be a true system.  (Thomas Paine)

A statue of Confucius, located in Hunan, China on the shore of the Dongting Lake.

Confucius intended his teachings to be implemented and practiced, not merely pondered and evaluated. As we shall do for each of the other figures, we turn now to give consideration to the aspect of his teaching I have categorized as spiritual discipline. Under this rubric, I include those exercises and activities that these teachers promoted as ways of nudging their followers closer to what they considered human fulfillment, however that might be understood. Each of our four figures (Confucius, Buddha, Jesus and Muhammad) regarded these practical disciplines as essential to their teachings. These practices were not optional activities for those interested in extra credit but the very means by which each teacher sought to share his vision with others. In a very meaningful sense, therefore, we cannot completely appreciate what anyone of them taught until we have actually taken the path he set forth and walked it to the end.

My choice of that metaphor, by the way, is deliberate. Confucius, the Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad each referred to his spiritual practice as ‘the way’ or ‘the path.’ Muhammad spoke of Islam as the ‘straight path;’ Jesus called himself ‘the way and the truth and the life,’ and one of early Christianity’s names for itself was simply ‘the Way;’ the Buddha established the ‘Noble Path’ to nibbana; and Confucius urged people to follow the way, or dao, of Heaven. Each teacher believed taking his path required commitment and disciplined action.

…

Confucius thought that continual practice of mannerly acts could engender sincere feelings in the one who performs them. You may not feel particularly humble, but after several thousand bows and prostrations, feelings of genuine humility begin to surface. Humans are habitual creatures, and so repetitious actions can do amazing things to transform the character. Aristotle said, ‘We are what we repeatedly do.’ John Dryden, the English poet and playwright, also observed the dialectical relationship between behavior and character. He said: ‘We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.’ As character is shaped by behavior, the performance of humane acts becomes natural and spontaneous. It loses the artificial quality that may have attended it at first. For Confucius, this dialectical relationship between the external act and the intemal disposition is the key to understanding how both ritual and decorum can make us more humane.[3]

But hesitancy does not mean silence in this case. Scattered throughout the Analects are references to the principal metaphysical concepts of ancient China. We will discuss these foundational ideas and then examine how they functioned in Confucius’ thought. Although Confucius did not speculate or speak much about the world of gods and spirits, he clearly thought that acknowledging the divine in certain ways was essential to human welfare.

Like all Chinese of his day, Confucius accepted the ancient belief that reality comprised two worlds, the realm of Heaven and the realm of Earth. Heaven, or tiiin, was the domain of gods, spirits, and ancestors; Earth, or di, was the sphere of humans and nature. One of the Chinese terms for the universe or cosmos was tiandi, a simple compound of both words. As this compound suggests, Heaven and Earth could not be thought of apart from one another. They formed a holistic and symbiotic unity. Each one depended on the other. The western conception of the absolute transcendence of god, as exemplified in Soren Kierkegaard’s famous claim that there is an “infinite qualitative difference” between god and humanity, was utterly foreign to the Chinese way of thinking. Heaven and Earth were permeable realms, and there was an intimate connection between them. The many gods and spirits of the universe were thought to be immediately available to human beings, and hence they could be consulted by means of divination and could even enter and possess individuals.

Due to the interdependence of Heaven and Earth, the well-being of everyone and everything in them rested on their harmonious relationship. Preserving this harmony was one of the king’s principal functions. One of the earliest narratives of Chinese history states that the ruler’s primary responsibility was “pacifying the multitude of spirits and putting in harmony the myriad of people,” and if this was not done, “the spirits will be incensed against him and the people will revolt.” Accordingly, the king was charged with performing the appropriate rituals and sacrifices to curry the favor of the divine figures whose good graces were essential to the well-being of the state and its citizens.

The idea of Heaven in Chinese philosophy and religion meant more than just the dwelling place of the divine beings, although it certainly included that. Originally, tian simply meant the “sky,” but over the centuries from the Shang dynasty down to Confucius’ time, the idea of Heaven came to accumulate a rich variety of meanings. During the Shang, tian appears to have been a generic term for the heavenly realm. The people of the Shang imagined this divine world as a heavenly court that paralleled the royal court on earth.

