Prepare To Be Beaten, Dead Horse!

So I've been somewhat reticent lately, and there have been a couple of good reasons for this--most important, though, is the simple reason that I haven't really had anything very interesting to say recently.  This is mostly because the dissertation is using up most of my creative energy, and given that I've blogged on many of the topics covered in the dissertation, I don't want to keep covering the same thing over and over (especially because, among other things, blogging is a way to avoid said dissertation).

Anyway--looking back over the heap of past blog posts here at "Unpolished Jade", I realized there was a project I was involved in some time ago which I'd completely forgotten about, and which I think it's about time to resurrect.  I had been giving translations and interpretations of passages from the Analects.  Now, in renewing this project, I think I will take a slightly different approach.  Namely, instead of simply going through the Analects passage by passage (this can get kinda tedious, especially when dealing with passages like the Book 10 "if the mats weren't properly positioned, he wouldn't sit" type of thing), I will focus on what I take to be interesting or important passages from the Analects (I know, I know--they're all interesting and important...).  Also, I will try to integrate (in a way I didn't before) some of the traditional commentaries in my discussions on the passages.  Of course, I will do this in a different way than Slingerland does it in his translation of the Analects--I will mention them in order to critically engage with them, rather than as ways to explain the text.  I was converted about a year or so ago to the view that the traditional commentaries are indispensable for understanding the Analects, even if mainly because many of the main interpretive options are descended from views outlined in the commentaries.  So I'll probably be wrestling with the Analects and some commentary, especially He Yan's  論語集解 (Lunyu jijie) and Zhu Xi's 論語集住 (Lunyu jizhu), along with other Zhu works, because I think Zhu Xi's impact on early Confucian interpretation was massive, and, maybe, underestimated by some philosophers, or at least not dealt with as often as I'd like.  I haven't completely lost my marbles and bought into the Neo-Confucian readings of the Analects, however, so expect resistance on this front.

One final matter--if there are any Analects passages any readers of "Unpolished Jade" are interested in, send them along, and I'll give my best shot at some interpretation.  This blog is nothing if not a springboard for further thoughts.  I have my pet passages (which I'll be sure to get in), and I'm sure everyone who reads this blog has their own as well.  So let's get Confucianizing!  I think I'll deal with 2.3 first--expect something on this in the next day or so.  A nice passage to begin with, I think, given my interest in Confucius and behavioral situationism.

Phronimos, We Hardly Knew Ye

On Chris Panza's blog a week or so ago, Aristotle's ethics came up during a discussion on Confucius and possible distinctions within the concept of ren or that of the junzi (check it out).  This got me to thinking about Aristotle and a problem I took him to solve in the Nicomachean Ethics by way of his distinction between natural virtue and full virtue—namely, the problem of how a person with a particular “virtue” (I use the scare quotes here to mark the ambiguity of the term 'virtue' here) could ever perform a non-virtuous action, or one not in keeping with that virtue, in unguarded moments, etc.  Here's what I say about Aristotle in a comment to the post:

He considers cases in which one has a disposition to act a certain way, but external forces keep one from performing the acts one intends to, or other considerations (for example, one act is even more virtuous than another) get in the way.

If I remember correctly, he goes so far as to say that if a person is thwarted in this way from performing virtuous action very often, then the disposition that person has toward this action does not count as a virtue. He is able to maintain this (although it’s not explicit, but has to be interpreted) due to his distinction between “natural virtue” and “full virtue”. 

So, after looking back through the NE after my move back to Connecticut, I noticed that Aristotle never actually explicitly says anything that exciting, but I think we can construct this interpretation of what Aristotle does say in various passages in the NE.  I'd simply been reading Aristotle this way so long that I thought he said it outright.  Anyway, here's some argument:

The key passage for the natural virtue/full virtue distinction is NE 1144b1-1145a6.  Here he explains that the difference between natural virtue and full virtue is phronesis, possession of which unifies the virtues and makes a natural disposition a full virtue.  The phronimos of necessity possesses all the virtues together.  One might possess some natural virtues without others, however.  These natural virtues seem from this passage to simply be the same thing as the full virtues without the unity to other virtues, without rationality leading them, or without requiring successful virtuous acts connected with the naturally virtuous disposition one has “of nature” (something one's born with, perhaps).  

If we then consider what Aristotle says about external goods and their relation to eudaimonia, in Book  I in NE 1098b32-1099a5 and NE 1099a32-b8, we can begin to see how the connection is made.  It's worth the space here to quote one of the above passages fully (Ross/Urmson translation):

(NE 1099a32-b8) “...it [happiness] needs the external goods as well; for it is impossible, or not easy, to do noble acts without the proper equipment.  In many actions we use friends and riches and political power as instruments; and there are some things the lack of which takes the lustre from blessednes, as good birth, satisfactory children, beauty; for the man who is very ugly in appearance or ill-born or solitary and childless is hardly happy, and perhaps a man would be still less so if he had thoroughly bad children or friends or had lost good children or friends by death.  As we said, then, happiness seems to need this sort of prosperity in addition; for which reason some identify happiness with good fortune, though others identify it with excellence.”

Keeping this in mind, let's return to virtue.  For the cultivation of the virtues, it is necessary to practice virtuous acts, as Aristotle explains at NE 1103a26-b2:

“...of all the things that come to us by nature we first aquire the potentiality and later exhibit the activity [...] but excellences we get by first exercising them, as also happens in the case of the arts as well.  For the things we have to learn before we can do, we learn by doing, e.g. men become builders by building and lyre-players by playing the lyre; so too we become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.”

Thus, one might have “natural virtue” in the sense of having a disposition toward generosity, etc., but if they are unable (for whatever reason) to practice generous acts, they cannot gain the full virtue of generosity.  Aristotle can sensibly maintain this by employing the distinction between natural virtue and full virtue, although he doesn't mention this distinction until much later in the NE.  One may not have a particular virtue (although one does have a disposition toward it) simply because one does not have the opportunity to practice acts connected with the disposition—for example, a completely poor person may have a disposition toward generosity, but without the opportunity to transform this disposition (a mere natural virtue) into a full virtue through practice (which seems that it must be connected to the habituation to reasons), the poor person cannot be generous in the full-blown sense.  The opportunity spoken of here is also related to the need for external goods mentioned above in NE 1098b32-1099a5 and NE 1099a32-b8.  That doesn't mean this poor person has nothing, though—they have a natural virtue (I can see Aristotle saying “and this is better than nothing...I guess...”).  Part of the process by which this natural virtue can become a full virtue, however, will have to do with gaining phronesis, and thus all the other virtues, without which one cannot be fully virtuous.

It seems to me Aristotle must have thought that there are plenty of people around who have various natural virtues, but that no one exists or probably had ever existed who was a phronimos.  In this way, we can liken the phronimos to Confucius' 聖人 sheng ren ("sage").  They are both ideals almost unattainable for real people.  But, although Confucius gives us the more attainable goal of becoming junzi, Aristotle seems only to offer the phronimos, giving us the pinnacle but nothing less.  Perhaps the idea here was that if we aim for the highest ideal, we'll get farther than if we aim for something lower, whereas Confucius took a more practical approach.

