Tsoi Dug Blog 才德博客

Who says Chinese people are not capable of returning to being The Land of Courtesy and Integrity? Hong Kong is proof that Chinese people can.

谁说华人不可以再构成礼义之邦？香港就证明华人可以。

Twenty-four years ago, in 1984, when I went back to Hong Kong for the first time in twenty years, it was truly shocking. The place was completely unlike what I remember as a child.

二十四年前，1984年我二十年第一次回到香港，令我非常惊讶：跟我童年记忆中的香港完全不同了。

Back then, in the late fifties and early sixties, the Hong Kong of my childhood was a place of at least courtesy, if not integrity. My mother would take me to market with her and would teach me that one must address the vendors on the street politely as Lao Ban (“boss”) and the workers in the shops as Shi Fu (“master”). In turn they would always address her politely as Shi Nai (“respected madam”) or Xiao Jie (“miss”). In the shops people were always polite and friendly. In school we were taught li rang: to be courteous, considerate, and to let others go first. When the teacher entered the classroom we stood up as a class, bowed and said in unison, “Good afternoon, teacher.” When we met a teacher on the street we bowed and said the same thing. It was considered shameful beyond imagination for siblings to argue, let alone fight, in front of anyone other than the immediate family. We were taught by our elders and by the popular culture surrounding us to be polite and respectful, to be kind to others, and to never speak ill of others. The movies we saw extolled courtesy, integrity, loyalty to country, and of course, being good to parents (xiao).

那时，五十年代尾、六十年代头，我童年时代的香港就算不是礼义之邦也是礼貌之邦。妈妈带我去市场时就教我，街上的小贩们就要有礼貌地称呼做“老板”，商店里面的工人们就称呼做“师傅”。他们也有礼貌地称呼妈妈做“师奶”或“小姐”。商店里的人们都有礼貌和友善。学校教我们要“礼让”：对人礼貌，为他人着想，让人家先行。老师进入课室时我们整斑起立、鞠躬，然后同声说，“老师午安”。街上遇到老师时我们也鞠躬问好。如果兄弟们在人家面前有一点争执，那是再羞耻不过的了，在公众场所兄弟们互相打骂就没人敢想像了。长辈们和周围的大众文化教育我们要尊敬有礼，对人善良，不要说人家坏话。看的电影都歌颂礼、义、忠、孝。

In 1984, however, when I walked into a store the staff just stared at me and didn’t say a word when I said good morning. When I couldn’t find what I wanted the staff yelled at me as I walked out the door, “If you are not going to buy why did you come in?” When I tried to flag down a taxicab I had to flag down five cabs before I could get in: all the four others I flagged down someone appeared out of nowhere and jumped into the very cab in front of me! The only way I could get a cab was to jump in as soon as the cab stopped, before the previous passenger had gotten out, and to sit right next to him as he paid his fare. By the way, I had been warned about this before my trip, that Hong Kong people were so bad they barged into cabs flagged down by returning overseas Chinese, but I had dismissed it as anti-Hong Kong fabrication – no people in the world, I had reasoned, could be that barbaric, let alone Chinese people! And the children, why, the children! The ones I had contact with were very cute and energetic, but when they opened their mouths filth came out! Little five year olds were spouting words of contempt, cynicism and outright insult to strangers, and then looking to their parents for applause! And the parents proudly smiled and said, “So smart, this cunning little kid!” The children fought with their siblings loudly in public, with the parents approvingly looking on! When I turned on the TV, I could see where it all came from. The people on TV lightly and constantly yelled at, insulted, and lashed out at each other; what was in fashion was cynicism and contempt. Quite the opposite of the Land of Courtesy and Integrity. I left Hong Kong saddened and angry.

但是1984年我走进商店，说一声“早晨”时，售货员们只睁大眼睛盯着我，一声也不出。当我找不到要买的东西转身出门的时候，售货员高声骂，“不是买东西的，进来干什么？”当我在街上招计程车的时候，我招停了五架车才上到车，因为头四架都突然有人跑出来，抢在我面前跳进了我招的车子。最后我唯有学他们那样，车子里面的客人还没出来就跳进车子，他还在付钱我就坐在他身旁。其实，去香港前已经有人警告我，说香港人风气很坏，回去的海外华人招计程车会被他们抢坐，但当时我就不信，认为这是歧视香港的谣言，因为这世界没人会这样野蛮的，何况是华人！另外，香港的孩子们，唉！我所接触的孩子都外形活泼可爱，但是张开口时出来的竟然是污垢！小小的五岁小孩子，对陌生人说出藐视、讥诮和侮辱的说话来，就回头望望父母，等待赏励。父母们竟然骄傲地笑着说，“很聪明的，这个蛊惑崽”！孩子们跟兄弟姐妹们在公众场所大声吵骂，父母们却赞同地观看。我打开电视，便知道这些行为从那里来的。电视中的人们轻易地、经常地骂人、侮辱他人、突然攻击他人，流行的是讥诮和鄙視。跟礼义之邦完全相反。我带着悲愤的心情离开了香港。

In 2007, however, when I returned to Hong Kong after twenty-three years, the place had again changed completely. When I walked into a store, the staff were friendly and actually smiled and nodded. When I asked for directions the store people actually spent time to tell me two different ways to get there. When a taxicab stopped and my wife mistakenly thought that it had stopped for her, the person for whom it had actually stopped said that it was all right and waved us to go ahead and get into the cab when we started to apologize and defer the cab to him. The children I saw were actually polite and friendly! And on TV, the people spoke politely and were decent to each other. People told me that the famous Korean series “Da Chang Jin”, which I saw in America and which portrayed a very kind, polite, and idealistic Korean woman doctor, had been all the rage in Hong Kong. Good gracious! The wheel has turned; Hong Kong is back in the folds of civilization! Who says there’s no hope for Chinese people? I left Hong Kong elated.

但是，2007年，二十三年后重回香港时，又再完全变了。我走进商店时，售货员态度友善，又微笑又点头。问路时，店里人员化时间来教我两个不同的路线。至于招计程车，我太太误以为计程车是为她而停的要进去，而发现了车子是为前头一个人停的我们开始退出道歉的时候，他却摇手把车子让给我们。见到的孩子们居然又友善又有礼貌的。电视中的人们说话有礼貌，互相对待也相当好。人们告诉我，描写一位很善良、有礼貌、追求崇高理想的女医生的著名韩剧“大长今”（我在美国也看过），风行香港。天啊！轮子转了，香港重新回到文明了！谁说华人没有希望？我带着欢乐的心情离开了香港。

Was it because I was better dressed last year, compared to 1984? No, not at all, I was still in my usual North American overseas Chinese plain garb. Was it because I was older now and so more respectable? No, because my children report the same thing: people, they say, are nice in Hong Kong.

是不是因为去年我比1984年衣着穿得好点？不，完全不是，我还是穿着北美洲华人的朴素装束。是不是因为我现在老一点了，所以被人尊重多一点？不是，因为我的孩子们也说同样的东西：香港的人们很好。

Of course, these are all things on the surface that I see; deeper down there must be a lot of things not to one’s liking. It is undeniable, however, that customs in Hong Kong have improved.