As the earthly king governed through a bureaucracy of nobles, counselors, and various other ministers of state, so the high god ruled heaven with his spiritual minions and assistants. The Shang people called the high god Shang Di, the Supreme Emperor or the Supreme Ancestor. Although he was never depicted by physical representations, Shang Di was imagined to preside over a court that included many lesser divinities, or shen, that controlled, or at least influenced, the powers of the natural and human worlds. These were the gods and spirits the Chinese turned to for help in matters of agriculture, hunting, military campaigns, health, and longevity. The high god would not be bothered for these trivial, mundane concerns. Unlike Shang Di, the lower gods were not universal and did not have broad powers; most were decidedly local, such as the town or village gods whose power extended only as far as the city limits, like the jurisdiction of a municipal magistrate.[4]

Confucius (Chinese: 孔子; pinyin: Kǒng zǐ; Wade–Giles: K’ung-tzu, or Chinese: 孔夫子; pinyin: Kǒng Fūzǐ; Wade–Giles: K’ung-fu-tzu), literally “Master Kong“,^[1] (traditionally September 28, 551 BC – 479 BC)^[2] was a Chinese thinker and social philosopher of the Spring and Autumn Period.

His philosophy emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity. These values gained prominence in China over other doctrines, such as Legalism (法家) or Taoism (道家) during the Han Dynasty^[3][4][5] (206 BC – 220 AD). Confucius’ thoughts have been developed into a system of philosophy known as Confucianism (儒家). It was introduced to Europe by the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci, who was the first to Latinise the name as “Confucius”.

His teachings may be found in the Analects of Confucius (論語), a collection of “brief aphoristic fragments”, which was compiled many years after his death. For nearly 2,000 years he was thought to be the editor or author of all the Five Classics (五經)^[6][7] such as the Classic of Rites (禮記) (editor), and the Spring and Autumn Annals (春秋) (author).

Kong Qiu (孔丘), as Confucius is commonly known, is a combination of his surname (孔) and his given name (丘), and he was also known as Zhong Ni (仲尼), which is his courtesy name. He was born in 551 BC in the Lu state^[8] (This state was in the south of modern-day Shandong Province) in the later days of the Spring and Autumn Period. Confucius was from a warrior family. His father Shulianghe (叔梁紇) was a famous warrior who had military exploits in two battles and owned a fiefdom. Confucius lost his father when he was three years old, and then his mother Yan Zhengzai (顏徵在) took him and left the fiefdom because as a concubine (妾), she wanted to avoid mistreatment from Shulianghe’s formal wife. Thus, Confucius lived in poverty with his mother since childhood. With the support and encouragement of his mother, Confucius was very diligent in his studies. When Confucius was seventeen years old, his mother died as a result of illness and overwork. Three years later, Confucius married a young woman who was from the Qiguan family (亓官氏) of the Song state (宋) . Though he had a mild tempered wife who loved him, he left his family to strive for his ideals. Confucius sought to revive the perfect virtue of Huaxia (Chinese civilization) and the classical properties of the Western Zhou Dynasty to build a great, harmonious and humanistic society.

Contents [hide] 1 Teachings 2 Names 3 Philosophy 4 Ethics 5 Politics 6 Disciples and legacy 7 Memorial ceremony of Confucius 8 Influence in Asia and Europe 9 Visual portraits 10 Home town 11 Descendants 12 See also 13 References 14 Further reading 15 External links

Teachings

The Analects of Confucius

In the Analects (論語), Confucius presents himself as a “transmitter who invented nothing”.^[6] He puts the greatest emphasis on the importance of study,^[9][10] and it is the Chinese character for study (or learning) that opens the text. In this respect, he is seen by Chinese people as the Greatest Master.^[11] Far from trying to build a systematic theory of life and society or establish a formalism of rites, he wanted his disciples to think deeply for themselves and relentlessly study the outside world,^[12] mostly through the old scriptures and by relating the moral problems of the present to past political events (like the Annals) or past expressions of feelings by common people and reflective members of the elite, preserved in the poems of the Book of Odes (詩經).^[13][14]

In times of division, chaos, and endless wars between feudal states, he wanted to restore the Mandate of Heaven (天命) that could unify the “world” (天下, “all under Heaven”) and bestow peace and prosperity on the people.^[15] Because his vision of personal and social perfections was framed as a revival of the ordered society of earlier times, Confucius is often considered a great proponent of conservatism, but a closer look at what he proposes often shows that he used (and perhaps twisted) past institutions and rites to push a new political agenda of his own: a revival of a unified royal state, whose rulers would succeed to power on the basis of their moral merits instead of lineage;^[16][17] these would be rulers devoted to their people, striving for personal and social perfection.^[18] Such a ruler would spread his own virtues to the people instead of imposing proper behavior with laws and rules.^[19]