Anyway, this is the idea—any thoughts on this interpretation? Is this taking the natural virtue/full virtue distinction to do more work than Aristotle intended it to do? (this is one possible worry)

Does He Really Know Where the Ford Is?

As is my habit, I've been thinking recently about topics that have almost nothing to do with my dissertation (or very little to do with it, anyway).  In particular, I've been reflecting on the exchanges between Confucians and the Yangist-types in Book 18 of the Analects.  Lots of interesting questions arise around these exchanges, and I thought I would just lay a couple of them out here.   I make some attempt to answer them, but I'm still not completely satisfied with these answers.  Anyway, here goes:

1) Who are the non-Confucian characters in 18.5,  18.6, and 18.7 supposed to represent?  The Madman of Chu, of course, appears also in Zhuangzi, giving almost the same speech to Confucius as he does in 18.5, with a Zhuangzi-style twist.  It seems likely that the Zhuangzi passage is later than this one, written as a reaction to Analects 18.5, as it has the same cast of characters and appears stylistically like a parody of the Analects passage, which is following with Zhuangzi's style in general.  So, we should take 18.5, at least, as pre-Zhuangzi.  But how long pre-Zhuangzi?  

A.C. Graham thought that the passages may simply have shown us representatives of a more general tendency, derived from the folkish "shen nong" ideal, rather than a specific strain of philosophical thought such as Yangism, Laoism (for lack of a better term) or Zhuangism (ditto).  Although I don't have a solid argument for this, it seems to me the characters in Book 18 represent a more coherent philosophical tendency than that of shennong idealism.  Actually, I think there are three distinct arguments here by the Confucians in Book 18.  My own view is that Book 18 is roughly contemporary with Zhuangzi, which is why Zhuangzi gets milage out of lampooning it.  In addition, the three key passages from Book 18 are meant to present arguments against three types of "Yangist-like" movements.  18.5 is against the "Laoist", 18.6 is against the "Yangist/Zhuangist", and 18.7 against the general "shennong idealist".

This is more speculation than anything at this point.  I have no strong textual argument for this yet, but it's based mainly on some hunches I get from looking at the responses of the non-Confucian characters in each of these passages.  In 18.5, for example, the Madman of Chu laments the weakening of de 德 and suggests as a remedy that we recognize 來 者 猶 可 追 (things to come can be followed).  Notice the similarity of zhui 追 here to the "Laoist" use of dao.  This seems like a suggestion to follow the yin 陰 (low, weak, etc.) when necessary.

18.6 is more difficult, I think, and the root of my second question, so I'll skip it for now.  18.7 shows a peasant farmer who takes in Zilu for the night and chides him for not knowing how to farm.  This person's folk demeanor and care for the land rather than for lofty philosophizing seems to mark him as one who would be praised by those raising up the folk "shennong" ideal.

So this brings me to question 2, about 18.6 specifically:

2) What is meant by the response of Chang Ju in 18.6:  是 知 津 矣  ("He knows where the ford is")?   I've spent years wondering what the right interpretation of this response to Zilu is.  I still don't have anything I'd be comfortable betting on, but here's my best shot, for now:  this sounds like a very Zhuangist response.  Especially when we consider Zhuangzi's position in the Xiaoyaoyou chapter, in which he talks about perspectivalism, and the fault of privileging certain perspectives over others.  Responding in this way to Zilu's question asking where a ford in the river could be found suggests that Chang Ju's criticism of Confucius' way is that the Confucian takes himself to have knowledge based on the narrow concerns they occupy themselves with, but is actually missing the wealth of other concerns and perspectives in the world.  Thus Confucian knowledge is no knowledge at all.  Confucius doesn't really know where the ford is, because he takes as complete knowledge that which deals with the narrow political concerns of human social groups.  Many things of nature fall outside of the ritual context, and so for Confucius are things that cannot be (and need not be) known.  Analects 11.12 is an example of this view:  "without being able to serve people, how could you serve the spirits?"..."without knowing life, how could you know death?"  Since Confucius restricts knowledge in this way to not only the human but the practical, Chang Ju criticizes him with a quip that seems equivalent to saying "if his knowledge is complete, he should know where the ford is. The fact that he does not know where the ford is shows that his narrow restriction of knowledge is inadequate for true understanding."

Thus, we might take Chang Ju to be saying something like: "Does he really know where the ford is?"  Still, I'm not completely comfortable with this interpretation--as I said above, it's more of a hunch than anything.  Personally, I've always found this reasoning to be the most effective "argument" against Confucianism, although it is merely suggestive.  I tend toward the Confucian mindset more than the Yangist/Daoist, but this passage from the Analects has always captivated me more than either Confucius' response at the end (the "we cannot group with the birds and beasts" bit), or the arguments of the Zhuangzi or Laozi.

So, if this is the right reading of 18.6, does that mean that this passage is a response to Zhuangzi, and is later than 18.5?  Or does it show that some of Zhuangzi's views on perspectivalism were already in the philosophical air at the time?  Or--is my reading just the wrong way to interpret 18.6?

Cross-Cultural Art and Confucianism

This is from an interesting exhibition by a Chinese artist discussed on a post on Frog in A Well.  The artist was trained in Germany, and her pieces are comparative, with the German conception of something in blue on the left hand side, the Chinese conception on the right.  A few of the pieces struck me as illustrating important points to keep in mind about Confucianism--like the above, which represents the two cultures' notions of social connectivity.

Check out the post, over at Frog in A Well.  My favorites are the ones on "sense of the self" and "authority/the boss".  

Yi (義) Can't Make a Junzi--Analects 17.23

Here's an argument from Jiyuan Yu:

"for Confucius, being virtuous must involve an intellectual aspect, which he calls yi (義) a term which is etymologically related to yi (宜, 'what is fitting' or 'what is appropriate') and which I choose to translate as 'appropriateness.'  Appropriateness is even said to be the most important factor for being an excellent person.  In addition to Analects 4.10 [...] Confucius also says: 'for the excellent man it is appropriateness (yi) that is supreme.' (17.23)."

(Ethics of Confucius and Aristotle, p. 140)

I've got to call Yu out on this one.  There is absolutely no way one can justifiably read 17.23 as showing that yi is "the most important factor for being an excellent person" (I assume he means junzi).  Why is this?  Well, let's look at the key bit of 17.23 being considered here:

君 子 義 以 為 上 ， 君 子 有 勇 而 無 義 為 亂 ， 小 人 有 勇 而 無 義 為 盜 。

(trans:  The junzi should take yi as of greatest importance.  The junzi who is brave but lacks yi will be disorderly.  The petty person (xiao ren) who is brave by lacks yi will be a thief.)

I am unsure how anyone can use this to show that yi is a necessary condition for being a junzi.  Not only does Confucius say that there can be a junzi without yi, "the junzi who is brave but lacks yi...", but he compares such a person with a petty person who lacks yi, and finds that each type of person has different qualities--the junzi without yi will be disordered, the xiao ren without yi will be a thief.  So it simply cannot be the case that being in line with yi is necessary or sufficient for being a junzi.  If it's necessary, then one cannot be a junzi without it, which 17.33 denies (as clearly as the bright noon sky).  If it's sufficient, then one with yi should qualify as a junzi, which seems inconsistent with 17.33 (the xiao ren who is brave but lacks yi is a thief, but one who is brave and has yi is not a xiao ren at all??)