当然，这都是表面看到的东西，深一层的必然还有很多不如意的事情，但是，无可否认，香港风气确实是进步了。

Yes, Chinese people can improve; it’s entirely possible for Chinese people to return to being The Land of Courtesy and Integrity…

是的，华人可以进步，华人完全能够再构成礼义之邦 …

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

Here’s some advice I gave to a young man who’s just moving to the USA from another country: “You can succeed in America if you are hard working, capable, and honest.” He said, “I can understand the hard working and capable, but why honest?” I said, “People here in the USA really hate dishonesty, at least people who are of a higher class. Some lower class people in America, like some lower class people everywhere, may not place much importance on honesty, but most higher-class people in America for sure place great importance on it. If they find out you’ve been dishonest to them, they just won’t deal with you any more. You know, people wonder why they get passed over for promotions, when they’ve been hard-working and capable, but that may be why – they may not have been 100% honest when dealing with other people…”

我对一位即将由另一个国家迁移到美国的青年人说：“如果你勤力、能干、诚实，则可以在美国成功。”他说，“我可以理解勤力和能干，但是为什么诚实呢？”我说，“美国这里，人们很憎恨不诚实，最少高上阶层的人们是这样。有些低下阶层的人们，好像其他地方的有些低下阶层一样，可能不很重视诚实，但美国多数高上阶层的人则非常重视。如果他们发现你曾对他们不诚实，他们会不再跟你交易。有些人不明白为什么勤力能干，仍然得不到升职，这就可能是原因：他们待人接物可能没有百分之百诚实。”

So, to succeed in America, be honest. Don’t exaggerate, don’t misrepresent, don’t bend things. If someone asks you something you don’t want to tell him, just say so, “Sorry, I can’t tell you that” or “Ah, that’s confidential.” People in America will respect you for being a “straight-shooting”, reliable person. Whatever you do, don’t make up something for an answer; don’t lie.

所以，要在美国成功就要诚实。不要夸张，不要误导，不要歪曲。如果人家问你的东西是你不想告诉他的，就坦直地说，“对不起，不能告诉你”或说，“唉，那是秘密啊”。在美国，这样做人家会尊重你的，认为你是个正直可靠的好汉。千万不要伪造些东西回答他，千万不要撒谎。

Why is America like that? That’s because American society has the most free market type of ideology, and free market ideology despises dishonesty. For a free market to be successful, the exchange of goods and services has to be reliable. Fraud, along with stealing and robbery, destroys the reliability of exchange and therefore destroys free exchange and the free market itself. Thus Americans hate dishonesty.

为什么美国这样呢？因为美国社会的意识形态是最崇敬自由市场的，而自由市场思想最厌恶不诚实。自由市场要成功，物品和服务的交换则一定要可靠。欺骗，跟偷和抢劫一样，摧毁交换的可靠性，因而摧毁自由交换和自由市场本身。所以美国人憎恨不诚实。

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

I visited Paris and Madrid recently, and after a few museums and historical buildings it looks to me like medieval European culture by the 1100’s was every bit as advanced as Chinese culture of the time if not more advanced! We’ve all been misled by those mistaken comparisons of the primitive castles of the Medieval kings with the grandiose imperial palaces of China of the same era, and come to the erroneous conclusion that culturally the Europeans have been far behind China until the 1700’s. Not so: the grandeur of Medieval Europe is not to be found in the kings’ abodes, but in the cathedrals and religious monuments. The proper comparison should be made between say, the Notre Dame de Paris Cathedral, which was at the time “the parish church of Europe’s kings”, and the contemporaneous Song Dynasty imperial palace of the 1100’s. The Notre Dame de Paris Cathedral wins in terms of technology: it’s far taller, and it’s got all those huge, gorgeous stained glass windows!

最近去了巴黎和马德里，看了好几处博物馆和文物建筑，发现到了1100年左右，中世纪的欧洲文化已经跟当时的中国看齐，还可能有过之无不及！不适当的比较误导了我们，把中世纪欧洲国王们原始的城堡跟同时代中国皇帝们的威煌宫殿比较，得到了错误的结论，以为欧洲文化比中国落后很多，一直到了1700年代才追上。其实，中世纪欧洲的辉煌并不在国王的住所，而是在大教堂和宗教建筑物。适当的是，以当时是“欧洲各国国王的御用教堂”即巴黎圣母大教堂，跟同时代即1160年代的宋朝皇宫比较。巴黎圣母大教堂则胜于科技：教堂高度高很多，又有那么多巨大华丽的彩色玻璃窗！

Sigh! So many “China scholars” tell us that Europeans had no culture; they just somehow came into possession of some better ships and some guns some time starting around the 1500’s, and then they conquered the world on that! Not true at all! No, they had a lot more, they had a deep, high culture based on Christianity, just like China used to have a deep, high culture based on Confucianism. The West hasn’t just been advanced for a couple of hundred years; they have been advanced for 1,000 years! The West’s modernity is deeply based on advanced cultural traditions that stretch back 1,000 years.

唉！很多“中国学专家”告诉我们，欧洲人是没有文化的，不过是1500年代开始，不知怎样的，拿到了比人家好的船只和几枝火枪，就征服世界了！但完全不是这样啊！他们还有很多其他的东西，他们有深厚的、高级的、基于基督教的文化，正如中国以前曾经有深厚的、高级的、基于孔教的文化一样。西方不是先进了仅仅那两百多年，他们先进了一千年了！西方的现代化，是深深地基于一套长达一千年的先进文化传统的。

So this proves to me that the thinking that China can disregard and even throw away all that high culture we’ve had for a couple of thousand years back and just somehow modernize, is wrong. The West has built its modernization upon a foundation of a thousand years of Western high culture; can China build its modernization without the foundation of past Chinese high culture? No, for China to modernize, China needs to come to terms with and embrace its past high culture, then add to it where it’s deficient and build on it where it’s advanced or even superior.

对我来说，这证明了现在以为中国可以不理会、甚至可以抛弃所有自己曾经拥有过几千年的高文化，也仍然能现代化起来的思想，是错误的。 西方的现代化是在自己一千年文化的基础上建筑起来的，中国可以不在自己几千年的文化基础上建筑现代化吗？ 不可以的。中国要现代化，就一定要包容和接纳自己过去的文化，然后有缺陷的地方就填补，有先进或甚至优越的地方就加强。

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

Sigh! I also admire Professor Yu Dan, whose books are wildly popular in China, for promoting Confucius, but in her talk on ideals she really is teaching people the wrong thing; according to her it’s bad to have high ideals, but good to be a hedonist! If you want to reform the country, to bring happiness to the country or peace to the world, then you lack humility. You are not good enough to talk about such things. You are only good enough to have as your ideals “down to earth” things, like going to the countryside in spring, having a party there, singing some songs and relaxing a bit. If this is not keeping the people foolish and enslaved then what is it? This is also putting down those who worry about their country and their people, and praising those hedonists who only think about enjoying themselves! And she talks about it with such conviction and self-righteousness - tsk, tsk!

唉！我也赞赏著书风行中国的于丹教授宣扬孔子，但她关于理想的谈话真是教坏人；依她说，怀抱着高尚的理想是坏的，做享乐主义者是好的！如果你想要改良国家，要治国平天下，那么你就是没有谦虚。你没资格谈这些东西，你的理想就只配是什么脚低下的东西，春天里跟朋友去郊外旅行，开一下party，唱一下歌，轻松一下… 这不是愚民和奴民是什么？同时，这也贬低那些虑国忧民的人，赞扬那些只顾寻求开心的享乐主义者！她还说得这么振振有词，哎呀！

Is everything in the classic Lun Yu always reliable, always correct? To me, this passage in Lun Yu is probably not accurate. Here Confucius is portrayed as a teacher who sneers at but wouldn’t come out and enlighten his student; when a student has high ideals he’s arrogant, yet when a student is more modest then he has denigrated the importance of The Rites. Only when a student obviously of noble birth, haughtily waiting until he has finished playing a lute that only nobles can play so well, give an answer from a hedonistic viewpoint that only a noble can fully appreciate from personal experience, promoting the kind of romantic activity that only a noble accorded a life of leisure can regularly enjoy, only then does Confucius endorse the answer. How could the “Teacher For All Generations” look down upon students of commoner origin and pander to students of noble origin?

