Filial piety

Filial piety

Scene from the Song Dynasty Illustrations of the Classic of Filial Piety (detail), depicting a son kneeling before his parents.[1]
Chinese name
Chinese 孝
Vietnamese name
Vietnamese alphabet hiếu
Korean name
Hangul 효
Hanja 孝
Japanese name
Kanji 孝
Kana こう

In Confucian philosophy, filial piety (Chinese: 孝, xiào) is a virtue of respect for one's parents, elders, and ancestors. The Confucian classic Xiao Jing or Classic of Xiào, thought to be written around the Qin-Han period, has historically been the authoritative source on the Confucian tenet of xiào / "filial piety". The book, a conversation between Confucius and his student Zeng Shen (曾參, also known as Zengzi 曾子), is about how to set up a good society using the principle of xiào (filial piety). The term can also be applied to general obedience, and is used in religious titles in Christian Churches, like "filial priest" or "filial vicar" for a cleric whose church is subordinate to a larger parish. Filial piety is central to Confucian role ethics.[2]


In more general terms, filial piety means to be good to one's parents; to take care of one's parents; to engage in good conduct not just towards parents but also outside the home so as to bring a good name to one's parents and ancestors; to perform the duties of one's job well so as to obtain the material means to support parents as well as carry out sacrifices to the ancestors; not be rebellious; show love, respect and support; display courtesy; ensure male heirs, uphold fraternity among brothers; wisely advise one's parents, including dissuading them from moral unrighteousness; display sorrow for their sickness and death; and carry out sacrifices after their death.

Filial piety is considered a key virtue in Chinese culture, and it is the main concern of a large number of stories. One of the most famous collections of such stories is The Twenty-four Filial Exemplars (Ershi-si xiao 二十四孝). These stories depict how children exercised their filial piety in the past. While China has always had a diversity of religious beliefs, filial piety has been common to almost all of them; historian Hugh D.R. Baker calls respect for the family the only element common to almost all Chinese believers.[3]

Etymology

Filial piety is illustrated by the Chinese character xiao (孝).[4] The character is a combination of the character lao (old) above the character zi (son), that is, an elder being carried by a son.[4] In Korean Confucianism, the character 孝 is pronounced hyo (효). In Vietnamese, the character 孝 is written in Quoc Ngu as hiếu. In Japanese, the term is generally used in spoken and written language as 親孝行, "oyakoukou," adding characters for "parent" and "conduct" to make the word more specific.

Cultural significance

Confucianism

Illustrations of the Ladies' Classic of Filial Piety (detail), Song Dynasty, depicting the section "Serving One's Parents-in-Law".

Illustrations of the Ladies' Classic of Filial Piety (detail), Song Dynasty, depicting the section "Serving One's Parents-in-Law".[5]

According to the Classic of Filial Piety, Confucius once said: "In serving his parents, a filial son reveres them in daily life; he makes them happy while he nourishes them; he takes anxious care of them in sickness; he shows great sorrow over their death that was for him; and he sacrifices to them with solemnity."[4] For Confucius, filial piety was not merely blind loyalty to one's parents. More important than the norms of xiào were the norms of rén (仁; benevolence) and yì (義; righteousness). For Confucius and Mencius, xiào was a display of rén which was ideally applied in one's dealings with all elders, thus making it a general norm of intergenerational relations. However, in practice, xiào was usually reserved for one's own parents and grandparents, and from time to time, was elevated above the notions of rén and yì.

Filial piety was emphasized in Confucianism because devotion to one's parents was often associated with one's devotion to the state.[6]

Buddhism

Early Buddhism did not have a strong tradition of filial piety. Buddhism in India involved many men leaving or abandoning their families, parents, wives, and children to become monks (Buddha himself was said to have done so). The true Buddhist had to reject all family ties, just as they had to reject social and class ties if they were to pursue Nirvana. Family was viewed as just another encumbrance of mortal life that had to be dealt with. Sorrow and grief were said to be "born of those who are dear.".[7] Theravada Buddhism stressed individual salvation, and had little room for the interdependent society that Confucianism had created in China, which stressed the good of the community more than the good of the individual. In India, Buddhism also advocated celibacy among its monks which was unacceptable in the Confucian world view, given that it was viewed as the child's duty to continue the parental line.[8]

Introduction of Buddhism in China

When Buddhism was introduced to China, it was redefined to support filial piety. The Mouzi Lihuolun (牟子理惑論), a work defending Buddhism to the Chinese, presented arguments for Buddhist monks' seemingly poor treatment of their parents, by closely reading the works of Confucius himself. The Guiyangtu (跪羊图)[9] and Vimalakirti Nirdesa Sutra[10] are also Buddhist works portraying lay householder duties and obligations in contrast with pure monastic renunciation.