Yu seems to be reading Confucius in this way in order to make him closer to Aristotle than he actually is.  The above quote from Yu comes from a chapter in which Yu is arguing that Aristotle's phronesis (practical wisdom) is similar to Confucius' yi, in that they are both intellectual aspects of cultivation of virtue the possession of which are necessary for one to be virtuous.  This is true for Aristotle's phronesis, but it makes a joke out of 17.33--it seems to me that the only reason one would ever consider reading 17.33 the way Yu seems is because they have Aristotle glasses on.  And even then, one has to deny that Confucius meant what he said in order to make it support the Aristotelian reading. 

What Really Matters--Analects 13.18

I've been thinking again about Confucian nepotism, because of the discussion on Manyul's blog some time back, and also because Jiyuan Yu talks a bit about it in his book (see review below).  

The catalyst for all these discussions has been Analects 13.18:  

葉 公 語 孔 子 曰 ： 「 吾 黨 有 直 躬 者 ， 其 父 攘 羊 ， 而 子 證 之 。 」 孔 子 曰 ： 

「 吾 黨 之 直 者 異 於 是 ： 父 為 子 隱 ， 子 為 父 隱 。 直 在 其 中 矣 。 」 

(trans [Ames/Rosemont, modified]: The Governor of She in conversation with Confucius said, "In our village there is someone called '[Upright] Person'.  When his father took a sheep on the sly, he reported him to the authorities."  Confucius replied:  "Those who are [upright] in my village conduct themselves differently.  A father covers for his son, and a son covers for his father.  [Uprightness consists of this].)

I've come to think that Analects 13.18 has a different purpose than some of the interpretations I've heard suggest.  Basically, I read 13.18 as nepotistic, sure, but also as anti-theoretical or anti-idealist (I'll try to explain what I mean by this below).  In a sense, it seems to me that what Confucius offered was simply an example of "common sense" ethics, which of course may have been more common-sensical in the ancient Chinese world than it is for us (although my intuitions strongly agree with Confucius here).  

Consider this, from Jiyuan Yu (The Ethics of Confucius and Aristotle, p. 127):  “This passage [13.18] has been a difficulty for commentators, as Confucius appears to endorse here a typical nepotistic behavior.  In Confucius' judgment, however, this governor is not good because he encourages the disruption of filial love, the root of cultivation of all other virtues.  He must be thinking that if the son turns the father in, he undermines the basis by which all virtues are nourished.”  

Because Yu takes virtue (de) as central for Confucius, he holds that family matters are taken to be important as instructive, teaching one how to gain virtue.  But this, of course, makes Confucius into a virtue consequentialist, and takes every normative claim in the Analects to have its basis in virtue.  Of course, this is done in neither Confucius nor Aristotle.  Confucius, in particular, is nowhere so concerned with theoretical constructs, making close relationships consequentially valuable in the way Yu suggests, and Confucius' statement in 13.18 might be seen as just such a denial.  No principle, however noble, trumps the love and responsibilities one has for one's family, and if one takes principles as more important than family duties we can only see them as morally flawed.  

A couple of historical examples come to mind.  Famously, Mao Zedong pronounced his care for the people and his energy for fighting for their causes, yet he treated his own wives in characteristically cold and unfeeling ways (and, even more importantly, was cold toward his children).  Perhaps Mao could justify this treatment by arguing that his energy was spent for the greater benefit of the whole people of China.  A more recent example also comes to mind, that of Pakistani ex-prime minister Benazir Bhutto.  She was asked by a journalist about a month before her assassination if her constantly putting herself into danger was bad for her children, who would be emotionally hurt if she were killed.  She answered that she cared about all the children in Pakistan just as much, suggesting that their needs trumped those of her own few children.  Something struck me as deeply morally wrong with this, and I think Confucius would agree.  He wouldn't buy it in either case.  He was not, in this sense, a consequentialist.  Yu's interpretation in essence takes Confucius to be a consequentialist with virtue playing the role of the good to be maximized, and family as good insofar as it can lead to virtue--but 13.18 seems to be a denial of that, rather than a theoretical specification of hierarchy of virtue.  

There is a moral flaw in a person, like Mao or Bhutto (or the “upright” man from 13.18), who chooses the greater benefit of the people over his or her own family.  In addition, we may be inclined to think it is a lie.  What is really psychologically operative, we might think, is some callousness or lack of concern for one's own family, or an all-consuming ambition, rather than a great concern for the people.  We, like Confucius, would find it hard to believe that one who cares so little about family that they could sacrifice them for principle (or cares so much for principle that they could harm their family) could actually care in any real sense for people they don't even know. (We could imagine Confucius making the inverse statement of 1.2—how could anyone ignoring filial care be ren?)   

To take another example—think of people whose sons or daughters are involved in crimes.  Do we ever hear people say: “well, if my son/daughter did that terrible thing, they ought to be punished...”?  Indeed, wouldn't we think it rather callous if a parent did react this way?  More common, I think, is the reaction a couple had when they discovered their son had been involved in a hit and run at the University of Connecticut last year—they tried to cover it up.  He was, after all, their son—and I can't say I would have done differently if my own son were in that situation.  Of course, this does not constitute an argument that such nepotism is morally right, but I think Confucius is simply playing on a common intuition (in his time and place) here.  “Family first” is the intuition, and it's one I share.

This is actually one of the things I've always admired about the Confucius of the Analects—he he has a way of pulling us down to earth when we get carried away constructing fancy ethical theories.  

Are We Arguing Past Each Other?

I really dislike the fact that my posts have become so overwhelmingly negative in the recent past.  There are a couple of reasons (perhaps good ones) for this, however.  First--I'm currently in the middle of writing the "negative portion" of my dissertation, in which I argue against the interpretations of Confucius I oppose, in order to lay the ground for my own interpretation.  This inevitably leads to some negativity, I guess.  Second--I'm in the middle of reading some interpretations of Confucius I believe are very problematic, and thus more objections are rising to the surface of the mind than usually do.

The latest example of this is in my reading of Jiyuan Yu's book The Ethics of Confucius and Aristotle: Mirrors of Virtue.  I am finding that in this book, as in May Sim's book on this topic (see below post), my problem is not so much with the interpretations of Confucius presented (which I also disagree with), but rather with the manner of argumentation used to establish these conclusions about Confucius, which in both Sim's and Yu's case I find far from ideal.  Their manner of argument is so lacking, by my estimation, that I've come to think that maybe something different is going on in these texts than what I expect of philosophical work.  Clearly, both Sim and Yu are very smart people (though both are Aristotle specialists, rather than Chinese philosophy specialists), but some of their interpretive argumentation on Confucius leaves me stunned by its weakness.

Often, I find claims made about what Confucius held, then citations of passages in the Analects where Confucius supposedly says it.  To say the least, this is a problematic way to argue for interpretations of a historical text.  One cannot simply point to a passage in a particular text when there is principled debate over the correct interpretation of that passage.  If we are to offer a particular interpretation and use a passage from a text to reinforce it, we need to argue that the passage we cite actually does the work we claim it does.