《论语》的一切都可靠，都没有错误吗？我看，《论语》里这段，就可能不准确，把孔子描叙为一个嘲笑学生又不明言指点教导学生的老师，学生抱负远大就说他骄傲，学生谦虚一点就说他贬低了礼仪的重要性，唯有那个明明是贵族出身的学生，傲慢地等自己弹完那具只有贵族才会弹得这么好的琴，然后作出只有贵族才体会贴切的享乐主义观点的答案，推崇只有习惯悠逸生活的贵族才会常常欣赏到的风流活动，唯有这个学生孔子才赞同。万世师表，怎会这样藐视平民出身的学生而谄媚贵族出身的学生呢？

He couldn’t. Therefore, Mr. Ma Qian Li, a modern Confucian scholar who has written a whole book to criticize Yu Dan, interprets this passage as the student wanting, not for himself to go play in the countryside during spring, but for everyone in the world to be able to go play in the countryside during spring, to be able to enjoy such leisurely lives, and that Confucius thinks that this is the highest ideal. I think that this interpretation is a bit contrived and does not match the original text, but at least Mr. Ma hasn’t participated in glorifying hedonism, the way that Yu Dan has. I personally think that Lun Yu does have some things that are wrong, some things that cannot be what Confucius would advocate, and this passage is an example. I think that toward things in the Confucian classics, it doesn’t hurt to take an objective attitude - of course we shouldn’t say that everything is wrong, but neither do we need to blindly take everything to be right.

不会的，所以，写了整整一本书来批评于丹的现代儒家学者马千里，就把这篇对话解释为，不是那个学生要自己在春天到郊外玩，而是他的理想是，要天下所有人都能够在春天到郊外玩，享受到这种舒逸生活，同时孔子则认为这个抱负才最高尚。我觉得，这个解释比较勉强，不符合原文，但是最少没有像于丹那样，参加了对享乐主义的歌颂。我本人呢，我就觉得《论语》里面有一些不对的、不应该是孔子所提倡的东西，这段就是例子。我觉得，孔教经典里的东西，我们不妨用客观的眼光来看待，当然不应该全盘否定，但同时也不需要盲目地全盘肯定。

By the way, I think that the kind of thinking that Professor Yu Dan promotes belongs to the school of Confucian philosophical idealism, and follows the same lines as people such as Zhu Xi, which I don’t completely agree with. Moreover, I think their method of thinking is dangerous, and can lead to absolutes, excesses, arbitrariness, cultism and other bad things, of which this extolling of hedonism is just an example. At the same time, however, she is still promoting Confucius, courtesy and integrity and she is making people interested in Confucius and the Chinese intellectual heritage, so all that should be affirmed. I don’t agree with “The Ten PhD’s” who rudely attack Yu Dan，saying that she has no right to interpret Confucius in her own way, and saying that in carrying Yu Dan’s talks the media lacks a conscience and is endangering Chinese culture. If Chinese culture is so weak that it collapses when a professor popularizes it a bit, when ordinary people get to know it a bit, and that it has to be kept hidden in the hot houses of some elite school PhD’s, why do we need this kind of culture? Perhaps The Ten PhD’s are a bit lacking in respect for the Chinese intellectual heritage?

再说，我觉得于丹教授提倡的思想，是儒家的唯心学派别，是步朱熹等人后尘的思想，我并不完全同意，而且还觉得这是一种危险的思想方式，可以导致绝对、过分、专横、过分崇拜等弊端，这里推崇享乐主义便是例子。但是，她总算是提倡孔子，提倡礼义，引发人们对孔子、对中华思维传统的兴趣，这个是必须肯定的。所以，我不同意“十博士”等人那样对于丹作出无礼的评击，说她没权对孔子作出自己的解释，说传媒没良心，刊载于丹就是危害中华文化。如果中华文化这么脆弱，一旦被一位教授普及一下，让普通群众们认识一下，就会崩溃，而只能永远躲在高校博士们的温室里，这种文化要它来做什么？十博士们不会是对中华思维传统缺乏了一点尊敬吧？

The Chinese Cultural Renaissance has begun; no doubt a hundred flowers will bloom and a hundred schools will contend.

中华文化复兴开始了，必将是百花齐放、百家争鸣。

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

It’s so nice to see a Mom discover Di Zi Gui for herself and her children! Back in the ’80’s I discovered the same thing: I read Di Zi Gui and I went, “Wow! This is exactly what my kids need! This is what I’ve gotta teach them!” They were newborn, 5 and 7 then.

真开心，看到一位母亲为自己和孩子们发现了《弟子规》！ 八十年代时，我也发现了同样的东西：我看了《弟子规》后说，“哗！这正是我孩子们所需的东西！这正是我须要教他们的东西！”当时他们是：刚出生、五岁、和七岁。

Back then, to teach my North American-born kids I had to translate the work myself, write the Cantonese pronunciation in English next to the Chinese words so my kids can recite the Chinese, and with scissors and much photocopying create my own bilingual textbooks.

当年，为了教我北美洲出生的孩子们，我要自己把文章翻译， 为了让他们能够把原文诵读，要在汉字旁写上广州话的英语字母拼音，又要用剪刀和复印机来创造我自己的双语教材书。

My 4 little ones have all been good as children, they have grown up to be pretty nice people, and, I risk sounding like a cocky parent but I have to put this in: they all got into good colleges - McGill, Harvard, and 2 in Stanford.

四个孩子，小时候都是好孩子，长大了都相当善良，同时，虽然不想做个夸耀自己孩子的家长，但还是要说：他们都进了不错的大学－麦克吉尔、哈佛、两个斯坦福。

And I credit a lot of it to Di Zi Gui. I think studying Di Zi Gui has not only given them a moral mooring, but has also given them a sense of pride and identity in their Chinese heritage, a quiet self esteem and self confidence that drives them to always do their best, and an inner strength that helps them overcome setbacks and adversity.

这一切我认为《弟子规》功劳很大。学习《弟子规》，不但给了他们道德的指南，也给了他们对自己中华血统的自豪感和认同感，使他们有自尊心和自信心，因而凡事都尽力而为，还使他们有内在的力量，来克服挫折和艰难。

Since then I’ve taught some of my Mandarin-speaking friends’ teenage kids, requiring me to also write in the Mandarin Pronunciation, and now I’ve been teaching it to teenagers. Also I’ve put my bilingual texts online so other people can take advantage of the wonderful Chinese intellectual heritage. Here’s the link: www.tsoidug.org/dizigui.php

之后，我教过几位说普通话的朋友们的十几岁儿女，就把普通话拼音符号也写上了，现在则教其他十几岁的少年。同时，我把我的双语教材放在网上，让其他人都可以享受这个优良的中华思维传统。网址是： www.tsoidug.org/dizigui.php

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

Some people ask me why I translate xiao into English as “being good to parents” rather than the prevalent translation of “filial piety”.  That’s because “filial piety” is open to cultish interpretation.

有人问我，为什么把“孝”用英语翻译为“对父母好“而不是通行的“子女的虔诚”呢？因为“子女的虔诚”一词，有时会令人用过度崇拜的角度来解释孝。

What cultish interpretation?  Well, around 1000 C.E., an intellectual movement came into dominance in China, and some people in that intellectual movement added some tendencies toward absolutes, excesses, metaphysics and cultish thinking onto Confucianism, originally a set of reasonable and practical tenets.