One of the deepest teachings of Confucius may have been the superiority of personal exemplification over explicit rules of behavior. His moral teachings emphasized self-cultivation, emulation of moral exemplars, and the attainment of skilled judgment rather than knowledge of rules, Confucius’s ethics may be considered a type of virtue ethics. His teachings rarely rely on reasoned argument, and ethical ideals and methods are conveyed more indirectly, through allusions, innuendo, and even tautology. This is why his teachings need to be examined and put into proper context in order to be understood.^[20][21] A good example is found in this famous anecdote:

廄焚。子退朝，曰：“傷人乎？” 不問馬。

When the stables were burnt down, on returning from court, Confucius said, ‘Was anyone hurt?’ He did not ask about the horses.

Analects X.11 (Arthur Waley translation) or 10-13 (James Legge translation)

The passage conveys the lesson that by not asking about the horses, Confucius demonstrated that a sage values human beings over property; readers of this lesson are led to reflect on whether their response would follow Confucius’s, and to pursue ethical self-improvement if it would not. Confucius, an exemplar of human excellence, serves as the ultimate model, rather than a deity or a universally true set of abstract principles. For these reasons, according to many Eastern and Western commentators, Confucius’s teaching may be considered a Chinese example of humanism.^[22]

Perhaps his most famous teaching was the Golden Rule stated in the negative form, often called the Silver Rule:

子貢問曰：“有一言而可以終身行之者乎”？子曰：“其恕乎！己所不欲、勿施於人。”

Zi gong (a disciple of Confucius) asked: “Is there any one word that could guide a person throughout life?”

The Master replied: “How about ‘shu’ [reciprocity]: never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself?”

Analects XV.24, tr. David Hinton

Confucius’s teachings were later turned into an elaborate set of rules and practices by his numerous disciples and followers who organized his teachings into the Analects. In the centuries after his death, Mencius (孟子)^[23] and Xun Zi (荀子)^[24] both composed important teachings elaborating in different ways on the fundamental ideas associated with Confucius. In time, their writings, together with the Analects and other core texts came to constitute the philosophical corpus known in the West as Confucianism. After more than a thousand years, the scholar Zhu Xi (朱熹) created a very different interpretation of Confucianism which is now called Neo-Confucianism, to distinguish it from the ideas expressed in the Analects. Neo-Confucianism held sway in China, Korea, and Vietnam^[25] until the 19th century.

Names

The tomb of Confucius in Qufu

• Michele Ruggieri, and other Jesuits after him, while translating Chinese books into Western languages, translated 孔夫子 as Confucius. This Latinised form has since been commonly used in Western countries.
• In systematic Romanisations:
  • Kǒng Fūzǐ (or Kǒng fū zǐ) in pinyin.
  • K’ung fu-tzu in Wade-Giles(or, less accurately, Kung fu-tze).
    • Fūzǐ means teacher. Since it was disrespectful to call the teacher by name according to Chinese culture, he is known as just “Master Kong”, or Confucius, even in modern days.
    • The character ‘fu’ is optional; in modern Chinese he is more often called Kǒng Zi (孔子).

• His actual name was 孔丘, Kǒng Qiū. Kǒng is a common family name in China.

(In Wade-Giles translation by D. C. Lau, this name appears as Kung Ch’iu.)

• His courtesy name was 仲尼, Zhòng Ní.
• In 1 C.E. (first year of the Yuanshi Era of the Han Dynasty), he was given his first posthumous name: 褒成宣尼公, Lord Bāochéngxūanni, which means “Laudably Declarable Lord Ni.”
• His most popular posthumous names are
  • 至聖先師,Zhìshèngxiānshī, lit. “The Most Sage Venerated Late Teacher” (comes from 1530, the ninth year of the Jianing period of the Ming Dynasty);
  • 至聖, Zhìshèng, “the Greatest Sage”;
  • 先師, Xiānshī, literally meaning “first teacher”. It has been suggested that ‘先師’ can be used, however, to express something like, “the Teacher who assists the wise to their attainment”.^[26]
• He is also commonly known as 萬世師表，Wànshìshībiǎo, “Role Model for Teachers through the Ages”.

Philosophy

The Dacheng Hall, the main hall of the Temple of Confucius in Qufu

Although Confucianism is often followed in a religious manner by the Chinese, arguments continue over whether it is a religion. Confucianism does not lack an afterlife, the texts express simple views concerning Heaven, and is relatively unconcerned with some spiritual matters often considered essential to religious thought, such as the nature of the soul.