Here is an example from Yu's book of an argument thus wanting.  On p. 27, Yu writes:

"The 'Mandate of Heaven' theory presupposes that Heaven has its own will and issues commands.  In the Spring and Autumn period, this is said to be the dao of Heaven.  Heaven was thought to have its own norm, and humankind has its way as well.  When Analects 3:24 claims that Heaven commands Confucius to restore the dao, it shows that Confucius introduces the concepts of Heaven and dao (way) into the center of ethics. [...] The divine mission indicates that the correct way of being a human is that which is in accordance with the way of Heaven."

Note what Yu is doing here.  He is using Analects 3:24 to support his interpretation that tian and dao are at the center of Confucius' ethics.  And they are at the center in a number of ways, according to Yu, including being, like the ancient Greek concept of 'the good', the ground of moral norms.  This view is very similar, of course, to all ancient Greek ones, including Aristotle.  It also has a striking similarity to later medieval Christian views, in which God is the ultimate ground of moral norms, and his command, or what he loves, is what fixes the good.  This is a pretty radical interpretation of Confucius, however, and it makes 3:24 do a lot of work.  If we can get all of this from 3:24, one should at least expect an argument from the text that 3:24 actually does suggest what Yu says it does.  But we are given nothing like this.  No consideration of the language of the text, no comparison to other passages in the Analects in which Confucius uses similar language in order to test the coherence of this interpretation, no consideration of how the terms used in 3:24 are generally used in contemporary and near-contemporary texts... just a pointing to 3:24.

So let's look at 3:24.  The crucial segment of this passage reads:  

天 將 以 夫 子 為 木 鐸  tian jiang yi fuzi wei mu duo (trans:  "Tian is about to use the master as a wooden warning bell.")

Now, it requires some muscular argument to show that this justifies the conclusion that tian and dao are at the center of Confucius' ethics in any sense, especially the strong sense of being the ground of moral norms.  Why, indeed, shouldn't we simply read this as colloquial and pragmatic--something like "The teacher is about to set people straight on what's right."  If I were to utter this sentence right now in a conversation with a friend or student, one could hardly use this as evidence to show that I have any conception of a central ground of moral norms, let alone as evidence to show what that ground is.  

So, what's the problem here?  It seems obvious to me that robust linguistic and textual argument is required to support one's interpretation of any historical philosopher, whether it be Confucius, Aristotle, or Descartes.  So maybe there's something I'm missing.  Perhaps what is going on is that I simply have a different conception of what it is to do historical interpretive philosophy than Sim and Yu (and some others).  Perhaps they are working from a method in which creativity in construing the texts trumps historical accuracy.  But many of the things they claim in their works seem to suggest that this is not what they're doing.  After all, they are claiming to be representing Confucius, rather than a creative ethical theory inspired by Confucius.  And there is some historical argument (although an inadequate amount) in these works.  And both authors claim to want to offer an authentic picture of Confucius.  So why are these arguments so empty?

What's going on here?  Are we just arguing past one another because we don't share methodology?  If so, perhaps the focus of some of these arguments between pro and anti "Confucius as virtue ethicist" philosophers should move from interpretation to interpretive methodology.

Problematic Arguments To Link Confucius and Aristotle

Here is a line of reasoning I don't understand--or if I do understand it correctly, then it's an invalid argument.  I thought I'd throw this out there to see what others think about this.

I've been reading May Sim's book Remastering Morals With Aristotle and Confucius, which presents an interpretation of Confucian ethics (mostly represented by the Analects) as resembling to some (great) degree Aristotle's virtue ethics.  This is the kind of interpretation I'm arguing against in my dissertation (which is consuming the little qi I have left!).  I have numerous problems with virtue ethical interpretations of Confucius, which I won't go into here--but one common type of argument Sim uses in her book to show the "commensurability" of Confucius (of the Analects) and Aristotle stands out as particularly distressing to me.

She argues, in chapter 2 of her book (a type of argument which is repeated in later chapters), that Confucius implicitly accepted Aristotle's ten categories (substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time position, state or condition, action, and affection).  She goes about showing this by mentioning passages of the Analects in which Confucius uses language that she takes to presume that he is operating with some view of various of these categories, accepting these categories (in some sense).  

The discussion about substance is the clearest place the problem arises.  Sim argues against those who hold that Confucius has no view of a substantial self similar to that of Aristotle.  Sim first discusses Confucius' view that one's roles dictate the actions they ought to perform.  Then she says, on p. 57:  

"Even if one's roles do dictate how to act (with shu, zhong, or yi) in various situations, an account of that which is capable of issuing forth such actions is still needed.  Confucius, without theorizing about it, does in discussion invoke a stronger sense of a self than commentators allow.  Thus the Confucian self is minimally 'substantial;' it persists through various changes, is the source of agency, and can adopt various roles and perform them more or less well.”

This argument seems to me straightforwardly invalid.  Before I discuss that, though, let me quote Sim further (from the same page:

"The distinction between one who fills her roles well and one who does not rests in an investment of the person.  A substantial enough self must be presupposed for such an investment.  Without such a minimal self, we can have neither personal investment nor ownership of the action, let along a creative addition to the tradition."  The footnote to this reads: "That a more substantial self is already there in Confucian literature is visible when Confucius mentions that filial piety consists in refraining from reforming a father's way for three years after a father's death (1.11).  Such talk of refrain or restraint presupposes that there is some figment of a self that is to be restrained beyond that of a son whose role is to adhere to the father's wishes--for what of the years following the mourning?"

It seems to me that Sim is basically arguing here that Confucius is using language which commits him to a view of the self as substantial--that is, he is using 'I' and 'self' language.  First of all, it is wrong to assume that language use commits us to any particular metaphysical view.  This is a pretty radical view, so it needs to be argued for.  And there seem to be clear counterexamples to that anyway--what about the (later) Buddhists, or Hume, for example?  The Buddhist view of the self (like Hume's), is explicitly anti-substance, yet they use the same colloquial language as any of us, including “I” to formulate their views (including ethical views).  Their use of common language to formulate their ethical views does not show that they (implicitly or otherwise) held a view of a substantial self--so how does Confucius' use of 'I' and 'self' language show that?  I don't think that when I utter 'I'm going up the street to get a soda then I'm coming back' I commit myself to Aristotelian notions of the substantial self, even if that is the right view of the self.

What Sim might be doing here is claiming that Aristotle's view of the substantial self is the correct metaphysics of the self, and thus when we talk about selves or use personal pronouns, we are implicitly holding such a view.  If this is what she's doing, though, it's false.  Our language use does not commit us to the correct metaphysical view of whatever we are talking about, any more than the identity between water and H20 would have committed Marcus Aurelius to holding the view that the liquid in his chalice was a chemical compound composed of molecules of two hydrogen atoms covalently bonded to one oxygen atom.  Certainly "having a metaphysical view that x" is an opaque context, if anything is.  And if it's not, then it's not only Confucius who implicitly accepts Aristotle's notion of a substantial self, but anyone who has ever used 'I' language, including Hume and the Buddhists.  So we all accept Aristotle's substantial self, whether we know it or not!  But that's just false--it seems incoherent to say, for example, that the early scientists who proposed the phlogiston theory actually implicitly held the correct view about the chemistry of burning, because they used the language of 'fire', 'burning', etc.

