The Analects of Confucius - A Philosophical Translation

Informationen zum Autor Roger Ames, translator Klappentext "To quietly persevere in storing up what is learned, to continue studying without respite, to instruct others without growing weary--is this not me?" --Confucius Confucius is recognized as China's first and greatest teacher, and his ideas have been the fertile soil in which the Chinese cultural tradition has flourished. Now, here is a translation of the recorded thoughts and deeds that best remember Confucius--informed for the first time by the manuscript version found at Dingzhou in 1973, a partial text dating to 55 BCE and only made available to the scholarly world in 1997. The earliest Analects yet discovered, this work provides us with a new perspective on the central canonical text that has defined Chinese culture--and clearly illuminates the spirit and values of Confucius. Confucius (551-479 BCE) was born in the ancient state of Lu into an era of unrelenting, escalating violence as seven of the strongest states in the proto-Chinese world warred for supremacy. The landscape was not only fierce politically but also intellectually. Although Confucius enjoyed great popularity as a teacher, and many of his students found their way into political office, he personally had little influence in Lu. And so he began to travel from state to state as an itinerant philosopher to persuade political leaders that his teachings were a formula for social and political success. Eventually, his philosophies came to dictate the standard of behavior for all of society--including the emperor himself. Based on the latest research and complete with both Chinese and English texts, this revealing translation serves both as an excellent introduction to Confucian thought and as an authoritative addition to sophisticated debate.INTRODUCTION   HISTORICAL AND TEXTUAL BACKGROUND   Master Kong  (Confucius) Confucius (551–479 BCE) is probably the most influential thinker in human history, if influence is determined by the sheer number of people who have lived their lives, and died, in accordance with the thinker’s vision of how people ought to live, and die. Like many other epochal figures of the ancient world—Socrates, Buddha, Jesus—Confucius does not seem to have written anything that is clearly attributable to him; all that we know of his vision directly must be pieced together from the several accounts of his teachings, and his life, found in the present text, the Analects, and other collateral but perhaps less reliable sources such as the Mencius and the Zuo Commentary to the Spring and Autumn Annals.   Recognized as China’s first great teacher both chronologically and in importance, Confucius’ ideas have been the fertile soil in which the Chinese cultural tradition has been cultivated and has flourished. In fact, whatever we might mean by “Chineseness” today, some two and a half millennia after his death, is inseparable from the example of personal character that Confucius provided for posterity. And his influence did not end with China. All of the sinitic cultures—especially Korea, Japan, and Vietnam—have evolved around ways of living and thinking derived in significant measure from his ideas as set down by his disciples and others after his death—ideas that are by no means irrelevant to contemporary social, political, moral, and religious concerns.   Confucius was born in the ancient state of Lu (in modern Shandong province) during one of the most formative periods of Chinese culture. Two centuries before his birth, scores of small city-states owing their allegiance to the imperial House of Zhou filled the Yellow River basin. This was the Zhou dynasty (traditionally, 1122–256 BCE) out of which the empire of China was later to emerge. By the time of Confucius’ birth only fourteen independent states remained, with seven of the strongest contending with each other militarily for hegemony over the central...

Produktdetails

• Autoren: Roger T Ames, Roger T. Ames, Henry Rosemont Jr, Henry Rosemont Jr.
• Verlag: Ballantine
• Sprache: Englisch
• Produktform: Taschenbuch
• Erschienen: 07.09.1999
• EAN: 9780345434074
• ISBN: 978-0-345-43407-4
• Seiten: 352
• Abmessung: 139 mm x 210 mm x 19 mm
• Thema: Geisteswissenschaften, Kunst, Musik > Religion/Theologie