Confucius’ principles gained wide acceptance primarily because of their basis in common Chinese tradition and belief. He championed strong familial loyalty, ancestor worship, respect of elders by their children (and, according to later interpreters, of husbands by their wives), and the family as a basis for an ideal government. He expressed the well-known principle, “Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself” (One of the earliest versions of the Golden Rule). He also looked nostalgically upon earlier days, and urged the Chinese, particularly those with political power, to model themselves on earlier examples.

Because no texts survive that are demonstrably authored by Confucius, and the ideas most closely associated with him were elaborated in writings that accumulated over the period between his death and the foundation of the first Chinese empire in 221 BC, many scholars are very cautious about attributing specific assertions to Confucius himself.

Ethics

The Confucian theory of ethics as exemplified in Lǐ (禮) is based on three important conceptual aspects of life: ceremonies associated with sacrifice to ancestors and deities of various types, social and political institutions, and the etiquette of daily behavior. It was believed by some that lǐ originated from the heavens. Confucius’s view was more nuanced. His approach stressed the development of lǐ through the actions of sage leaders in human history, with less emphasis on its connection with heaven. His discussions of lǐ seem to redefine the term to refer to all actions committed by a person to build the ideal society, rather than those simply conforming with canonical standards of ceremony. In the early Confucian tradition, lǐ, though still linked to traditional forms of action, came to point towards the balance between maintaining these norms so as to perpetuate an ethical social fabric, and violating them in order to accomplish ethical good. These concepts are about doing the proper thing at the proper time, and are connected to the belief that training in the lǐ that past sages have devised cultivates in people virtues that include ethical judgment about when lǐ must be adapted in light of situational contexts.

In early Confucianism, yì (義) and lǐ are closely linked terms. Yì can be translated as righteousness, though it may simply mean what is ethically best to do in a certain context. The term contrasts with action done out of self-interest. While pursuing one’s own self-interest is not necessarily bad, one would be a better, more righteous person if one based one’s life upon following a path designed to enhance the greater good, an outcome of yì. This is doing the right thing for the right reason. Yì is based upon reciprocity.

Just as action according to Lǐ should be adapted to conform to the aspiration of adhering to yì, so yì is linked to the core value of rén (仁). Rén is the virtue of perfectly fulfilling one’s responsibilities toward others, most often translated as “benevolence” or “humaneness”; translator Arthur Waley calls it “Goodness” (with a capital G), and other translations that have been put forth include “authoritativeness” and “selflessness.” Confucius’s moral system was based upon empathy and understanding others, rather than divinely ordained rules. To develop one’s spontaneous responses of rén so that these could guide action intuitively was even better than living by the rules of yì. To cultivate one’s attentiveness to rén one used another Confucian version of the Golden Rule: one must always treat others just as one would want others to treat oneself. Virtue, in this Confucian view, is based upon harmony with other people, produced through this type of ethical practice by a growing identification of the interests of self and other.

In this regard, Confucius articulated an early version of the Golden Rule:

• “What one does not wish for oneself, one ought not to do to anyone else; what one recognises as desirable for oneself, one ought to be willing to grant to others.” (Confucius and Confucianism, Richard Wilhelm)

Politics

Confucius’ political thought is based upon his ethical thought. He argues that the best government is one that rules through “rites” (lǐ) and people’s natural morality, rather than by using bribery and coercion. He explained that this is one of the most important analects: 1. “If the people be led by laws, and uniformity sought to be given them by punishments, they will try to avoid the punishment, but have no sense of shame. If they be led by virtue, and uniformity sought to be given them by the rules of propriety, they will have the sense of the shame, and moreover will become good.” (Translated by James Legge) in the Great Learning (大學). This “sense of shame” is an internalisation of duty, where the punishment precedes the evil action, instead of following it in the form of laws as in Legalism.

While he supported the idea of government by an all-powerful sage, ruling as an Emperor, probably because of the chaotic state of China at his time, his ideas contained a number of elements to limit the power of rulers. He argued for according language with truth; thus honesty was of paramount importance. Even in facial expression, truth must always be represented. In discussing the relationship between a king and his subject (or a father and his son), he underlined the need to give due respect to superiors. This demanded that the inferior must give advice to his superior if the superior was considered to be taking the wrong course of action. This was built upon a century after Confucius’s death by his latter day disciple Mencius, who argued that if the king was not acting like a king, he would lose the Mandate of Heaven and be overthrown. Therefore, tyrannicide is justified because a tyrant is more a thief than a king. Other Confucian texts, though celebrating absolute rule by ethical sages, recognise the failings of real rulers in maxims such as, “An oppressive government is more feared than a tiger.”