It seems that the only thing that could make Sim's argument valid is a premise to the effect that "when one uses language and makes claims about certain concepts, one implicitly accepts (or is committed to) the correct metaphysical theories regarding those concepts."  But then the argument trades in its invalidity for unsoundness, because that premise is clearly false!

Any thoughts?

Listening to the Past

I love things like this--announced by many news sources today, here is the first audio recording in human history, from 1860, of a person singing "Au Clair de la Lune".  With the constant focus on the future in our society, it is refreshing to take a moment to look into (and listen to) our past.  I just wish we did it more often.  Confucius would approve.

--here's the story..

The "Al Qaeda Effect" and Why We Don't Care About the Uighurs

Recently, problems in Tibet have been in the news again, with the riots on the occasion of the 49th anniversary of the "National Uprising" against Chinese rule after which the Dalai Lama fled to India.  Only days before this, there was reportedly an attempt to bomb a China Southern Airlines flight by a Uighur separatist group attempting to get attention for their cause ahead of the Beijing Olympic Games this summer (though this has been questioned by some Uighur groups and human rights groups).  

The difference between the media attention and responses each of these has attracted in the US, is startling.  One of the main things it shows me is that, while Americans seem to have undying sympathy for the Tibetan cause, we either ignore the Uighurs, or malign them as Islamic terrorists, following the Chinese rhetoric designed to undermine their cause, even though the violence against the Uighurs is as at least as bad as that against the Tibetans.  Chinese rhetoric on Tibet largely falls on deaf ears in the US, as does that on their role in the Darfur crisis.  Generally we disbelieve the official proclamations on these issues, and side (morally, at least) with the opposition.  

With the Xinjiang situation, however, things are different.  The newest Chinese claim is that Al Qaeda (along with the Taliban) has infiltrated the region and is behind the separatist movements there (hey, why not throw in Adolf Hitler, Charles Manson, and Lex Luthor while you're at it?).  This, of course, is about as plausible as the weak 2003 claims of the Bush administration that Al Qaeda was in bed with Saddam Hussein, and perhaps (unfortunately) it will be as successful.  Al Qaeda, of course, has become the global Bogeyman which is easily trotted out to undermine the legitimacy of certain Islamic regimes and movements who have tenuous, if any, links to the shadowy organization.  It has become all too easy to completely dehumanize and disengage with any state or other entity by pasting them with the "Al Qaeda" title.  

As we saw with Iraq, making claims of Al Qaeda connection with a certain entity is generally given as justification for using force against the entity.  The Chinese have certainly noticed this, and they're jumping on board now, too.  Regardless of what the United States and other influential countries think, of course, the Chinese government will probably continue their violations of human rights in the Xinjiang region as well as in Tibet and elsewhere.  China's essential role in the global economy will ensure that other countries will continue to avoid putting much pressure on China for these violations, but it seems that now China has come up with a way to avoid having any attention payed to their rights violations in the Xinjiang region, by attempting to work the magic of the "Al Qaeda Effect" on the Uighurs.  

A Matter of Efficacy

Well--I'm finally on my way back to the good old USA, and thought: "what could be a better way of spending my last few hours in India than doing some writing on early Confucianism?"

So--I've been thinking recently about a question that seems to continually arise when I present my work on Confucianism to philosophers working outside of Chinese philosophy. The question is: to what extent for Confucians (as represented by the Analects, at least) is the use of force acceptable as a means of ensuring communal agreement and the correct ordering of the social hierarchy? Variations of this question, I have noticed, always come up when I present to non-specialists, and hardly ever come up when I present to specialists. In fact, when I was first confronted with this question, I had to respond that I hadn't given it much thought myself, even though I spend a whole lot of time thinking about early Confucianism.


So, two questions occur to me now: 1) why do non-specialists tend to worry about the issue mentioned above more than specialists? 2) what is Confucius' view on the use of force? I think that both of these questions can be answered by looking not to the Analects, however, but to the Daodejing, which shares certain features with Confucian literature (even the Analects!), and offers better explanations of some processes discussed in the Confucian as well as the Daoist literature.


The passage of the DDJ that seems relevant here (as well as my favorite DDJ passage) is DDJ 17 (Lau trans.):


"The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects. Next comes the ruler they love and praise; next comes the one they fear; next comes the one with whom they take liberties. When there is not enough faith, there is lack of good faith. Hesitant, he does not utter words lightly. When his task is accomplished and his work done, the people all say, 'it happened to us naturally.'"

For the daoist, like the Confucian, the use of force to attain order (or one's goals, whatever they are) is acceptable, but a sign that one is doing something wrong. A ruler who needs to resort to force has failed in a fundamental way. This, of course, is not because it is somehow wrong to use force--arguably the classical Chinese tradition in general did not see violence as intrinsically an evil, as does (for the most part) the post-Christianity western tradition. Rather, the reason using force is not as good as other methods is, as DDJ 17 suggests, a matter of efficacy, with which the Chinese tradition is deeply concerned.

DDJ 17 suggests that the "shadowy presence" is the best kind of ruler because this ruler is the one who will be able to impose his will on the people without their even knowing it. Why, we might ask, is this situation the best one for a ruler to be in? To take a strictly Machiavellian (or Legalist, for that matter) line here, the "shadowy presence" will be, of the four types of ruler, the one whose power is most secure. Think of this in terms of likelihood of rebellion and overthrow. The "shadowy presence" cannot be rebelled against or overthrown, because his will is invisible. The people do his will seemingly of their own will, so the only ones they have to rebel against if they disapprove of what they must do is themselves! The ruler who is loved is not quite as stable in his power. He has some stability, however, because the people are unlikely to rebel against and overthrow this ruler. Their love for him keeps him in power, and the people will not go against their ruler even when the opportunity arises. The ruler who is feared and imposes his will by force (this is where the "justifiability of force" question comes to play) is less secure than either the "shadowy presence" or the ruler who is loved, because even though he can keep order while he has strength, if the opportunity arises or if the ruler's strength diminishes, the people will quickly rebel and overthrow this ruler. Thus, his power is based on volatile external situations--there is much that is simply out of his control, and thus his hold on power is less secure. The ruler with whom the people take liberties, of course, is doomed, because he does not even have the fear of the people to rely on. They do not respect his will, and are likely to subvert it whenever they feel like it. This kind of ruler is a ruler in name only, and has no control over his people.

It is not only in terms of holding power that we can read DDJ 17, however. It will also be true that the better types of rulers will be more effective at making a virtuous society, etc. Just like much of the DDJ, 17 does not offer us normative claims about ends, but about means. The DDJ offers us a method, whereas the Confucian and Mohist texts give us a picture of the ends we ought to be aiming to achieve. The Daoist concern with method rather than ends, however, does not mean that its methods are all that different from those of the Confucian, and on this issue (rulership), they seem to line up nicely. What is the "shadowy presence" of DDJ 17, after all, if not the sagely ruler of Analects 2.1 who, like the pole star, simply "facing south" creates virtue through the de around which the people gravitate?

