Kongzi (Confucius)
551-479 BC · Classical Confucianism · Household name
Confucius was a Chinese teacher who wanted rulers worth copying. Govern by your own conduct and people follow without being driven. Human excellence, ren, grows out of small things done right: ritual, li, good manners, care for your parents. Offices should go to virtue and merit rather than to birth. His followers gathered his sayings as the Analects, the book Confucianism grew out of.
Signature
The position Confucius is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Society
- leans Collectivism
- Ethics Basis
- Virtue
Positions on the 6 axes the sources answer
- Society
- leans Collectivism (25 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- Meaning
- leans Inherent (75 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Order
- leans Vertical (19 on a 0–100 scale from Vertical to Horizontal)
- Polity
- leans Illiberalism (25 on a 0–100 scale from Illiberalism to Liberalism)
- Ignorance
- mildly between Bondage and Bliss (42 on a 0–100 scale from Bondage to Bliss)
- Allegiance
- leans Local (25 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
14 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Confucius refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Other
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Communal Order
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Virtue / Harmony
What is the highest good? - Knowledge
- Phronesis / Tradition
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Virtue
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Libertarian Free Will
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Authority
- Sacred Tradition / Hereditary / Benevolence
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Language
- Conventional / Speech Act
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Law
- Customary Law
What is the ultimate source of legitimate law? - Death
- Ancestral Presence / Living Memory
What happens at death? - Primary Bond
- Family
What is your primary bond and loyalty?