The Mouzi Lihuolun

The Mouzi Lihuolun compares the Buddhist monk to a filial son who saves his father from drowning.

A long time ago, the Ch'i people crossed a large river in a boat and it happened that their father fell into the water. His sons rolled up their sleeves, seized his head, and turned him upside down, forcing the water out of his mouth, thus bringing their father back to life. Now, to seize one's father's head and turn him upside down is certainly not very filial. Yet they could have done nothing better to save their father's life. If they had folded their hands and practiced the norm of filial sons, their father's life would have been lost in the waters.[11]

The behavior of a Buddhist monk is similar. While on the surface the Buddhist seems to reject and abandon his parents, the pious Buddhist is actually aiding his parents as well as himself on their path towards salvation. The Mouzi Lihuolun also attempted to counter charges that not having children was a violation of good ethics. It was pointed out that Confucius himself had praised a number of ascetic sages who had not had children or family, but because of their wisdom and sacrifice were still perceived as ethical by Confucius. The argument that Buddhist filial piety concerns itself with the parent’s soul is the most important one. The same essential argument was made later by Sun Chuo, who argued that Buddhists monks (far from working solely for their own benefit) were working to ensure the salvation of all people and aiding their family by doing so.[12] Huiyuan continued in this reasoning, arguing that if one member leaves the household to be a monk, then all other members of the family would benefit from good fortune and lead superior lives.

Adapting their efforts

These philosophical arguments were not entirely successful in convincing the filial Chinese that the behavior advocated by Buddhism was correct, and so less subtle methods were employed. To more directly give Buddhism filial nature, passages and parables that were of minor importance in Indian and Central Asian Buddhism became very prominent in Chinese Buddhism. The story of Shanzi 睒子 (Syama in Sanskrit, Sama in Pali, from the Sama Jataka), is an example of this.

Story of Shanzi

Shanzi (睒子) spent his entire life aiding his blind parents, until he was accidentally killed. But, because of his life of filial devotion, he was miraculously revived. This story was often mentioned in the Chinese canon of Buddhist writings, included in a number of different anthologies (such as the Liudu Jijing 六度集经) and referred to by other Chinese Buddhist writers.[13] While it is clearly of Indian origin based on the story of Shravan, this tale was virtually indistinguishable from similar Chinese tales. While the tale was transmitted along with Buddhist writings, philosophically it had very little to do with traditional Buddhism.

The story of Moggallana

Another story advocating filial piety is that of Moggallana, a Buddhist monk who goes to great lengths to rescue his mother from condemnation for her unjust life. This story appeared in the Ullambana Sutra and it is far more relevant to Buddhism than the tale of Shan-tzǔ, though it was still not a particularly important tale in Indian Buddhism. In China, however, these stories became not just elements of Buddhist scripture, but also popular tales which were even told amongst non-Buddhists. While these tales were a part of the Buddhist tradition, Chinese Buddhism raised them from a peripheral role to a central one.

Other texts

Ryūkyūan cultures

Filial piety is an important element in the cultures of the Ryukyu Islands. It is the topic of half of the verses of the most popular Okinawan folksong, Tinsagu nu Hana.

Criticism

Lu Xun in his collection "Dawn Blossoms Plucked at Dusk" (朝花夕拾) criticized the stories "He Buried His Son for His Mother" and "Wang Xiang: He Lay on Ice in Search of Carp".

The latter story is about Wang Xiang, a very young boy, who laid on an iced lake in order to get a fish for his sick mother. Although this may seem a bit extreme, filial piety emphasizes on the importance of putting one's parents' interests ahead of one's own.

Abrahamic Thought

Honour thy father and thy mother is one of the Ten Commandments in the Hebrew Bible.