So, this is the beginning of an answer to question 2 above, I think. What about question 1? That is--why do non-specialists focus on the question of whether force is justified in Confucianism as a way to realize the goals of the community? I suspect that one of the reasons for this is that the notion of the rulership in the western tradition has developed in a somewhat different way than in the Chinese tradition. The "shadowy presence" has not been seen as the ideal of rulership in much of western history (there are, of course, exceptions, including Machiavelli). Rather, the "loved and praised" ruler whose power is on full display has been the ideal for much of western history (Alexander the Great, Charlemagne, etc.). The benevolent and powerful king whose commands are direct and clear for the world to see but who is well loved--this has been the western ideal. The noble Homeric warrior, storming the front lines of the enemy's army, rather than the ninja in the shadows or the sniper blending in with concrete and raining silent death from above, has been the western ideal. Thus, perhaps resorting to force to control a community is seen as a "plan B" in this tradition, whereas it is less justified in the Chinese tradition, being a measly "plan C". This, along with the fact that violence in itself is not seen as intrinsically evil in Chinese thought, as it is in much of western (post-Christian) thought, may help to explain why the "force question" arises more among non-specialists in Chinese philosophy than it does among specialists. Of course, I'm not completely comfortable with this answer, but I'll need to reflect on this some more to come up with something better. Any thoughts?

That's What Superdelegates (Like Friends) Are For

I'm becoming increasingly frustrated with the talk during this year's presidential elections about the unfairness of the status of "superdelegates" in the primary process. Of course, this issue has only arisen in the Democratic party contest this year, as the Republican race is all but settled in favor of my candidate, John McCain (I was a McCain supporter at the beginning of all this when he was only polling 10 percent, I might add).

In the Democratic race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, of course, superdelegates are likely to play an important role (this, from the Washington Times, is some evidence). This seems to have many people upset, as they see this as intrinsically "undemocratic". The flames of this fire are, of course, fanned by the news media. However, I'm not sure why Americans should be upset about superdelegates and their status. Consider first this fact (often insisted upon by fellow Republicans): The U.S.A. is not a democracy, in the pure sense of the word. It is is a federal republic. We practice representative government, not direct democracy. We do not take national votes on issues of the legislature, and we vote for people to hold offices in which they are entitled to make decisions affecting the actions of the government. Second, consider this: superdelegates are (mostly) elected officials, part of whose responsibilities are to exercise their own judgments (not those of the polls) in order to come to decisions on whom to support. If their votes "count more than ours", it is because they have responsibilites beyond ours for which they have been selected by vote. It is similar to the case of Presidents selecting Supreme Court nominees.

So please, my Democratic friends, please...stop complaining about the superdelegates or expecting them to "validate the will of the people". Ought they not, as we would expect of a responsible person, decide what they think is best, rather than following the tide, changing with the wind?

Brainwashing With A Light Touch

I've been reading Kathleen Taylor's book "Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control" lately, and have learned some interesting things which I think are relevant to the project of understanding Confucius and Chinese philosophical thought in general. According to Taylor, the origin of the term "brainwashing" comes from (guess what!) the Chinese term xi nao, which described a process of "thought control" used by the Chinese Communists, and which US captives were subjected to during the Korean War.

This revelation prompted me to write this post, as I've been thinking about these issues quite a bit lately. In a post a few days ago, I talked about the difference between Aristotelian "virtues" and Confucian "dispositions" (for lack of a better term) as turning on the lack of reason as necessary support for Confucius. What is important for Confucius is that one have certain dispositions, not that one have them supported by any particular reasons. This, of course, raises the question of how one comes to gain dispositions one does not already have. The Analects and other Confucian literature is deeply concerned with this. It is the central question: how do we cultivate good dispositions? For Confucius, gaining such dispositions is a complex task, and requires surrounding oneself with others who have the desired dispositions, being open to instruction and deferent to one's superiors, avoiding people without the desired dispositions, and strictly adhering to ritual (li), which includes integrating oneself fully into the community--becoming ren, (remember Analects 12.1--ke ji fu li wei ren). In addition, Confucius seems to think that it is helpful to have a ruler with good dispositions in order to cultivate these in the people. Many passages in the Analects attest to the moral importance of the ruler. He is to act as the "pole star" around which others orbit, setting an example for others. Indeed, Confucius says that if the ruler is virtuous, the people will simply become so, with no particular effort on the part of the ruler. It is the de of the good ruler which causes the people to rectify their own behavior, rather than any actions the ruler takes.

Confucius speaks similarly about how one manages to gain ren ("humanity"). Analects 4.1, for example, suggests that li ren ("being in the vicinity of ren) is instrumental to gaining ren. How does this process work? It seems to me that in both cases (being in the midst of ren and the ruler as moral example) what is working here is a kind of psychological habituation. This is a well known phenomenon in psychology--and even us non-psychologists know that we tend to be like the people we run with. We always advise the addict to cut their old ties and surround themselves with people who avoid their drug of choice and are supportive of their new lifestyle. This is also the case with moral cultivation, for Confucius. We might take the Analects to be recommending a kind of moral rehab. And the moral rehab, like its substance abuse cousin, isn't in the business of reasons.

So what's really going on here? I think that the practice of "brainwashing" offers us a useful analogy. Robert Lifton, in his book "Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism", describes what he sees as eight indicators of thought control regimens, carried out by totalitarian groups. All eight of them seemed very familiar as recommended to some extent by most of the classical Chinese philosophers I've studied. But three of Lifton's indicators in particular struck me as very Confucian:

"mystical manipulation--evoking certain patterns of behavior and emotion in such a way that they seem to be spontaneous...the demand for purity--the belief that elements outside the chosen group should be eliminated [or avoided] to prevent them from contaminating the minds of group members...sacred science--viewing the ideology's basic dogmas as both morally unchallengeable and scientifically exact, thus increasing their apparent authority..." (from Taylor).

With some change in wording, these principles could have come right out of the Analects. It's no coincidence, I think, that the term 'brainwashing' originated with Chinese practices. The ancients endorsed it. We might call what sages like Confucius advocated as "Brainwashing with a Light Touch." Certainly Confucius would have thought something had gone wrong if one had to resort to torture or other harsh methods in order to "reform one's thought", but it is not so clear that he would have rejected the basic methods of brainwashing in order to bring about good dispositions. It is, after all, in the Confucian Xunzi (a better Confucian than Mencius, I think), where we see a great deal of "expedient means" style teaching, which becomes even more apparent in the work of Xunzi's most brilliant student and (I think) the only one who truly realized the inherent power of the Confucian "method" (even though he clearly ignored other bits of Confucian teaching). It's always seemed to me that "brainwashing" is an extreme version of habituation anyway, in which the process of habituation is sped up through a variety of means.

Don't Scientologists Have Rights?

Forgive me, enlightened readers, for defending Scientology for a moment. Of course, I am not a scientologist myself, and I find many of their teachings and methods as strange as the next man, but I can't help but believe that they are not given a fair shake in the general public, including the media. A Washington Post article today quotes Michael Shermer, in an LA Times piece, in which he said:

"I'm a scientist who studies belief systems for a living, so take it from me: Scientology is unlike any other religion in history. Although the Church of Scientology is recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as a tax-exempt religion (despite years of litigation by the IRS to collect taxes on its income), no other religion I know of considers theological doctrines and core religious tenets to be intellectual property accessible only for a fee."