什么过度崇拜？就是公元一千年左右，有一股思潮在中国上升为主流，而这思潮中的一些人，对本来是一套合理实用原则的孔教，加上了一些绝对、过分、形而上学、过度崇拜等倾向 。

When it came to xiao some people with this mode of thinking advocated a sort of god-like worship of one’s living parents, a self-deprecating all-pervasive guilt feeling, constant self-punishment as a form of “offering” and piety, excessive emphasis on obedience and prostration, excessive grieving to the point of quitting all duty and staying night and day next to the parent’s grave for a full three years, and so forth and so on.

说到孝时，那思潮中的一些人提倡，好像对神那样崇拜还活着的父母，对父母怀着一种贬责自己、渗透一切言行的内疚，用不断的自我惩罚来作为“奉献”和“虔诚”，过分强调服从和俯拜，过分哀悼父母乃至丢掉所有职责、在墓旁日夜守整三年等等。

It was precisely when this mode of thinking was at its zenith, during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), that Jesuit missionaries working at the Emperor’s court coined “filial piety” as the term for xiao.

正是当这思潮处于巅峰时，即明朝时（1368－1644），在朝廷工作的耶稣会传教士把孝翻译为“子女的虔诚”。

I think xiao should mostly be a normal day-to-day activity of being good to parents and acting in their fundamental interests.  No god-like worship of one’s living parents is needed, no self-deprecating all-pervasive guilt feeling is called for, and no extraordinarily painful, self-punishing, excruciating exertion or sacrifice need be involved, except under certain special circumstances.  Instead of a subjective state of mind, i.e. a “piety”, I think xiao is more of an objective state, i.e. a way of conduct, indeed, as Confucius and Zeng Zi have said in Xiao Jing (The Classic of Xiao), a whole way of living one’s life.

我认为孝主要是日常行为对父母好，为父母的根本利益行事。不需要对还活着的父母好像神那样崇拜，不需要那种贬责自己、渗透一切言行的内疚，同时，除非特殊情况之下，也不需要异常痛苦的、自我惩罚性的、不必要的辛劳和牺牲。我认为孝的主要成分，并非是主观的一种心态或“虔诚”，而是一个客观的状态，是一种行为，事实上，好像孔子和曾子在《孝经》所提出一样，是一整套生活方式。

Thus I think it is more accurate to translate xiao as “being good to parents” than as “filial piety”.

所以，我认为把孝翻译为“对父母好”比“子女的虔诚”更为正确。

Feng Xin-ming  冯欣明

July 6, 2008 edited July 11, 2008

People ask me why I translate xiao as being good to parents and not being dutiful to parents or being dutiful as a son or daughter. It’s because xiao is more than just duty; it is a whole way of living one’s life. Xiao Jing, the first and most authoritative Confucian work on xiao, says that the xiao of people occupying various positions in society, such as emperors, ministers, officers, commoners, and so forth, is to be good at their callings. Xiao Jing also says that to be xiao, one must not only serve and provide for one’s parents well, but must also engage in good conduct both inside and outside the family.

有人问我，为什么把孝翻译为“对父母好”而不是“对父母尽义务”或“执行子女的义务”呢？这是因为孝不单是义务，孝是整个生活的方式。《孝经》是孔教解说孝的最早和最具权威性的经典；它说，社会不同地位的人，例如天子、大臣、吏士、庶人等，他们的孝，都是要把自己的职责做好。《孝经》又说，要孝就不光只是供养侍奉父母好，还须要家庭内外的行为都好。

Also, being dutiful often conjures up grim-faced carrying out of some painful task or of some sort of sacrifice, but xiao also includes the normal day-to-day life, the normal day-to-day interactions with parents, some of which may be joyful, like playing and not drudgery. One example is keeping parents up-to-date on one’s activities and situation, which is one of the demands of xiao (see verse 12, p.7 Xiao Jing : often truly xiao offspring have such a good relationship with the parents that updating them means enjoyable and relaxing conversation that all parties look forward to. Another example is respectfully listening when parents teach: offspring should have a relation with parents healthy enough that offspring realize the teaching from parents are greatly beneficial and something to look forward to. Teaching by parents can be fun and enjoyable: I remember well myself looking forward to and greatly enjoying the Sunday afternoon teaching of Chinese classics by my father to my brothers and me as young children.

另外，“尽义务”令人联想起辛苦的事务或某样的牺牲，但孝也包括普通的日常生活，跟父母普通的日常相处。这些都不一定是劳工，亦有愉快、好像是玩游戏的。例如孝要求子女对父母报道活动和情况：很多时候真正孝的子女跟父母关系很好，报道就是个很开心、很轻松、双方都盼望的会话。另一个例子就是孝要求，父母教导时要恭敬会心地听。子女跟父母的健康关系应该达到这个程度：子女们知道父母教导是非常有益的、应该欢迎的，而父母的教导，是可以有乐趣的，令人愉快的。我记得小孩子时，爸爸每星期日教我和我哥哥学古文，我那时觉得这教导多么好玩、多么令人盼望。

Therefore, I feel xiao is better translated as “being good to parents”.

所以，我觉得把孝翻译为“对父母好”比较适合一些。

Feng Xin-ming 冯欣明

One of the criticisms leveled by Westerners and, far more vehemently, by Westernized Chinese, at Chinese people in general is that they don’t “show love”. In fact, this theme is enlarged upon in a very unflattering manner in more than one novel written by Chinese-Americans about Chinese-Americans. The gist of the criticism is that traditional Chinese culture doesn’t value love and that therefore Chinese people are cold and incapable of feeling love.

西方人对华人的批评之一，就是华人“不表示爱”，而西化的华人对一般华人这批评更尤为激烈。事实上，美籍华人写的、关于美籍华人的小说，非常不赞扬地提及华人怎样不表示爱的，不只一本。批评的中心是，华人传统文化不重视爱，所以华人冷酷，没有能力感觉爱。

Sigh, that is not so! Traditional Chinese culture does value love, and Chinese people are capable of feeling love! It’s just that first, traditional Chinese culture considers obligations, which are objective and are defined by the objectively existing relationship, to come before love, a subjective feeling, and second, because of the foregoing, Chinese people don’t need to express love in the very demonstrative ways that Westerners express it. Traditional Chinese culture makes Chinese people secure in that should one day the subjective feeling of love towards them not be felt by the other party in the relationship, that doesn’t mean the relationship will come crashing to an end. The relationship continues as long as one continues to fulfill one’s relationship-defined obligations. Thus one expresses love by fulfilling one’s obligations with all one’s heart and soul. In traditional Chinese culture, in the novels, plays, and stories, what is sung in praise to is the behavior of fulfilling one’s obligations with all one’s heart and soul regardless of difficulty or sacrifice, while the subjective feeling of love is included in and expressed by the objective behavior. Traditional Chinese culture puts objective behavior first and subjective feeling second.

唉，并非如此！华人传统文化确实重视爱，华人也有能力感觉爱！只不过是：第一，华人传统文化认为客观的、由客观存在的关系而规定的义务为先，爱这个主观的感觉为后，第二，正因如此，华人不需要像西方人那样，用很富于表达性的方法来表示爱。华人传统文化让华人们很放心，如果跟他们有关系的对方，有一天对他们不感觉爱，关系并不会因此就突然完蛋。只要坚持完成自己由关系所规定的义务，关系就会延持下去。因此，爱是用全心全力完成自己的义务来表示的。华人传统文化里，小说、戏剧、故事等歌颂的，就是这种不管困难或牺牲多大都用全心全力来完成义务的行为，而爱这主观的感觉，是包含和表现于行为之中的。华人传统文化把客观的行为放在前，把主观的感觉放在后。

Therefore, Chinese don’t need to always say “I love you”, to always kiss and embrace in front of others, like Westerners do. On the contrary, Chinese feel that such things are creepy, like they are phony, part of an act. Chinese people fulfill their obligations and duties every day with whole heart and soul, with an attitude that’s both reverent and joyful, and such is their expression of love.

