Neo-Confucianism and Zhu Xi | World History | Khan Academy

In previous videos, we've talked about some of the major schools of thought that emerged at the end of the Joe Dynasty, especially as we start to enter the Warring States period. The famous hundred schools of thought, and most prominent amongst them is Confucianism, started or based on the teachings of Confucius, who lived around 2500 years ago. It was all about how does a society live in harmony. Confucianism is based on a lot of teachings that were already part of Chinese culture, and Confucius, one could say, put them together, but put them together in a contextual way, and made them more relevant.

You can see on this diagram that Confucianism was really focused on the ethical, but Confucius himself tried to apply some of his teachings into the more practical realm. Now, out of that hundred schools of thought, you also have Daoism that we talk about in other videos. Daoism is really based on this idea of the Dao, or the way. We could do many videos on Daoism, but it's this idea of letting go, and you could even think of it as going with the flow and simplicity, a return to nature, freeing yourself from desires. It was definitely more philosophical and more focused on the spiritual than Confucianism.

Now, in other videos, we talk about Legalism, which was a key part of the Chin Dynasty, the first real Imperial Dynasty. China is named after the Chin Dynasty, but it was fairly harsh. It was really this idea that, hey, human beings really need strong leadership, sometimes harsh leadership, in order for society to actually work. Now, the school of thought that we have here up at the top, Buddhism is interesting because it did not emerge from that hundred schools of thought period that we get at the end of the Joe Dynasty. Buddhism emerges in India at around the same time, roughly 2500 years ago, with the teachings of Buddha, a Hindu prince who lived in Northeast India, Southern Nepal.

His teachings are, in some ways, you could almost view as a reformation of Hinduism at the time, a return to the idea that someone, through meditation and realization, can become one with at least in Buddhism, the emptiness, nirvana, and can escape from clinging to desires of this non-reality that we think we live in. Now, we've talked about in previous videos how the Chin Dynasty was really based on this legalist philosophy, but the Han Dynasty is considered the Golden Age of China. Now under the Han Dynasty, Confucianism really took hold and became the dominant philosophical structure of China, and to some degree, would stay that way.

Now at the end of the Han Dynasty, China goes into a chaotic period for several hundred years until we get to the 6th century when the Sui Dynasty is able to finally reunify China for the most part. In that interim, Confucianism starts to give way to some degree to both Daoism and Buddhism, these things that are more focused on the spiritual areas where Confucianism was not as interested. What's interesting about Buddhism, even though it started in India, famously Ashoka in the 3rd century BCE really becomes a patron of Buddhism and even sends missionaries out to spread it. It comes to China via Central Asia and Southeast Asia, and it really takes on a uniquely Chinese nature as it enters China.

Really, it eventually evolves into Mahayana Buddhism, and under the Tang Dynasty, which is considered one of the high points of Chinese civilization, Buddhism is really able to take hold, especially in the early Tang Dynasty. However, as we get into the late Tang Dynasty, Buddhism starts to get some pushback and even gets persecuted to some degree, with people arguing that, hey, Buddhism is a foreign belief system. In some ways, it’s not concerned enough with social cohesion; it’s all about the individual through meditation, trying to separate themselves from reality, becoming one with the emptiness.

Around the same time, someone could argue in reaction to the strength of Buddhism, you have a movement known as Neo-Confucianism, taking the central ideas of Confucius but using some frameworks and terminology from Daoism and Buddhism. There were many Neo-Confucian philosophers that began to emerge in the late Tang Dynasty, but it's really considered the Song Dynasty where Neo-Confucianism really takes hold. The most famous of the Neo-Confucian philosophers, sometimes ranked second to Confucius himself in terms of influence on Chinese philosophy, is Zhu Xi. He lived from 1130 to 1200, and he’s most known for his, one could say, curation of Confucian texts.

He famously curated the Four Books: the Analects of Confucius, the Mencius or the Mengzi by Mencius, the Great Learning, and the Doctrine of the Mean, written by Confucian followers. This curation of Confucian thought, shortly after Zhu Xi's life, becomes the bedrock of the Chinese education system and the civil service examinations as we go through the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties all the way to the early 20th century. Now, he also wrote books on tradition and rituals, which are in some ways very Confucian because they're focused on the practical; they're focused on the family, they're focused on social cohesion.

But he also dabbled in the more spiritual, wrote extensively about notions of Tai Chi, which is really a Daoist or even a Buddhist idea, thinking about what is the fundamental nature of the universe. The Tai Chi itself is the great ultimate, sometimes represented by the yin-yang symbol. Really, this is showing Tai Chi divided into this dualistic nature between yin and yang, how at the center of each or at the extreme of each, they become the other. He writes about Qi, this life force or energy, and once again these are ideas he takes from Daoism.

But in Neo-Confucian thought, there's this idea of you shouldn't just detach yourself from physical reality; you should study it. There's an order, there’s a logic to the universe that could be understood. Because of the influence of the Neo-Confucians, especially their focus on belief in the order and logic of the universe, it's no coincidence that the Song Dynasty saw some of the major technological advancements, not just of China, but of the world—advancements that really put China at the technological forefront. Remember, Europe at this time is in the Middle Ages, the Middle East is under the Golden Age of Islam, but it's really the Chinese who are pushing the envelope here.

Now just get a flavor of some of Zhu Xi's writing: "Original mind is principle as derived from Tai Chi in itself unmoved and perfectly good, while physical nature on the other hand is principle mixed with material force Qi. It is the aroused state involving both good and evil. The two natures, however, are always interfused; one the substance and the other the function." So once again, even though he was Confucian—a Confucian philosopher—this is very Daoist in nature. Even this notion of talking about original mind as principle in itself unmoved and perfectly good feels very Buddhist or even Hindu in its thinking.

Now one could debate what it was and to what degree it was influenced by Buddhism. It is a very central idea that all of reality, all of sense, is emergent from this Atman, from this Brahman, from this original mind, emerging from the emptiness. But what makes it Neo-Confucian is beyond the metaphysical and the philosophical; they bring it down to reality. They bring it down to practical concerns: how does this affect how one governs? How does this affect how one should learn? How does this affect how one should be in social harmony with those around them?