In the Gospels, Jesus affirmed the importance of honouring one's father and mother (Matthew 15:1–9, Matthew 19:17–19, Mark 10:17–19, Luke 18:18–21) Paul quotes the commandment in his letter to the church in Ephesus:

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honour your father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), "that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land." (Ephesians 6:1–2, ESV. See also Colossians 3:20)
— Ephesians 6:1–2 (ESV)

In his letters to the Romans and Timothy, Paul describes disobedience to parents as a serious sin (Romans 1:29–31, 2 Timothy 3:2).

The words of Jesus and the teaching of Paul indicate that adult children remain obligated to honour their parents by providing for material needs. In the gospels, Jesus is portrayed as angry with some people who avoided materially providing for their parents by claiming the money they would have used was given to God (Matthew 15:3–8, Mark 7:9–12. In these passages, Jesus quotes Isaiah 29:13) According to the Gospel of John, when Jesus was on the cross, he provided for his natural mother by giving the Apostle John the charge to care for her, which John accepted.

Nevertheless, modern Western society of today rarely practices "filial piety" as most children from a Judeo-Christian background do not honor and care for parents to the extent of those from Eastern backgrounds. This is because in the modern West, the individual is more important than the family and when an elderly parent becomes a burden to the adult child, the needs of the adult child to be burden-free supersedes any feeling of obligation to care for the elderly parent. Western children tend to abandon elderly parents to be cared for by the State or to fend for themselves in old age compared to Eastern children who feel great sense of obligation to care and repay their debt to their parents.[14]

Western cultures tend to be youth-centric, emphasizing attributes like individualism and independence. This relates back to the Protestant work ethic, which ties an individual's value to his or her ability to work — something that diminishes in old age. Anthropologist Jared Diamond, who has studied the treatment of the elderly across cultures, has said the geriatric in countries like the U.K. and U.S. live "lonely lives separated from their children and lifelong friends." As their health deteriorates, the elderly in these cultures often move to retirement communities, assisted living facilities, and nursing homes.[15]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Paintings with political agendas". Retrieved 12 January 2012.
  2. ↑ Wonsuk Chang; Leah Kalmanson (8 November 2010). Confucianism in Context: Classic Philosophy and Contemporary Issues, East Asia and Beyond. SUNY Press. p. 68. ISBN 978-1-4384-3191-8.
  3. ↑ Baker, Hugh D. R. Chinese Family and Kinship. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979. pg. 98
  4. 1 2 3 Ikels, Charlotte (2004). Filial piety: Practice and discourse in contemporary East Asia. Stanford: Stanford University Press. pp. 2–3. ISBN 978-0-8047-4791-2.
  5. ↑ Mann, Susan; Cheng, Yu-Yin, eds. (2001). Under Confucian eyes: Writings on gender in Chinese history. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press. p. 46. ISBN 978-0-520-22276-2.
  6. ↑ See Analects 1:2, Xiao Jing chap.1
  7. ↑ Piyajatika Sutta, or Sutta 87 of the Majjhima Nikaya, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.087.than.html
  8. ↑ Traylor, Kenneth L. Chinese Filial Piety. Bloomington: Eastern Press, 1988. pg. 110
  9. ↑ "跪羊图高清大字版". Youtube. Retrieved 25 June 2014.
  10. ↑ Robert, Thurman. "Vimalakirti Nirdesa Sutra". Retrieved 25 June 2014.
  11. ↑ Keenan, John P. (1994). How master Mou removes our doubts: a reader-response study and translation of the Mou-tzu Li-huo lun, SUNY Press, p. 83.
  12. ↑ Zurcher, E. The Buddhist Conquest of China. Leiden: E. J. Brill., 1959a, pg. 134
  13. ↑ Ch'en, Kenneth. The Chinese Transformation of Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973. pg. 23
  14. ↑ Lee R.P., Yu E., Sun S. & Liu W.T. (2000) Living arrangements and elderly care: the case of Hong Kong. In Who Should Care for the Elderly: An East-West Value Divide (Liu W.T. & Kendig H., eds), Singapore University Press, National University of Singapore and World Scientific, Singapore, pp. 269–296.
  15. ↑ http://theweek.com/articles/462230/how-elderly-are-treated-around-world>

Bibliography

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