因此，华人不需要好像西方人那样，常说着“我爱你”，常在人家面前接吻、拥抱。相反地，华人觉得这些东西肉麻，好像是假的、演戏般的。华人们带着恭谨喜悦的心情，聚尽全心全力来完成每天的义务、责任，这就是他们爱的表示。

So, yes, in traditional Chinese culture love is important, indeed very important; it’s just that love is not supreme, not important above all else, the way Western culture has it. Traditional Chinese culture puts love in its proper place.

所以，爱在华人传统文化里的确重要，而且很重要，只不过，爱不是至上的，不是好像西方文化那样，比任何事情都更为重要的。传统的华人文化把爱放在适当的地位。

It’s not just traditional Chinese culture that’s like this; traditional Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese cultures are also like this, in a word, all the Asian cultures that have revered Confucius are like this.

不仅华人的传统文化如此，韩国、日本、越南的传统文化也如此，总之，亚洲文化凡是曾敬奉过孔子的都如此。

Feng Xin-ming
冯欣明

With a heavy heart we think of the victims of the earthquake in China: the dead, the missing, the homeless, the dispossessed, and their families. Likewise we mourn the victims of the cyclone in Myanmar. These are sad, sad tragedies. So many lives, wiped out or severely damaged. No one who is associated with Asia could be untouched by these calamities.

In fact, the whole world is touched, and moved. I was in Paris recently, and when I told the cab driver, who was originally from Mali in Africa, that I was Chinese he said, “Ah, yes, the great earthquake – so sad!” When I went to visit the famous Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris as a tourist the priests at Mass were praying for the victims of the earthquake in China. Great indeed is the feeling of brotherhood among people all over the world!

Di Zi Gui tells us that “We must love all who are human: we are covered by the same sky and borne by the same earth.” In this admonition to universal love and charity traditional Chinese culture is no different from traditional Western culture, where the admonition is to love all humans because they are all children of God.

May the earthquake victims be comforted; may they know that the whole world thinks of them.

Feng Xin-ming

Back in my blog of March 31, 2007, I said that in today’s world, we need to recognize a sixth Cardinal Relationship ( 第六伦, or 第六倫 in complicated script), that between buyer and seller. In my blog of April 5, 2007, I listed the Cardinal Obligations the two parties owe each other in this Sixth Cardinal Relationship: the buyer is obliged to pay on time and in the amounts promised for the good or service bought, and to make clear what he wants and expects. The seller is obliged to deliver the good or service on time and in the amounts and quality promised. I also said that this Cardinal Relation includes the relationship between employer and employee; the employer is the buyer and the employee is the seller. When it comes to the teacher and the student (or parent), the student (or parent) is the buyer and the teacher the seller.

Some people have commented that they don’t see why lowly buying and selling is so important that it should be elevated to a Cardinal Relationship. Doesn’t buying and selling inherently involve cheating? As for saying that the relationship between the teacher and the student is part of buying and selling, why, they say, that’s outright cheapening of a relationship held to be sacred in traditional Chinese Confucian thinking. Haven’t I heard of the old adage, “be my teacher for one day, be my father all my life” (“ 一日为师，终身为父” or “ 一日為師，終身為父” in complicated script)?

Just to refresh the reader’s memory, the other five Cardinal Relationships (五伦, or 五倫 in complicated script) are between: government and citizen (ruler and subject), parents and offspring, sibling and sibling, husband and wife, and friend and friend. Their mutual Cardinal Obligations I’ve talked about in my blogs from February 25 to April 2, 2007.

Well, I think that not only do we merely need, but also we need desperately, to recognize the relationship between buyer and seller as a Cardinal one.

For one thing, as I’ve discussed in my blog of April 5, 2007, buying and selling is truly mutual help on the grandest scale. Indeed, far from being a “cheap” act, buying and selling is the sacred act that has transformed humans from a stage when life was short, brutal and barbaric, to the stage now, when life is quite a bit more civil, enlightened and comfortable. And no, cheating is not an inherent part of buying and selling. Please see my blogs of Nov. 4 and 17, 2007 on how honesty and integrity is the only way to make money in a sustained way and on how shopping around will keep one safe from cheating. No, buying and selling is a sacred act of mutual help. Such a sacred and important act must be recognized as belonging to a Cardinal Relationship.

Second, where there is prevalent recognition of buying and selling as being honorable and respectable, where sellers and buyers are usually honest and usually don’t cheat, the society is relatively rich, and where the opposite is prevalent, the society is poor. It is not an accident; it is cause and effect. In the old days, when China has been one of the richest, if not the richest, country in the world, the attitude prevalent in society has been that one must be honest, must not be greedy, and must not cheat. In the past, Chinese businessmen have had a sterling reputation for honesty, fairness, and being true to their word. By enshrining buying and selling into a Cardinal Relationship we will contribute to the development of society and the progress of mankind.

Third, a lot of Chinese and Asians in Asia in general operate in business according to the thinking that you need to become friends first, and then you can do business. That’s why you have to go to all those drinking parties and boys’ nights out (including brothels) to do business in Asia. They often can’t just sign the contract, and on the basis of promises made and monies paid, do business with people who are not emotionally bonded except on a working, formal basis. If you are not emotionally bonded with them they just might, or actually they think that you’ll think they just might, cheat you, and they think you just might cheat them. I think that’s bad for work hours, for the health of the businessmen involved, and the whole setup discriminates against females, who can’t go on boys’ nights out the same way as males. Recognizing buying and selling as a Cardinal Relationship will correct that situation, make life much better for businessmen, and enable females to participate in Asian business in a more equal footing.

As for “be my teacher for one day, be my father all my life”, I know where that comes from: it comes from the same cultish places in traditional China where the cultish aberrations of xiao (being good to parents) come from. It’s that intellectual trend that started around 1000 C.E. to change Confucianism from a set of practical and reasonable tenets into a metaphysical cult of absolutes and excesses. Hey, listen, if it’s true that being one’s teacher for one day makes that person into one’s father for life, then what about the even older adage, from Confucius’ Analects no less (Chapter Shu Er, or 《论语：述而》/《論語：述而》), that “when I am in a group of three, there has to be someone who’s my teacher” (“ 三人行，必有我师焉” or “ 三人行，必有我師焉” in complicated script)? Then one acquires fathers every day? Maybe even several times a day? Hey, I think that making one’s teacher into one’s father is an act of luan lun ( 乱伦 / 亂倫) or mixing up of the Cardinal Relations. Yes, yes, I know they use the term luan lun to mean incest nowadays, but I am using the term in its original meaning in The Analects and other traditional Chinese writings.* So no, I don’t think I cheapen or besmirch the sacred role of teachers at all when I include teaching in the just as sacred buyer-seller, Sixth Cardinal Relationship.

Yes, time to recognize the actually sacred act of buying and selling as part of the just as sacred Cardinal Relations, with sacred Cardinal Obligations.

Feng Xin-ming, May 11, 2008, minor edits June 21, 2008
——————–
* See Ci Hai词海 / 辭海，Shanghai, 1989, p. 2107, under the entry 乱伦 / 亂倫.

