Confucius returns

How is Confucius being reinstated?

As part of a drive to restore Confucian teachings to the heart of China’s cultural life, the state is funding a £16m film about the sage, who will be played by Chow Yun-Fat, the tough-guy star of Hong Kong gangster movies. Confucian texts are being pushed to the fore in uni-versities and schools. Confucius Institutes (modelled on the British Council) have been set up in more than 50 countries to promote Chinese culture. Even prisoners are now taught Confucian principles to keep them on the straight and narrow. The Beijing Institute of Genomics has even compiled a database of descendants of the great man, to clarify who among 1.3 billion people can claim a blood link.

And just who was Confucius?

Born in 551BC in the small state of Lu in northeast China, into a poor but noble family, he worked as a cowherd, clerk and book-keeper before rising, at the age of 53, to become Lu’s Justice Minister. According to the 2nd century BC historian Sima Qian, the rival state of Qi, worried that Lu was becoming too powerful, sought to undermine its Duke by sending him a gift of 80 dancing girls. For three days the Duke indulged himself, neglecting his official duties. So Confucius left Lu to seek a more worthy master.

And did he succeed in his quest?

No. Though he acquired many disciples in the course of his 12-year journey round China, he couldn’t find his Philosopher King; he died in 479BC with no hope for the future of civili-sation. Scholars now believe he never actually wrote anything down; his teachings (see box), passed down by his disciples who had no trouble “recalling” extra ones after his death, have survived as a collection of small aphoristic fragments, The Analects. Unlike Christ, Confucius was not a religious teacher: his counsels and maxims are concerned with the orderly conduct of life in this world, rather than with hopes and fears for the next.

So he was something of a conservative?

And then some. He stressed the ideals of harmony and obedience, based on his concept of “virtue” – ie honouring one’s family, obeying one’s social superiors, and being honest. He deplored innovation, scorned the idea of progress, and hoped for a society where learning, study and ceremony would be put before pleasure, profit and power. His ideal system of govern-ment was one run by an honest bureaucracy under a bene-volent prince committed to public duty. Governments should rule through a well understood system of li (rites) based on immemorial custom rather than bribery, coercion or even laws, which he saw as making people act out of shameless self-interest. He believed in making people virtuous by example, not punishment.

How did his ideas take hold?

The Han emperors (206BC-220AD) and their successors valued his emphasis on