Tenets Of Confucianism

Confucianism In today’s world, people, religions and cultures are influenced in through the actions that occur. Some of the action going on in the world, such as Donald Trump’s constant negative banter, have negatively influenced the world. And some of the action going on in the world, such as a person offering to pay off all of a school’s lunch debt, spreads forth a positive influence amongst people in the world. There are many religions and philosophies throughout the years, such as Islam, that have greatly swayed throughout the years. Regardless of the many attempts to sway Confucianism into a different pathway throughout the years, Confucianism has remained true to its original tenets, resulting in a positive influence amongst society …show more content…
There are five basic relationships in society: between parent and child, between husband and wife, between older sibling and younger sibling, between friend and friend, and between ruler and subject. Confucianism believed that the most important relationship is between parent and child since the parent nurtures the child into being a good human being for the future (History Alive! World Connections 45-46). Confucianism truly does do value collectivism over individualism (“Confucius 101”). Confucianism did not believe in any sort of afterlife. Confucius stated that people should be promoting positive social relations and not except rewards or punishments after death (Richey). Confucianism did have a social class system. The first class, the highest, was the emperor, his court members and his scholars. The second class was composed of farmers; the third class was composed of artisans; the fourth class was composed of merchants (Confucian Social Hierarchy). This social class structure was designed to show to the importance of each group, but Confucius believed that respecting everyone was more important than the emphasis on social class (History Alive! World Connections …show more content…
Instead, it spread through word of mouth between people of different regions communicating with each other (“How did Confucianism Spread?”). Just like other religions, Confucianism has divided into several divisions. Religiously, they are called sects, but since Confucianism is a philosophy, not a religion, the divisions are called schools. These schools were formed after Confucius’s death. These “schools” were formed to promote different ideologies, but they were not formed due to any discord within the philosophy. In Confucianism, there are 8 schools: Mencius, Xunzi, Dong Zhushu, Song, Ming, Korean, Qing and Modern