Well, as soon as I talk about “brothers are like one’s own limbs”, I am presented with that cynical Chinese saying: “Brothers are like one’s limbs; spouses are like mere clothes ( 兄弟如手足，夫妇如衣服).” Yes, I’ve heard it before, from mistaken Chinese women criticizing traditional Chinese culture.

Why, that saying is downright untrue: traditional Chinese culture never denigrates the relationship between husband and wife to be mere clothes! At every wedding, the traditional Chinese wish is “to grow old with white hair together, to forever unite the hearts as one ( 白头皆老，永结同心).” So what are these people talking about?

Well, actually, they then say, the problem is that with the advocacy of family closeness in traditional Chinese culture, while the men have deep feelings for even their brothers there are no comparable feelings for the wives. This, it is said, proves that women must always engage in a bitter rivalry with their husbands’ relatives for affection and devotion. It’s either the wife or the in-laws, there’s no having both.

Ah, so that’s the problem! Tsk, tsk, tsk, when looked at from the viewpoint of traditional, Confucian ideology, how foolish for a woman to set herself up against her own in-laws! It is very foolish to view relations among people as a zero-sum game: if one loves his brothers the more, one must love his wife the less, and vice versa. Only fools live their lives as zero-sum games. No, the matter should be viewed this way instead: how much better for one’s husband if he has not only his wife’s love, but also that of his brothers!

True, true, back in the old days some (not all!) in-laws had been bad to the wives. But that happened not when the core Confucian principles were being followed, it happened when they were being violated! It is in accordance with the core Confucian principles for husband and wife to love each other deeply; it is a deviancy from the same principles for husbands to have “no feelings” for their wives.

From the point of view of the core Confucian principle of Cardinal Obligations being supreme, there is no conflict of interest between a wife and her in-laws. Her husband owes her the obligation of building a life together, just as she owes him the same obligation in return. He and his brothers mutually owe each other the obligation of mutual help and mutual support, and that can only be in line with the wife’s interest of building a good life together with her husband! The fact is that, far from having a fundamental conflict of interest, a woman and her in-laws have a fundamental convergence of interest. That’s why both the negative saying about in-laws and the negative attitude towards in-laws, as foolish as both are cynical, should be completely discarded.

Feng Xin-ming

“Brothers are like one’s own limbs” (兄弟如手足) is an old Chinese saying that all kids brought up in the traditional Chinese way know by heart. Of course, nowadays, the sexes having to be explicitly mentioned equally in our speech, we would have to say “siblings are like one’s own limbs” since just saying “brothers” is no longer considered to also include the feminine equivalent, i.e. sisters. At any rate, kids brought up the traditional Chinese way know the saying by heart because everyone who is an elder to them, as well as all the culture around them, i.e. parents, grandparents, teachers, relatives, textbooks, books for children, magazines for children, and so forth, drill the saying into the kids over and over. All around the kids the prevailing, traditional Chinese culture emphasizes that siblings must love each other, stick by each other, help each other, and work together with each other their entire lives.

Children brought up the traditional Chinese way are told the story of the king who summoned all his sons, the seven princes. He gave each prince one arrow to break, which was done easily. Then he gave each seven arrows bundled together to break, which none could do. “Ah,” the king said, “Each one of you by yourself can be broken easily, but if you all unite and pull together, you will never be broken.”

Kids raised in the traditional Chinese way know that they are lucky to have siblings and know to treasure and value siblings. Whether they actually always do it or not, kids raised in the traditional Chinese way know that the older siblings are supposed to help and guide the younger ones, and that the younger siblings are supposed to be respectful to the older ones. They know that siblings should not fight, that it is wrong to fight, and that it is very shameful for siblings to fight.

Never, never do they hear from their elders or from school that it’s natural for siblings to engage in hostilities or even to physically fight because it’s “sibling rivalry”! Never, never is fighting among siblings tolerated with mere annoyance or even condoned with a chuckle. If it comes to light that siblings have been fighting, there is always reprimand. Unlike today’s parents who rely on their natural maternal or paternal instinct, which favors the younger child, and thus always scold the older child for not having been accommodating enough to the younger one no matter how unreasonable, for kids raised in the traditional Chinese way the younger one is always in the wrong to have hit the older one for the younger one is to treat the older sibling with respect.

Yes, kids raised the traditional Chinese way know they are to treat, whether they always practice it or not, siblings like one’s own limbs.

By the way, that wasn’t so long ago: I was a child in Asia in the early sixties and I was engulfed in that traditional Chinese culture. I guess it simply disappeared during the seventies.

Feng Xin-ming

In the relationship between parents and offspring, again traditional Chinese culture is liberating and empowering.

True, true, I know that a lot of people nowadays mistakenly think that traditional Chinese culture is oppressive, despotic, and downright abusive when it comes to parents and offspring, and almost all the modern Chinese novelists and playwrights portray it thus – why, just turn on the TV and watch a Chinese soap opera and you’ll see how horrible “feudalism” is – but that’s all nonsense and distortion. Since the 1900’s many Chinese intellectuals have seized upon aberrations and deviants in traditional Chinese society – now which society doesn’t have aberrations and deviants – and portray them as being representative. Some of these intellectuals even wildly distort and misrepresent Chinese culture. The sad thing is that, being weak, backward and poor, Chinese civilization hasn’t been able to speak up for itself. Today, with the Chinese Cultural Renaissance beginning, that’s going to change…

At any rate, the reason that traditional Chinese culture liberates and empowers in the parent-offspring relationship is that with the always-reciprocal relationship-defined obligations being supreme instead of some subjective feeling called love, one doesn’t have to worry about the fickleness of emotions. As in marriage, one doesn’t have to panic over what to do, or whether one is doing the right thing. The obligations are clear and well defined both on the parents’ end and on the offspring’s end. The parents’ obligations are to raise and educate the offspring to the best extent possible. The offspring’s obligations are to cooperate with this raising and educating, to strive to do his or her best in conduct and career, to help the parents, and to support and care for the parents when they are old and infirm.

The criteria for whether obligations are carried out or not are objective and verifiable, and are not some subjective “feeling” inside people’s head called “love”. With objective relationship-defined obligations, it isn’t hard to substantiate whether a parent is, say, raising and educating the offspring, while with love, it is hard to get inside someone’s head and confirm that there is or there is not love there. Sometimes even the person himself or herself is confused: hence the perennial question: do I love him, or do I love him not? And if we go according to the modern Western paradigm of “love” being supreme, one comes to this question: if I don’t love my parents, should I have anything to do with them? With traditional Chinese culture, one is liberated from the groundless insecurities over the existence of “love,” and the horribly mistaken conclusions to which these insecurities lead.

Actually, those positive feelings of deep attachment to and profound willingness to do things for someone, feelings that are generally considered to constitute love, arise anyways, naturally, in both parties, in the course of their fulfilling the always-reciprocal relationship-defined obligations day in, day out. It is not necessary to “cultivate love” and curry favor with one’s offspring or one’s parents; it is only necessary to carry out one’s obligations, faithfully, every day.

Feng Xin-ming

That it is truly liberating and empowering for traditional Chinese culture to insist on always carrying out one’s Cardinal Obligations to the other party in one’s Cardinal Relations no matter what one’s subjective feelings such as “love” are (see my blogs from Feb. 27 to April 29, 2007) can be seen readily in the relationship called marriage.

