Confucius (1) Benevolence in Confucius' eyes

"Benevolence" in the Eyes of Confucius

Personality consciousness

What is personality? Personality is a person's morality. To say that this person has personality is to have morality. Without morality, there is no personality. Then this person's morality is noble, noble is high personality, and this person's low morality is low personality.

Confucius believed that personality should be higher than status. Of course, Confucius emphasized the hierarchy, that is, the monarch, the minister and the father. Confucius emphasized the need to prove the hierarchy of monarch and minister. But this level can't sum up personality. Personality is above rank. Confucius said, "The three armed forces can win the position of commander in chief, but ordinary men can't win the ambition." -"The Analects of Confucius Zi Han", handsome is identity. Handsome is of high taste, but handsome can be taken away by others. The enemy can capture and take away your handsomeness, but you can't take away your personality. Ordinary people, ordinary people, can't grasp ambition, ambition is personality. The contrast between "the ambition of one man" and "the handsome of the three armed forces" reflects that Confucius has such an idea. That is, your personality is higher than your rank. Although your level is higher than mine, your high level does not mean your high personality or your high morality.

Character is not born, but learned, so Confucius especially emphasized learning. How did Confucius learn? Confucius' study is not only an intellectual study, but also a personality study. The cultivation of personality is really "learning from time to time", and it is really a holistic study. It is said that Confucius played the piano with Shi Xiangzi, a famous performer in Lu State, when he was twenty-nine. Shi Xiangzi taught him a melody. Confucius is very clever, and this melody will be played soon. Then Shi Xiangzi also felt that he played well and could learn from him. But Confucius thought he didn't really learn, so Shi Xiangzi asked him why he didn't learn. You can play this piece of music. How can you say you haven't learned? Confucius said that I haven't mastered the number of this melody yet. What is the number? It is equivalent to rhythm, that is, although I can play the melody, I haven't really mastered the hidden rhythm and internal rhythm behind the melody, so Shi Xiangzi thinks this young man who is learning the piano is very powerful. It is his study of this music and melody, not superficial mastery, but just a kind of knowledge. He asked for mastery, so he asked Confucius to continue his practice. Then Confucius practiced for a long time. What happened? He plays quite well, unlike just mastering the melody at first. So what will happen once he has mastered the rhythm? Shi Xiangzi later listened to the melody of the bullet and felt very moved. What does this mean? Confucius mastered this melody not at a shallow level, but at a deep level, and mastered its quantity. Then Shi Xiangzi told Confucius that you are learning well now and you can learn from it, but Confucius said it was still no good. I still have a shallow grasp of this melody. What is this ambition? Theme thought, what kind of theme thought does the person who makes this melody want to express, and what is his thought? It is quite profound, deeper than numbers and deeper than rhythm. Everyone should pay attention to what you need, who needs to play the piano, and at the same time, your personality, your ideology and morality have to be sublimated step by step if you want to master the theme and deepest thoughts of predecessors. If we can't sublimate to a certain level, we can't understand the theme of our predecessors at all. What do I want to illustrate through this example? It shows that the cultivation of personality is not a general cultivation, and the study of personality is not a general study, not a simple study and understanding, but a kind of edification, an experience and a taste, which needs in-depth understanding.

Confucius emphasized the importance of seeking knowledge through "learning from time to time". Obviously, if a person lacks knowledge, he will also lack certain achievements in his career. So Confucius is famous for his eagerness to learn. His famous words, such as "learning from time to time is better than speaking", have been regarded as the motto by later scholars, so we say that personality is cultivated.

Human consciousness

In Confucius' view, everyone should have the desire to be kind and should sincerely seek kindness. Therefore, if we want to achieve the realm of benevolence, we need to do it ourselves, not others. Therefore, Confucius focuses on people everywhere, and people are the object of study and attention. So how does Confucius embody "benevolence" in daily life?

