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Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Contrast & Comparison of Philosophies Between Plato & Confucius

Ironically, however, when Confucianism began to disintegrate among the upper class under Sun Yat-sen, "among the peasants a form of virtual(a) Confucianism remained. non only did fathers expect their sons to stay with them, to help eke out a living from the soil, but whole clans clung together in a sort of mutual-assistance society" (Clark, 1959, p. 102).

Although Confucius was concerned with the individual, those individual concerns were always located formally in the context of the family and fond organization. Confucius was a practicable man with both feet planted on the ground. He believed that if he could gain powerful political office, he could create the model society, a vision which reminds us of Plato, as we shall see.

As we call for in Huston Smith's The Religions of Man, "As posit after state forgotten his counsels of peace and concern for the people, recluses and hermits sneered at his efforts to reform society and hash out him to join their quest for a self-mastery sufficient to offset the ills of a society beyond redemption . . . A failure as a politician, Confucius was undoubtedly one of the world's greatest teachers" (Smith, 1965, p. 144).

Confucius' teachings consisted of a practical blend of concern for self-development and a concern for other gentleman's gentleman beings. It is a down-to-earth philosophy which reminds us somewhat of the practicality and wide humor of Benjamin Franklin. Some of Confucius' sayings ar


Where Plato and Confucius meet in agreement, however, with respect to their views on the individual, on the relationships among human beings, and on man's ultimate concern, is in their delineation of social roles.

It is plausibly that Confucius and Plato would confound gotten along charmingly if they had met and exchanged philosophical viewpoints. They overlap many points of agreement on the basics of what it means to be an individual in society. Their differences would seem to be minor, with the exception of Plato's cartel on reason.
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Confucius aphorism the family as the center of the social fabric, whereas Plato saw the connection between the individual soul and the nature of the state as crucial. Both emphasized the importance of the Socratic rule in education, although, again, Plato seems to have bet rayed that method with his employment of the imposing lie in the Republic.

For example, to Confucius the ultimate goal for any soulfulness is to become fully involved in their familial and social roles: "When Confucius says that nothing is more important than that a father be a father, that a regulation be a ruler, this implies setoff that we know what we mean when we use the words father and ruler and that we mean the right things. Behind the concept of Li, then, stands the presumption that the heterogeneous roles and relationships of life will have been normatively delineated and defined" (Smith, 1965, pp. 161-162).

We have seen that for Confucius the highest achievement for the individual is to be a father if he is a father, to be a ruler if he is a ruler. Plato would agree wholeheartedly. For Plato, society cannot meaningfully exist, and certainly cannot attain its example state, unless the people are performing effectively in their item social roles.


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