In the Western tradition, love is supreme. Love is the supreme value that is put above all else. The problem with love being supreme is that love is a subjective feeling, and can change from time to time, especially when the going gets tough. In life, there will always be times when the going gets tough. Outside circumstances can turn adverse, people make mistakes, and life is full of misunderstandings. For long term relationships, such as family or spouse, there will always be a time when all looks black, when there seems to be no hope, or when anger takes precedence over all else. During those times one might not be able to feel a positive feeling, let alone love, towards the other party. Of course, eventually the hard times will be over, so if in the interim the parties have persisted and carried on fulfilling their obligations towards each other, feelings will change again and love will return. In the Western world, however, long before that stage is reached, one will say, “I don’t love this person any more; why am I still with him/her?” Of course, according to Western thinking, it is “dishonest” and “not honorable” to stay in a marriage “devoid of love.” And so one picks up and leaves one’s spouse, and the marriage is over.

In traditional Chinese culture, however, the relationship-defined Cardinal Obligations are supreme. Relationships exist objectively and are not subject to subjective feelings. Whether someone is one’s parent, or sibling, or spouse is objectively determined, and doesn’t change no matter what one’s feelings are towards that person. Therefore, during the hard times, each party in the relationship continues to carry out the obligations toward the other party, regardless of feeling.

The wonderful thing in this is that when the two parties in a relationship carry out their obligations toward each other, positive feelings will appear and grow. It is something that is independent of subjective will. And then after the hard times are over, love returns and this love is stronger and deeper than ever. It now is a love that has been tested and is rooted in overcoming common adversity and misunderstanding. It is a love that has been nurtured by self-sacrifice, magnanimity, faith and humility on the part of both parties. It is a truer, more mature love. Happy indeed are those who can enjoy this far deeper, far truer love! And it will be thanks to the Chinese tradition of putting the relationship-defined obligations, instead of love, above all else.

In the Western or Westernized marriage, people are always trying to keep and cultivate the other party’s love. People are fearful that they might lose the other party’s love. There is insecurity, and whether the relationship lasts is not within one’s control. “What if he/she meets someone else and falls in love?” When someone of the opposite sex comes around one’s spouse, one gets all flustered and anxious - anyone could be a predator. One must always try to “show love,” to “keep the love going,” to “stay in love with each other.” All this anxiety and striving to please and “hang onto” one’s spouse invariably results in resentment.

In the Chinese tradition, however, one can be secure that the relationship holds as long as one stays in the relationship and as long as one carries out one’s obligations to the other party. There is no need to be fearful about losing the other party to some “wilting of love.” One can relax, be oneself and enjoy one’s spouse. As long as one is the other’s spouse, the other person owes one the Cardinal Obligations. Of course, one owes the other person the reciprocal obligations. Unlike whether one can keep one’s spouse “in love with” oneself, which involves the spouse’s subjective feelings and are not entirely within one’s control, whether one carries out one’s obligations is entirely within one’s control.

Therefore, in the Chinese tradition, there is a lot more security in marriage and permits a lot more relaxed enjoyment of marriage.

Not only is this liberating and empowering, but also this is far better for the growth and development of true love.

Feng Xin-ming

Happy New Year! It’s already 2008! Hey, we are one year further into the beginning of the Chinese cultural Renaissance that will mark the next couple of centuries, and that’s something to celebrate for sure!

Well, let’s deal with a charge levied by those who have misunderstood traditional Chinese culture that the traditional Chinese/Confucian teachings, like the ones in Di Zi Gui , are oppressive and take away personal freedom. Why do, say, offspring have to be xiao (good to their parents)? Why do subjects have to obey their governments? Why do wives have to respect their husbands? Where’s choice? Where’s freedom?

Well, for one thing, the traditional Confucian teachings about offspring being xiao, subjects being obedient, and wives being respectful don’t mean blind and abject submission the way people nowadays so wrongly think. It’s right there in the Confucian classics: offspring, subjects and wives all have the duty to voice opposition and dissuade parents, governments, and husbands, respectively, from moral unrighteousness. So it’s not blind obedience that the authentic, as opposed to the misrepresented, old Confucian teachings teach.

For another thing, for every imperative to discharge an obligation there’s a reciprocal imperative for the other party to discharge a reciprocal obligation: while offspring have to be xiao, parents have to be kind; while subjects have to obey the government, the government has to be competent and to listen to the subjects; while wives have to respect their husbands, husbands also have to respect their wives.

So where is the oppression? Where’s the lack of freedom? Or of choice?

Well, actually, our critics reply, the problem is, why does traditional Chinese Confucianism insist that offspring must be xiao, subjects must be obedient, and wives must be respectful, no matter how they feel about it? Why do they have to do all that even if they dislike, despise, or even hate their parents, or governments, or husbands? Isn’t that oppressive? What about choice? What about freedom?

Aha! So that’s it! You are criticizing the Confucian teachings, good sirs and madams, because they say that people should carry out their Cardinal Obligations, no matter how they may feel towards the other party in the Cardinal Relationship! You are absolutely right; Confucian teachings do insist that one carries out one’s Cardinal Obligations no matter what one’s subjective feelings are towards the other party in the Cardinal Relations: offspring must be good to their parents, subjects must obey their governments, and wives must respect their husbands, even if there’s “no love in the relationship.”

So the real complaint by those who characterize, wrongly of course, Confucian teachings as oppressive and anti-freedom is that Confucianism places obligations above “love.” And when “love” is not allowed to have free, supreme sway, when one cannot act according to one’s subjective feelings of the moment, then why, our critics say, that’s unfree! That’s oppression!

Yes, yes, true, absolutely true: quite unlike the modern day insistence by the Westernized world, i.e. most of today’s world, that some subjective feeling loosely characterized as “love” hold supreme sway over human relationships, Confucianism teaches that the Relationship-Defined Cardinal Obligations hold supreme sway over human relationships. (See my blogs from Feb. 27 to April 29 of 2007.) Why, even if there’s “no love” between two spouses, at least not for the time being, they must discharge their obligations towards one another of respect and of building a life and a family together. Yes, quite true, that’s what our critics are complaining about: they want the “freedom” to pick and choose whether and when they need to discharge their obligations in a relationship, as well as which obligations to discharge, but no, Confucianism is against that. For Confucianism, being in a relationship means you must discharge all your obligations at all times to the other party. Faithfully. Without fail.

And this very insistence by traditional Chinese culture, by Confucianism, misrepresented as being oppressive and anti-freedom, is actually, exactly, the most liberating and empowering of all traditional Chinese, i.e. Confucian, precepts. Imagine: as long as you keep discharging your obligations, the other party is obliged to discharge his or her obligations to you in return! How liberating! How empowering! This is true freedom! Freedom from fear, from insecurity, from the capriciousness of fancy and fickle feelings of the moment, in a word, from the myriad ills that human relationships in today’s Westernized world are prey and captive to.

We’ll elaborate further on this liberating and empowering aspect of traditional Chinese culture, of Confucianism, in blogs to come.

Feng Xin-ming

Merry Christmas everyone! Hey, I live in the West, and a lot of people I know celebrate Christmas. And traditional Chinese teachings like Confucianism are secular and, as far as I can tell, are compatible with most religions.

Hey, besides Christmas, there’s something else to celebrate: the beginnings of a Chinese cultural Renaissance. Here’s an excerpt from the Tsoi Dug Foundation’s reply to a reader, who wrote wondering if the textual differences on the various Di Zi Gui websites might cause people to doubt and lose faith in the old Chinese teachings:

What has made most people doubt and lose faith in the old Chinese teachings is not the minor discrepancies among texts, which have been recognized and accepted for centuries in China, but the sad fact that during the past century these teachings have been blamed, wrongly of course, for China’s backwardness and despotism.