As the Post article rightly points out, the Scientology clan doesn't have a corner on the practice of making money on religion (just cruise by the home of any pastor of an evangelical megachurch in your neighborhood and you'll be quickly disabused of the notion that Scientology alone is a profitable business). So how exactly does their focus on being profitable set Scientology apart from other major religions operating today? Scientologists, just as Evangelical Christians, would tell you that "saving souls" is their first priority, but why must that rule out making money?
Shermer seems to suggest that the reason this practice is unacceptable in the case of Scientology is that "most of us do not consider Scientology a religion, at least not a religion that resembles in the slightest the world's major faiths." But this seems like a sorry reason to me. Since when is it is a necessity that any religion, in order to qualify as a religion, must resemble "the world's major faiths?" Imagine that Hinduism were formed today, instead of thousands of years ago. If this were the case, it would certainly not resemble the established religions in many ways. Would we therefore be justified in withholding the title of "religion" from Hinduism?

Indeed, it seems trivially true that any truly new religion will differ greatly from other established religions--otherwise it would not be a new religion, but a variant of an already existing religion. Scientology, even with its focus on making a profit, seems to me to qualify as a religion. We, in the United States, have decided that religious organizations qualify for tax-exempt status. If we are going to be consistent with this, we ought to accept that Scientology qualifies. If, however, we are wary of granting this status to Scientology, perhaps we ought to rethink the practice in general. Perhaps the evangelical megachurches should not be tax-exempt.

I suspect that what is behind much of the mud being slung at Scientology is simply the resistance many of us feel toward new religions in general. We tend to think of religions which are not old and revered traditions as somehow fake or insincere. I'm not sure why this is the case, considering that every religion was once "new". And as much as I heap scorn upon new religions here (see my post on Falun Gong, for example, which I particularly dislike), as a good libertarian (at least concerning social issues) I can't help but feel that we should give Scientologists a break. Plus--isn't free enterprise the American ideal? They're selling a product and people are buying it!

Reasons? We Don't Need No Stinking Reasons!

One of the key differences between Confucius and Aristotle (or perhaps the western virtue ethical tradition in general) is the focus on reason in the cultivation of virtue--which is central to Aristotle, and completely missing in Confucius. For Aristotle, a "natural disposition" which one has and which predisposes them to a certain type of action, does not count as an "excellence" unless this disposition is supported by right reason. A person who performs generous actions does not have the virtue of "generosity" unless their actions are in conformity with right reasons, which, in this case, would have to do with the knowledge of the goodness of acts of generous type for one's character, with the intention being to aim at eudaimonia, etc. One who is generous not for these reasons but simply because they have an innate, natural tendency to act generously (genetically inherited, perhaps), does not have the virtue of "generosity"--that is, they do not have "excellence proper" (N. Ethics, Ross translation), but "natural excellence", which is of lower quality, and does not entail unity of the virtues. One who only has the natural excellence of generosity and not the full excellence might be unvirtuous in a number of other ways (cowardly, weak-willed, etc.), while one with the virtue of generosity will possess, of necessity, practical wisdom (phronesis), which (if I'm reading the Nicomachean Ethics correctly) ensures that one possesses all the other virtues.

I read Confucius as taking a very different line on virtue. For him, what Aristotle calls the "natural excellences" are actually superior to those which need to be learned (or supported by reasons). Analects 16.9 reads:

孔子曰：「生而知之者，上也；學而知之者，次也；困而學之，又其次也。困而不學，民斯為下矣！」
Confucius said: 'Those who are born knowing it are the first class (shang); those who know it through study (xue) are next; those who have difficulty yet learn it are next; those who have difficulty and do not learn it, they are the lowest class of the people!'

This passage talks specifically about zhi zhi ("knowing it"), and thus one might claim that it is not virtue that is discussed in this passage, but knowledge of the reasons for action, or knowledge of what to do--or something like this. However, I think this is the wrong way to interpret 16.9. "Knowledge" seems to be used here, as often (but not always!) in the Analects, as performance, so that "knowing it" is here taken as identical to "doing it". When zhi is used this way in the Analects, it is generally shown in a positive light. On the other hand, when zhi is used in the sense of "propositional knowledge" it is disparaged. And if this latter sense is what is meant in 16.9, it is unclear why those who possess such knowledge from birth (perhaps Confucius was way ahead of his time...) are ranked higher than the rest of us just because they possess it. After all, if possession of such knowledge does not necessitate performance, than one who has knowledge from birth might in practice be a xiao ren ("petty person"), while one who has to learn it might act in an exemplary fashion even approaching sageliness. So it seems likely that 16.9 is talking about something like disposition or performance, rather than propositional knowledge.

Given that this is the case, there are no virtues in the system of the Analects, by Aristotle's lights. And it seems worse than this. Given that right reason occupies such an important place in Aristotle's ethics, doesn't the absence of this feature in Confucius' ethics make it difficult to hold, as Van Norden does, that Confucius and Aristotle are simply giving two different "thick" theoretical descriptions of the same "thin" concept of virtue? Without the rational requirement, Aristotle might simply say that we are not dealing with anything like virtue, because "natural excellence" has no connection with practical wisdom, unity of the virtues, or the all-important eudaimonia!
I've not yet read completely through Van Norden's Virtue Ethics and Consequentialism in Early Chinese Philosophy, so I'm not sure how he confronts this difficulty, but he doesn't say much about it in the early part of the book. I, for one, don't buy into the "virtue" interpretation of Confucius, for a number of reasons--this being only one of them.

Any ideas on this?

Why No Trancendence in China, Then?

Heinrich Zimmer's classic "Philosophies of India" (edited by J. Campbell) makes an interesting and occassionally remarked on point about the reasons for the focus on transcendence in Indian philosophy, while this is seemingly absent in Chinese philosophy (misreadings of Daoism aside, of course...). Zimmer says:

"One cannot but feel that such a sublime flight as India's into the transcendental realm would never have been attempted had the conditions of life been the least bit less hopeless. Release (moksa) can become the main preoccupation of thought only when what binds human beings to their secular normal existences affords absolutely no hope--represents only duties, burdens, and obligations, proposing no promising tasks or aims that stimulate and justify mature ambitions on the plane of earth. India's propensity for transcendental pursuit and the misery of India's history are, most certainly, intimately related to each other; they must not be regarded separately." (p. 82-83)

Of course, Zimmer was clearly being careful to maintain that hopelessness is a necessary, not a sufficient condition for a culture's concern with transcendence. Still, is this right? The obvious difficulty of course is the case of ancient China. Prospects for people in many periods in Chinese history (including the formative Warring States period) were every bit as bleak as those in low periods in Indian history. If there is such a close connection between misery and concern with transcendence, as Zimmer claims, why should misery not be a sufficient condition? And if it isn't a sufficient condition, what else is required to bring about the concern with transcendence? I suspect that Zimmer's claim is false. In the Chinese case, we see two very different responses to a collapsing society and human misery--the advent of the social crusader who strives to bring back order (Confucians, Mohists), and the attempt to salvage one's own "vital essence" (qi) (Yangists, Daoists). It's certainly not obvious that either of these are connected with "transcendental pursuit". And, even though Zimmer's claim is only that misery is a necessary condition, we still might ask the question of him: what was so different about China that made its misery cause philosophers to look to the order of the world, rather than, like ancient India and Greece (Plato, at least), to the transcendent? For that matter--what was the necessary (according to Zimmer) strife that led Plato to his own transcendental pursuits? His disastrous lack of success in politics?

