Negotiating genealogy

 

I´m not that well-versed in Confucianism, so this video about a purported direct lineal descendant of the famed Master Kong was actually interesting. The short story is that alleged descendants of Confucius held important positions at various imperial Chinese courts for centuries. 

But are their claims to be descended from the old sage really true? Here some skepticism in clearly in order, since the first "official" lineage-holder (known as the Duke of Yansheng) wasn´t appointed until 1,500 years after the time of Confucius. At one point in Chinese history, there seems to have been three "dukes", appointed by rival dynasties (one of them Mongol)!

Of course it´s fake. Some time ago, I read a Swedish book about fake genealogies and the "cults" they spawned among amateur researchers. Now, imagine if being a descendant of a certain famed person also carried very definite material and political benefits. Exaaactly.

Obviously the family trees in such a situation are going to be negotiated and re-negotiated (to use the current euphemism) until the point is proven. I suppose we could call them apocryphal (to use an older euphemism)... 

The biggest scheme the Jesuits ever pulled

 

Is Confucianism a religion? And if it isn´t, why is it included in virtually all basic text books on world religions? (A staggering 0.2% of the world´s population identify as Confucian.) The very short story is that Confucianism "shouldn´t" be a religion on standard modern Western definitions of that term. 

Rather, it´s a social and political philosophy set in a matrix of traditional Chinese religion, including the ubiquitous ancestor worship. Specifically Confucian rituals were carried out by imperial officials for the benefit of the state, and only a certain class of people who worked for the government were considered "Confucians". There was no Confucian clergy. The great mass of people might not even have been aware of the special Confucian rituals! Today, the government of China doesn´t consider Confucianism to be a religion, and its historical sites are administered by the ministry of culture rather than the ministry of religious affairs.  

The Jesuits considered Confucianism to be a philosophy rather than a religion, and apparently dressed as Confucian scholars during their missionary activities in China. However, they also believed that Confucianism was in some sense a survival of a primordial monotheist religion, while Taoism and Buddhism were condemned as "idolatry". When the papacy condemned Confucian ancestor worship as equally idolatrous, Christian Europeans began to look upon Confucianism as a "Chinese pagan religion". 

Apparently, some Protestant missionaries in China during the 19th century also appealed to the primordial monotheism concept, and tried to cast Confucianism in a "Christian" mold to make conversion easier. Meanwhile, Max Müller and other pioneers of comparative religion included Confucianism in their studies. In this way, Confucianism became enshrined - pun intended - as a "real" religion, at least in the minds of Western barbarians. 

And there, it´s probably set to stay for some time to come. 

     

Confucianism and the art of breaking a motorcycle

 

The old bearded sage Confucius is apparently being rehabilitated in the People´s Republic of China, so I assume the campaign to criticize Lin Biao and said sage (and beard) has been cancelled. 

The clip above explores some of the ways Confucianism is experiencing a renaissance in today´s China, sometimes even with the support of the Communist Party. The fusion of the Classics and modern capitalist "positive thinking" is intriguing...and tiresome. Some shit really is the same the world over. Note also the crypto-religious traits of some of the revival.  

The most interesting info in the clip was actually about a 19th century Chinese reformer named Kang Youwei, who tried to turn Confucianism into a kind of ersatz Christian Protestantism as part of a daring attempt to reform China. It didn´t work...although a roughly similar project did just fine in Japan!

Personally, I´m frankly skeptical. Maybe Confucius should go the same way as Lin Biao...   

The grey cardinal of Xi Jinping Thought

An interesting article on Chinese paramount leader Xi Jinping´s "grey eminence" Wang Huning, also regarded as the CCP´s inofficial chief ideologist. I also link to Wiki´s entry on Wang, for easy reference. I don´t know who or what "Palladium" might be. One of many things I noticed in their article is the following description of Xi´s recent politics: 

>>>This intervention has taken the form of the Common Prosperity campaign, with Xi declaring in January that “We absolutely must not allow the gap between rich and poor to get wider,” and warning that “achieving common prosperity is not only an economic issue, but also a major political issue related to the party’s governing foundations.” This is why anti-monopoly investigations have hit China’s top technology firms with billions of dollars in fines and forced restructurings and strict new data rules have curtailed China’s internet and social media companies. 

>>>It’s why record-breaking IPOs have been put on hold and corporations ordered to improve labor conditions, with “996” overtime requirements made illegal and pay raised for gig workers. It’s why the government killed off the private tutoring sector overnight and capped property rental price increases. It’s why the government has announced “excessively high incomes” are to be “adjusted.”

>>>And it’s why celebrities like Zhao Wei have been disappearing, why Chinese minors have been banned from playing the “spiritual opium” of video games for more than three hours per week, why LGBT groups have been scrubbed from the internet, and why abortion restrictions have been significantly tightened.

If this is true, Xi is combining increasing authoritarianism and moralistic "Confucianism" with a kind of left-populist turn in economic matters. It also seems to imply that the present "economic crisis" in China surrounding Evergrande might somehow be engineered by the Communist Party leadership to roll back the neo-bourgeoisie. What if the Evergrande situation is a sign of *strength* rather than weakness? Then, the CCP won´t collapse any time soon...

The Triumph and Terror of Wang Huning

Wikipedia on Wang Huning

The campaign to uphold Xi Jinping and Confucius

An interesting introduction to the "Chinese intellectual ecology" (the present semi-official intellectual discourse in the People´s Republic of China), of which I know almost nothing. Note the attempts to fuse Marxism with Confucianism! 

I´m not sure who is behind the Palladium magazine, where this article was published. Some kind of soft core neo-reactionaries? 

More to come... 

Chinese Intellectual Ecology