The good news is that today people are starting to turn back and look at these old Chinese teachings again, and the rediscovery of and renewed interest in Di Zi Gui is just part of this cultural phenomenon. Today we have the good fortune of witnessing the beginnings of a Chinese cultural Renaissance.

Just as in the cultural Renaissance of the West from the 13th to the 17th centuries, one voice cannot a renaissance make. While everyone pulls in the same general direction there will be much diversity, because there will be mass participation. And it will be diversity and mass participation that gives the Chinese Renaissance its strength and vitality. When spring arrives, a hundred flowers will bloom - 春臨大地日，百花齊放時。

Tsoi Dug Foundation

What I like to emphasize is that the popularity of Di Zi Gui in the last few years is part and parcel of the Chinese cultural Renaissance that we are witnessing.

Hurray! Cheers!

Feng Xin-Ming

There is a totally unfounded idea among a lot of people that xiao means blind obedience. Why, just the other day someone came up to me and said, we can’t just say xiao; we’ve got to say xiao for modern people, because nowadays you can’t have just blind obedience. Goodness! Does xiao mean blind submission to authority? Is that what the sages have taught?

No, definitely not. As we can see from just Di Zi Gui (“Rules for Students”) alone, even such a text, meant to be a primer for children, teaches that parents may be wrong sometimes. Moreover, Di Zui Gui teaches that when parents are being unrighteous, xiao requires offspring to remonstrate and dissuade. Di Zi Gui (see P. 9) actually spends a lot of time on how to remonstrate and dissuade, and on persisting in doing so even if one incurs wrath and punishment from one’s parents.

One of the most important Confucian works, the “Annotations to the Thirteen Classics (十三經注疏)”, says that there are three things that are very un-xiao, and one of them is to blindly obey one’s parents even when there is error and thus to entrap one’s parents in moral unrighteousness. (於禮有不孝者三，事謂阿意曲從，陷亲不義，一不孝也。)

In Xiao Jing (孝經), when Confucius is asked whether if a son is obedient to his parents, then he should be considered xiao, Confucius says, “What kind of talk is that? What kind of talk is that? (是何言歟？是何言歟？)” Then he goes on to explain that having a son who will remonstrate and dissuade keeps a father from falling into moral unrighteousness.

Thus, no, xiao has never meant blind obedience and blind submission, not in the old days, and not now.

Feng Xin-ming

(“Whenever one speaks, trustworthiness comes first; lying and pretending to know, how can one do such things? 凡出言，信為先；詐與妄，奚可焉。” Di Zi Gui, p.20.)

Today I read in this article that Asian countries, while enamored with China’s economic power and peaceable overtures, are nonetheless repelled by China’s “opaque domestic politics and LACK OF BUSINESS ETHICS (capitals mine).” According to the article, today’s prevalent Asian view of China and Chinese conduct is this:

…it is everything goes—precisely because, yes, everything goes—no good credit checking system, no well-placed fear of violating good norms, one can get away with cheating, et cetera.

Good grief! For a country that has for millennia prided itself on being “the Land of Courtesy and Integrity,” is this not utterly shameful? What happened to the legendary Chinese businessman’s reputation for honesty? What happened to the traditional Chinese practice of trustworthiness, of xin 信?!

Well, it is the sad, sad story of a proud, upstanding culture, having sunk into degeneracy during the twentieth century. It is the sad, sad story of a brilliant thousands-year old code of ethics wrongly blamed for the backwardness of its adherents, the Chinese under the imperial dynasties, who would actually have been far more backward had it not been for exactly this code of ethics. In probably the greatest erroneous verdict in human history, this marvelous code has been rejected and wrongly condemned by its very beneficiaries, the Chinese themselves. It is time that this code of ethics, much of it expressed in succinct form by Di Zi Gui, be re-embraced by the very descendants of those who have created it in millennia past.

Yes, today’s Chinese must return to these ethics if China is to regain its stature and the high respect rightfully accorded China by other countries during centuries past.

Feng Xin-ming

(“Whenever one speaks, trustworthiness（xin 信）comes first; lying and pretending to know, how can one do such things? 凡出言，信為先；詐與妄，奚可焉。” Di Zi Gui, p.20 )

Of course, in traditional China, back in the old days, it was of utmost importance to educated people that they were honest and trustworthy. “Without trustworthiness a person has no standing (人無信不立).” Promises were considered things a Good Man must keep: “A promise from a Good Man is worth a thousand ounces of gold (君子一諾千金).” There were many moving stories of people in traditional China who made big sacrifices to carry out their promises.

Of course, honesty and keeping promises was legendary among traditional Chinese merchants and businessmen back in the old days. One mutual salute (they didn’t shake hands back then) and the deal was as good as gold. That trustworthiness and integrity had been one big factor why Chinese businessmen had been so successful in Southeast Asia.

Yes, when a country is rich and powerful, as China has been back in the old days, its people tend to be honest and trustworthy. Of course, that’s because the people being honest is a major factor, perhaps even the decisive factor, in enabling the country to be rich in the first place.

Feng Xin-ming

(”Whenever one speaks, trustworthiness（xin 信）comes first; lying and pretending to know, how can one do such things? 凡出言，信為先；詐與妄，奚可焉。” Di Zi Gui, p.20 )

One thing that has struck me living in the US versus living in Canada is that in the US people generally place more value on honesty in their everyday dealings and in their outlook. For example, during the impeachment of President Clinton, most Americans I talked to, even strong Democrats, were quite incensed that President Clinton had been dishonest during the investigation of his sex scandal. It was very instructive: people were not angry at his sex scandal but at his attempts to mislead. In contrast, during the Quebec Liberal government corruption scandal in Canada, in response to the outcry from the opposition parties, Prime Minister Chretien came right out in public and said to the media, “So we tried to cover up some bribes, so what?!” And Canadians thought that it was fine to have a little dishonesty as long as it helped fight Quebec separatism. Another example is the way people view professional hockey: there’s a lot of fighting, illegal checking from the back, and other such non-rule-abiding behavior that have been very important to winning in professional hockey. Professional hockey is immensely popular in Canada, and most Canadian hockey fans I’ve talked to say that fighting and illegal checking is part of the sport. On the other hand, professional hockey is not very popular in the US because Americans can’t stand all that fighting and rule breaking. In fact, to get hockey to become more popular in the US, back in the 1990’s professional hockey have made a lot of rule changes such that fights and illegal checking are now much rarer. Thanks to the US market, the once commonplace “bench-clearing” fights, where everyone on both teams come onto the ice to fight, have now disappeared. Moreover, in day-to-day dealings with people, with businesses, with institutions, I’ve found that people in the US are stricter about honesty, especially people who are more educated and have higher social status.

Why is that? It got me thinking. I think it’s because the US is the country with the most free-market leaning ideology in the world. Now in free markets people make a living by providing service or merchandise to their customers, not by fawning upon some politically powerful figure, getting into his good graces, and then having him give you some kind of lordship over economic resources, as happens in command economies and socialistic countries. Therefore in market economies one must be trustworthy, sell honest merchandise and charge honest prices, not taking advantage of even the very aged or the very young. Only then can there be exchange of equal values, exchange of mutual benefit, and prosperity and wealth in the society as a whole. If one uses trickery and deception to cheat others of the fruits of their sweat and toil, instead of using one’s own sweat and toil to create concrete benefits with which to exchange with others for the fruits of their sweat and toil, then how can the market continue? The market order will be destroyed, as will prosperity and the whole social order. That’s why free markets value honesty and despise dishonesty.

That’s why honesty is especially important for success and happiness for people who live in market economies.

Feng Xin-ming