Charismatic Culture Imagine if every question we could ask, could be answered. What is the purpose of life? Why must people suffer? These questions, gone. No further research or time would be wasted pondering the unknown. The reality is, as famous Greek thinker Aristotle would vouch, we can’t solve every question we create. But we can approach the unexplained through the enlightenment of ourselves, and the awareness of our self-existence. This is Philosophy.
Greek Philosophy is largely considered as the chief pioneer of the irrational study. During the Golden Age, monumental ideas and ingenious engineers created concepts that still have a critical impact on our lives today. One of those philosophers, Plato, wrote Euthyphro in 380 B.C. His …show more content…
While the two most influential faces of Ancient Chinese Philosophy, Lao Tzu and Confucius, disagreed over various goals for man, they both advocated for humans to live tandem with nature. In The Tao-te Ching, Lao Tzu advises that the way to achieve individual tranquility was by following the “Tao” or “the path.” During man’s walk on this path he advises, “To know contentment of wealth” (The Tao-te Ching 97). In this particular snipit, he preaches that satisfaction, regardless of economic situation, is wealth. What is wealth? Lao Tzu would argue that wealth is not security or pleasure, but peace. Peace implies that the stressful obligations of everyday life are negligible. It is this reason that Lao Tzu’s life, teachings, and philosophy are so ambiguous, for the discovery of self-tranquility should not be strictly limited to a book in a library. What this tells us about Ancient Chinese culture is that it was vastly different than what we see today. I can speak personally for this. My mother was born in GuangZhou, China. She literally saw the eruption of Chinese culture in the “Cultural Revolution.” All educated citizens, businessmen, even people who just wore glasses were stripped of socio-economic status to be “re-cultured” as the traditional chinese peasant. The largest contrast between modern Communist China and its ancient past is its distribution of power. In Analects, Confucius supplies the rulebook for the ideal moral man. He states, “In a high position he does not domineer over his subordinates” (Analects 111). Confucius makes the point that overwhelming power and social status are a recipe for evil. Since Mao zeDong and his communist coup intervened with the natural tranquility of everyday life for those “subjects,” he embodies the cultural shift we see
Greek Philosophy is largely considered as the chief pioneer of the irrational study. During the Golden Age, monumental ideas and ingenious engineers created concepts that still have a critical impact on our lives today. One of those philosophers, Plato, wrote Euthyphro in 380 B.C. His …show more content…
While the two most influential faces of Ancient Chinese Philosophy, Lao Tzu and Confucius, disagreed over various goals for man, they both advocated for humans to live tandem with nature. In The Tao-te Ching, Lao Tzu advises that the way to achieve individual tranquility was by following the “Tao” or “the path.” During man’s walk on this path he advises, “To know contentment of wealth” (The Tao-te Ching 97). In this particular snipit, he preaches that satisfaction, regardless of economic situation, is wealth. What is wealth? Lao Tzu would argue that wealth is not security or pleasure, but peace. Peace implies that the stressful obligations of everyday life are negligible. It is this reason that Lao Tzu’s life, teachings, and philosophy are so ambiguous, for the discovery of self-tranquility should not be strictly limited to a book in a library. What this tells us about Ancient Chinese culture is that it was vastly different than what we see today. I can speak personally for this. My mother was born in GuangZhou, China. She literally saw the eruption of Chinese culture in the “Cultural Revolution.” All educated citizens, businessmen, even people who just wore glasses were stripped of socio-economic status to be “re-cultured” as the traditional chinese peasant. The largest contrast between modern Communist China and its ancient past is its distribution of power. In Analects, Confucius supplies the rulebook for the ideal moral man. He states, “In a high position he does not domineer over his subordinates” (Analects 111). Confucius makes the point that overwhelming power and social status are a recipe for evil. Since Mao zeDong and his communist coup intervened with the natural tranquility of everyday life for those “subjects,” he embodies the cultural shift we see