Some well known Confucian quotes:

• “To know your faults and be able to change is the greatest virtue.”
  知錯能改，善莫大焉

• “What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others.”
  己所不欲，勿施於人。

• “With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my crooked arm for a pillow—is not joy to be found therein? Riches and honors acquired through unrighteousness are to me as the floating clouds.”
  疏食飲水，曲肱而枕，樂在其中矣。不義而富貴，於我如浮雲。

• “Wisdom is recognizing what you know and what you don’t.”
  知之為知之，不知為不知，是知也.

• “Reviewing the day’s lessons. Isn’t it joyful? Friends come from far. Isn’t it delightful? One has never been angry at other’s misunderstanding. Isn’t he a respectable man?”
  學而時習之，不亦說乎？有朋自遠方來，不亦樂乎?人不知而不慍，不亦君子乎？

The last quote was chanted by the numerous drummers in the Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China.

Disciples and legacy

Confucius’ disciples and his only grandson, Zisi, continued his philosophical school after his death. These efforts spread Confucian ideals to students who then became officials in many of the royal courts in China, thereby giving Confucianism the first wide-scale test of its dogma. While relying heavily on Confucius’ ethico-political system, two of his most famous later followers emphasized radically different aspects of his teachings. Mencius (4th century BC) articulated the innate goodness in human beings as a source of the ethical intuitions that guide people towards rén, yì, and lǐ, while Xun Zi (3rd century BC) underscored the realistic and materialistic aspects of Confucian thought, stressing that morality was inculcated in society through tradition and in individuals through training.

This realignment in Confucian thought was parallel to the development of Legalism, which saw filial piety as self-interest and not a useful tool for a ruler to create an effective state. A disagreement between these two political philosophies came to a head in 223 BC when the Qin state conquered all of China. Li Ssu, Prime Minister of the Qin Dynasty convinced Qin Shi Huang to abandon the Confucians’ recommendation of awarding fiefs akin to the Zhou Dynasty before them which he saw as counter to the Legalist idea of centralizing the state around the ruler. When the Confucian advisers pressed their point, Li Ssu had many Confucian scholars killed and their books burned—considered a huge blow to the philosophy and Chinese scholarship.

Under the succeeding Han Dynasty and Tang Dynasty, Confucian ideas gained even more widespread prominence. Under Wudi, the works of Confucius were made the official imperial philosophy and required reading for civil service examinations in 140 BC which was continued nearly unbroken until the end of the 19th Century. As Moism lost support by the time of the Han, the main philosophical contenders were Legalism, which Confucian thought somewhat absorbed, the teachings of Lao-tzu, whose focus on more mystic ideas kept it from direct conflict with Confucianism, and the new Buddhist religion, which gained acceptance during the Southern and Northern Dynasties era.

During the Song Dynasty, the scholar Zhu Xi (1130-1200 AD) added ideas from Daoism and Buddhism into Confucianism. In his life, Zhu Xi was largely ignored, but not long after his death his ideas became the new orthodox view of what Confucian texts actually meant. Modern historians view Zhu Xi as having created something rather different, and call his way of thinking Neo-Confucianism. Both Confucian ideas and Confucian-trained officials were relied upon in the Ming Dynasty and even the Yuan Dynasty, although Kublai Khan distrusted handing over provincial control. In the modern era Confucian movements, such as New Confucianism, still exist but during the Cultural Revolution, Confucianism was frequently attacked by leading figures in the Communist Party of China. This was partially a continuation of the condemnations of Confucianism by intellectuals and activists in the early 20th Century as a cause of the ethnocentric close-mindedness and refusal of the Qing Dynasty to modernize that led to the tragedies that befell China in the 19th Century.

In modern times, Asteroid 7853, “Confucius,” was named after the Chinese thinker.

Quote: “Respect yourself and others will respect you.”