Back In Action!

As readers may have noticed, there's been an enormous pause at this blog--it was even down for a week or so. Lots has happened to make this the case, including sickness (myself and my son), traveling to India (where I've been since the start of January and will be for another week), and worrying about how to get some work done on the dissertation over here. So--now since many of the problems have been solved, I'm ready to jump back into the action. Manyul Im has recently begun a Chinese Philosophy blog, at http://manyulim.wordpress.com/, where there are some interesting things going on.

Meanwhile, I'm busy making a bit of a change at Unpolished Jade. I'll be collapsing my general website into this page (consolidation gives birth to organization!), and in following with this, I'll also be bringing my various blogging concerns together. So, while this blog will still be filled with Chinese philosophy, now you'll also see more broad topics here (most likely some history, contemporary politics, globalization, foreign relations, etc.). And also I'll sometimes post a bit on books that might be of interest to those with interest in things Asian (in general). Still, the words of the sages are always the priority here!

Reflections on Analects 12.1--Translations and Commentary

Analects (first part): 顏淵問仁。子曰﹕克己復禮為仁。一日克己復仁﹐天下歸仁焉。為仁由己﹐而由人乎哉?

English Commentarial Translations

(McLeod trans.) Yan Yuan asked about ren. The master said: "conforming oneself to and thus returning to ritual creates ren. If for one day one could conform oneself to and thereby return to ritual, the whole world would then return to ren. One creates ren oneself--can others possibly do it?"

(Slingerland trans.) Yan Hui asked about Goodness. The Master said, "Restraining yourself and returning to the rites constitutes Goodness. If for one day you managed to restrain yourself and return to the rites, in this way you could lead the entire world back to Goodness. The key to achieving Goodness lies within yourself--how could it come from others?"

Slingerland is doing two interesting things here. First--He reads the wei as constitutive, which disagrees with Zhu Xi's reading (below) and leaves Analects 9.1 unclear, and also seems to broaden ren, because of the many other wei ren formulations. However, then the internal/external definition problem becomes pressing, if one wants to maintain that ren lies on either of these sides, rather than containing both, as I claim.
Second, he takes ke as "restraint", likening it to yue (in 4.23). I think this is correct. However, this can also lend support to Kong Anguo's reading as "can of oneself", where 'restraint' is thought of in terms of discipline, self-control. The discipline here is surely meant as connected to ritual, which is why I translate as "conforming oneself to [ritual]". It is not just the ke ji that creates (or is) ren, it is the ke ji with ritual. Focusing on the ke ji without its ritual connection neglects the external factor clearly at work here. Slingerland claims precedent, saying his reading "follows early commentators such as Ma Rong and Huang Kan", but what about Kong Anguo, in the He Yan commentary, which is earlier than either?
Also, Xing Bing (and Daniel Gardner, following him) holds, as I do, that the two senses, Ma Rong's and Kong Anguo's are compatible in the way suggested above, that restraint is thought of in the sense of turning of one's own volition to ritual. (Gardner, p. 83): "for He Yan, Kong's remark, 'if the self is able to return to ritual' is not basically at odds with Ma's understanding of the line 'to restrain the self and return to ritual.'" It appears to me that the best way to explain the sense of the unification of the two is through the notion of conforming oneself to ritual--which suggests both restraint, and self imposition, as well as the necessary connection to ritual itself.

(Ames and Rosemont trans.) Yan Hui inquired about authoritative conduct. The Master replied, "Through self-discipline and observing ritual propriety one becomes authoritative in one's conduct. If for the space of a day one were able to accomplish this, the whole empire would defer to this authoritative model. Becoming authoritative in one's conduct is self-originating--how could it originate with others?"

This is closer to my own reading, in that ke is taken as disciplining combined with ritual, rather than focus on the restraint which allows one to return to ritual, though Slingerland does a better job at retaining some of the neutrality of the text--which neither Ames and Rosemont nor my own translation here attempts.

(Chan trans.) follows Zhu Xi explicitly. Note claiming that Zhu Xi's reading of ke ji was "to master oneself", and Chan follows this.

(Fingarette) "self-disciplined and ever turning to li."

This is much closer to my own rendering. Benjamin Schwartz says that Fingarette is concerned with tying in the bit about the self and its control to ritual, seeing these two as "sides of the same coin"--one formulation. I completely agree. (Schwartz. p. 77) "One simply notes that Fingarette's version very much stresses the absolute simultaneity and inseparability of the two halves of the statement, implying that the self-discipline and the performance of li are two sides of the same coin. the first translation ("curb your ego and submit to li"), supported by a majority of Chinese commentators, suggests that the correct performance of the li presupposes a sustained inner effort to overcome those evil impulses which prevent the performance of li in the spirit appropriate to li."
Schwartz, I think, is wrong here, both about the reading and about the commentators. By "the majority of Chinese commentators," he must mean post Cheng/Zhu commentators. Certainly Ma Rong and Kong Anguo, the commentators mentioned in the much earlier He Yan commentary, do not hold this view. And if we can offer an explanation of why the later commentators went wrong, this further undermines Schwartz' offered support for his reading, which echoes Zhu Xi in key ways, taking the internal half of the formulation as central, and the latter external half as secondary.

Chinese Commentary

He Yan: 馬曰克己約身﹐孔曰復反也身能反禮則為仁矣。Ma (Rong) said: ke ji is "to restrain the self" (yue shen). Kong (Anguo) said: fu is "to return" (fan). If one can return one self (shen) to ritual then there is ren." 行善在己不在人也。 "The practice of being good depends on oneself not on others."

Zhu Xi (Gardner trans.): "True goodness [ren] is the virtue of the original mind-and-heart [xin] in its wholeness. Ke [to subdue] is sheng, 'to overcome or subdue.' Ji [the self] refers to the selfish desires of the self [shen zhi si yu]. Fu [to return] is fan, "to return"... 'The practice of true goodness' [wei ren] is the means of preserving whole the virtue of the mind-and-heart. Now, the virtue of the mind-and-heart in its wholeness is nothing but heavenly principle and thus can only be harmed by human desire. Consequently, to practice true goodness, one must have the wherewithal to subdue selfish desires and thereby return to ritual." [note the focus on subduing of desires as the operative condition, and return to ritual as the result of this subduing.]

Ren is mysterious for Zhu Xi because it underlies all the workings of ren. It is the virtue of the original heart-and-mind (ben (?) xin). Thus all the wei ren formulations are explained as giving us a description of the practice of ren. If this is true, however, then Confucius never said anything about ren, which makes sense of one passage [9.1], but leaves us with trouble explaining all the formulations of ren practice which involve other than the mind.