The second consciousness of "benevolence": human consciousness. Attention, everyone. What is the greatness of Confucius? He can see the problem from the perspective of human beings, break through the family, break through the race, and even break through me and others. There is a saying in The Analects: Sima Niu is worried: "Everyone has brothers, and I die alone." Xia Zi said: "I heard from merchants; Life and death are life, and wealth is in the sky. A gentleman treats others with courtesy, and all men are brothers within the four seas. Why don't gentlemen have brothers? " -The Analects of Confucius Yan Yuan. Confucius had a student who said that everyone else had brothers, but I didn't. I felt very uncomfortable. Then one of Confucius' students said to him in summer, "What are you afraid of without brothers?" "Everyone is your brother. So this sentence is very important, so in China society at that time, the patriarchal clan system was very strong, and the family consciousness, blood relationship and group consciousness were very strong, so in this case, he was able to break through the limitations of the family and patriarchal clan system and have human consciousness. This is very, very important.

Not all the students taught by Confucius are from Shandong. When Confucius was teaching, he had already broken national boundaries, and students from various vassal countries came to teach. Why? Because in his idea, his moral consciousness is the consciousness of people, not the consciousness of a certain family, not the consciousness of a certain country, not the consciousness of a certain person, but the consciousness of people. So Confucius put forward such an idea. What idea? It is how a person handles the relationship between himself and others, and this method should be adopted. This is called "putting yourself in the other's shoes". It is the time to put yourself in others' shoes when dealing with problems. You should also think about yourself and how you think in this situation. Therefore, what Confucius said is: If you want to stand up and be a man, you must be a man-The Analects of Confucius, Yongye, don't do to others what you don't want them to do to you-The Analects of Confucius, Wei Linggong. What does "stand up" mean? If you want to stand on your own feet, you should also think about it, and others want to stand on their own feet. You put yourself in others' shoes. You want to stand up, others want to stand up. You can't say that I want to stand up and not let others stand up, or that I want to stand up and not let others stand up. Don't! If you want to stand up, you have to put yourself in other people's shoes, and others want to stand up. "If you want to achieve it, you can achieve it." If you want to achieve it yourself, you have to let others achieve it, and others want to achieve it. "Don't do to others what you don't want them to do to you." People hate things you don't like and things you hate. You can't hurt others if they don't want to. It's no good imposing what you don't want on others. Therefore, it shows that Confucius' personality is great and there is a kind of human consciousness.

Respect the consciousness of others.

From the viewpoint of benevolence in the Analects of Confucius, its value connotation is mainly reflected in the feelings of benevolence, which teaches us how to correctly handle the relationship between people, people and society, and people and themselves in today's society. Only when the relationship is harmonious can the society be harmonious. Then "benevolence" is the essence of Confucius' thought, so how to embody this "benevolence" in Confucius' behavior?

What is the third important consciousness of "benevolence"? People attach importance to consciousness. People are more valuable than heaven and earth, which is a very important concept of Confucianism. The chapter of The Analects of Confucius records that Confucius went to court. When he came back from the court, he was told that the stable was on fire. As a result, Confucius immediately asked, "Harm people." What do you mean, don't ask the horse? It's on fire. Is anyone hurt? What does this reflect? People are the most valuable things in the world. At that time, the society, slave owners, nobles and rich people, I'm afraid they paid the most attention to their wealth. He must have thought of me when the stable caught fire. There are many noble horses. Then this concept cannot be said to have been completely eliminated in our society today. Then in ancient times, in the era of Confucius, this concept was more common. Such as Jin and Jin Pinggong. I went out hunting once. Seeing a bird, he shot the bird with an arrow. The bird also hit it, but it may have grazed a little, but it didn't kill it. It's just that the bird is injured, which may not be serious. Jin Pinggong immediately told his slave to go and get the bird back. As soon as he caught it, the bird flew away. It flew away again. As a result, Jin Pinggong flew into a rage and accused the slave. Your movement is too slow, and the bird has escaped. Jin Pinggong was furious, so he killed the slave. This was very common at that time, and there was a bad atmosphere at that time, that is, martyrdom, barbarism and backwardness. Give the people as property to the nobles and sacrifice them to the rulers. It is cruel to sacrifice people and treat them as material and wealth. Then Confucius was very disgusted with these practices. Some people say, I don't need to be buried with the living. Shall I be buried with servants? Confucius also objected that it was not good to use this. Why? Because these things you make still look human, you use servants to die, which reflects that in your mind, in your mind, you still want to use people to die. It is out of the question.