Quote: “Today I have seen Lao-tzu and can only compare him to the dragon.”^[27]

1. ^ More commonly abbreviated to Chinese: 孔子; pinyin: Kǒngzǐ; see Names section
2. ^ “Confucius (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)”. Plato.stanford.edu. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/confucius/. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
3. ^ Ban 111, vol.56 (Chinese language only)
4. ^ Gao 2003^{[citation needed]}
5. ^ Chen 2003^{[citation needed]}
6. ^ ^{a b} The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, VII.1^{[dead link]}
7. ^ Kang 1958^{[citation needed]}
8. ^ “china”. Dignubia.org. http://www.dignubia.org/maps/ct_popup.php?ct_date=551bce&ct_civ=china. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
9. ^ Chien 1978, pp. 117–120
10. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, I.1^{[dead link]}
11. ^ Gu 1658, vol. 51, sec. 9
12. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, III.3^{[dead link]}; VI.13^{[dead link]} and XVII.11^{[dead link]}
13. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, XIII.5^{[dead link]}; XVII.9^{[dead link]}
14. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, VI.25^{[dead link]}
15. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, XVI.2^{[dead link]}
16. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, XIV.9^{[dead link]}
17. ^ Zhang 2002, p. 208
18. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, VI.24 and 30^{[dead link]}; XIV.16 and 17^{[dead link]}
19. ^ The Analects 479 BC – 221 BC, II.20^{[dead link]}; XII.19^{[dead link]}
20. ^ Derrida 1983, p. 63
21. ^ Du 2005
22. ^ Lee 1995, pp. 1–3
23. ^ Legge 1895
24. ^ Xun 325 BC – 238 BC
25. ^ Li 2005
26. ^ Zhang 1988, p. 76
27. ^ This quote has been attributed by some scholars to a later student of Confucius as an attempt to create a meeting between Confucius and Lao-tzu which may never have occurred.
28. ^ The first was Michele Ruggieri who had returned from China to Italy in 1588, and carried on translating in Latin Chinese classics, while residing in Salerno
29. ^ “Windows into China”, John Parker, p.25
30. ^ “Windows into China”, John Parker, p.25, ISBN 0890730504
31. ^ “The Eastern origins of Western civilization”, John Hobson, p194-195, ISBN 0521547245
32. ^ “Revelation Rationality Knowledge and Truth”. Alislam.org. http://www.alislam.org/library/books/revelation/part_2_section_3.html. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
33. ^ Herbert Roslyn Ekins, Theon Wright (1938). China fights for her life, Volume 2. Whittlesey house. p. 315. http://books.google.com/books?id=OXlCAAAAIAAJ&q=confucius+sought+by+japanese+as+puppet+emperor+of+china+in+1937+but+refused&dq=confucius+sought+by+japanese+as+puppet+emperor+of+china+in+1937+but+refused&hl=en&ei=tRaeTNfjHYO78gaX3bX5Dw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA. Retrieved 2010-06-28.
34. ^ ^{a b} Kong Demao, The House of Confucius (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1988).
35. ^ “Confucius family tree revision ends with 2 mln descendants”. En.ce.cn. http://en.ce.cn/National/culture/200901/04/t20090104_17866318.shtml. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
36. ^ ^{a b c} “Updated Confucius family tree has two million members”. News.xinhuanet.com. 2008-02-16. http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-02/16/content_7616027.htm. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
37. ^ “DNA test to clear up Confucius confusion”. Ye2.mofcom.gov.cn. 2006-06-18. http://ye2.mofcom.gov.cn/aarticle/chinanews/200606/20060602462372.html. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
38. ^ “DNA Testing Adopted to Identify Confucius Descendants”. China.org.cn. 2006-06-19. http://www.china.org.cn/english/culture/171840.htm. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
39. ^ ^{a b} Jane Qiu (2008-08-13). “Inheriting Confucius”. Seedmagazine.com. http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/inheriting_confucius/. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
40. ^ “Confucius descendents say DNA testing plan lacks wisdom”. Eng.bandao.cn. 2007-08-21. http://eng.bandao.cn/newsdetail.asp?id=4644. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
41. ^ “Confucius’ Family Tree Recorded biggest”. Chinadaily.com.cn. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-09/24/content_8733256.htm. Retrieved 2009-09-27.
42. ^ “New Confucius Genealogy out next year”. China Internet Information Center. 2008. http://www.china.org.cn/china/features/content_16696029.htm. Retrieved 2008-11-01. “With a history of over 2,500 years covering more than 80 generations, and the longest family tree in the world according to the Guinness Book of Records, the fifth edition of the Confucius Genealogy will be printed in several volumes in 2009, according to an organizer of the Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee (CGCC).”
43. ^ “Confucius family tree to record female kin”. Chinadaily.com.cn. 2007-02-02. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-02/02/content_800011.htm. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
44. ^ www.stat.yale.edu Common Ancestors Article