Talk:Mandate of Heaven

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[edit] Scope

I wonder about this: "any failed ruler was considered to have lost it, no matter how great his personal virtue." Can anyone name one ruler who both represented the end of a dynasty and who had great personal virtue? I doubt there were any but I'm not sure.

"It also encouraged both Chinese unity and a disdainful attitude towards the outside world, since there was only one Mandate, and so only one true ruler of humankind—the Emperor of China". I think this statement is ridiculous. I don't think the Mandate applied to foreigners. Do you really think the Hans thought the Mongolians had the Mandate of Heaven during the Yuan dynasty? And where does it say that China believed the emperor of China is the ruler of all humankind? If China really believed that, then they would not have had peaceful relationships with so many other kingdoms around the world. And if China really had such disdainful attitudes, it wouldn't send so many envoys around Asia. If the Chinese court resisted the ravenous European empires of the 1800s, it was because of .. well they were ravenous European empires.

Sour pickle 22:26, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Actually alot of literature (not sure if its fact or fiction) give last emperors great personal virtue, but commonly a dynasty falls from corruption and internal (ie. the court) struggle. China isnt a single being that believes single ideas. Also, this page has suffered alot of old vandals. --1698 06:16, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Current belief?

I have been wondering this for a while. Theoretically, it is possible that one could use the Mandate to justify the current (post-)Maoist state in China. If it hasn't been overthrown, it's legitimate/blessed, right? Does anyone know if there is a significant group which still holds to the Mandate? Or, could we trace the current Chinese support of their system to their cultural heritage of the Mandate? samwaltz 19:40, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] See Also..

This list of related topics strikes me as arbitrary: Tian'anmen? Amaterasu? Where's General Tso Chicken, while we're throwing random Asian concepts at the reader? Keep it short and closely related. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 74.100.116.23 (talk) 03:10, 2 April 2007 (UTC).

Tiananmen was called the gate of accepting heavenly mandate. It is either Amaterasu or japanese sun deity. I think you're just in the mood to whine and complain. It is not random and they make sense. Benjwong 03:35, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ambiguity

"Times of floods or famines were considered divine signs from the heaven in violation of the Mandate."

This sentence seems ambiguous to me. Are floods and famines results of Mandate violation (i.e., sent from heaven to punish Mandate-violating mortals), or are the floods and famines themselves cases of a heavenly divinity violating its own Mandate? Hopefully someone can clarify. - Tobogganoggin talk 05:04, 15 October 2007 (UTC)