I came across this term in the Qinshihuang's thread at http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php?showtopic=4766, when Warhead mentioned about "Confucian Historian's biasedness".

"Confucian historian" or "Confucian historical view" as I've understood is probably referring to the fact that many chinese historians were themselves confucian scholars and thus heavily influenced by confucianism, such that when they wrote chinese history, it was normally with some views or biasedness from "confucian perspective".

For instance, Confucianism's basic political ideology is to encourage a ruler himself to become a "Junzi 君子" (gentlemen) or 'Renren 仁人" (a man of benevolence). According to confucianism, such kind of ruler with great morality and virtue is a great ruler. Otherwise, if he was oppressive and killed lots of people, he would be considered a tyrant or bad ruler. I wonder if such kind of judgement based on confucian ethic was used to evaluate whether a ruler is a great or bad ruler in the past, probably one reason why Qinshihuang was so negatively rated as a tyrant in chinese history.

What do you think? Is there such a thing called "confucian historical view" or "confucian historian"?

The views that history is continuous, and that the dynasties are a succession of legitimate reign with the Mandate of Heaven regardless of ethnicities of the rulers, and an unified Zhong Yuan under the rule of a legitimate regime, appear to be Confucian.

This is a product of Han Imperial Confucianism, a la Dong Zhongshu, rather than the original thought of Kong Qiu/Confucius, who spoke hardly anything about the dynastic cycle, the Mandate of Heaven, or a unified regime. Indeed Confucius shied away from any discussion of cosmology or metaphysics. He said only that rulers gain legitimacy through moral authority. The part about ethnicity being irrelevant is even more recent, being developed by the Qing dynasty. The Neo-Confucians had earlier reversed Sima Guang's judgment on the Age of Fragmentation and declared the Northern Dynasties to be illegitimate compared to the Southern Dynasties because the Northern rulers were 'barbarians' - this was of course also a reaction to the claims of the Jurchen and then the Mongols to have inherited the Mandate of Heaven. It took some time for the Qing to convince its Neo-Confucian elite that culture, and not ethnicity, was the determinant of political legitimacy in Chinese civilization.

Confucian political thought is highly moralistic and, in a sense, puritanically conservative. Any ruler who engaged in behaviour considered self-indulgent and pleasure-seeking, and spent a great deal on projects of little public utility, was considered fatuous and decadent. Any ruler who spent a lot on expansionist military campaigns without any clear moral purpose was considered overly ambitious and inconsiderate to the livelihood of the people. Any ruler who sought to rule through strict laws and harsh punishments was considered to be undermining his moral authority by treating the people like criminals rather than educating them about right and wrong. Thus the ideal ruler practices an austere lifestyle, maintains the status quo and refrains from offensive warfare unless the cause is just, sets an example of moral virtue for everyone he rules, selects ministers who are themselves moral exemplars, and promotes education as the best means of maintaining public order and gaining the loyalty of his subjects.

Confucian political thought also had a strong misogynistic (i.e. anti-woman) streak. Women, including the emperor's women, have only two roles - to bear children, and to educate children. Sometimes, an exceptional empress or concubine may have enough moral virtue to counsel the emperor against immoral or unwise behaviour. But most of the time, it is bad news for women to be involved in matters of state, or for a ruler to listen too much to a woman, whether it is his wife or his mother. Women were routinely seen as fickle, unprincipled, superficial, short-sighted, driven by emotions, and lacking in a sense of the greater good. Thus Confucian historians had few good things to say about rulers who liked their women too much, or for women who meddled in politics.

Didn't this refer to the western Han historians/writers ? At this time, Confucianism became the dominnt ideology, and a lot of works were edited (having been destroyed by Qin), some texts being found, with sometime editions or additions (eg some chapters in the Shujing), commentaries were written (eg the Gongyang and Guliang commentaries on the Chunqiu), works were compiled (Zhanguoce), or commented upon (Guoyu). As such, there was something like a confucean reinterpretation of history.

I didn't add Sima Qian on purpose, for I am a bit suspicious of his confucean "spirit"... He seldom borrows from the Gongyang zhuan, and seems to have a less conventional approach, especially wrt "recent history" (ie Qin and the civil war).

Francois

Thanks.. I now understand more about how the confucian historian wrote chinese history and their critique on rulers. There seemed to be a more biasedness of view that "women" should not be involved in politics, and that if they interfere and meddled around, it would cause the downfall of a dynasty. However, we've seen some great female politician such as Empress Dowager Dou of Han, Wu Zetian of Tang dynasty.

Then we've seen Qinshihuang and Emperor Yangdi of Sui dynasty being branded as 'tyrants' in chinese history. I guess, with the view of confucian moral perspective, it would seem easier to understand this kind of critique.

Actually, this appears to be a feature of Neo-Confucianism, not the original Confucianism. For example, as far as I'm aware, prior to Neo-Confucianism, the decline of Shang wasn't blamed on Shang Tang's wife.

Funny that we are pointing out the anachronism in each other's statements.

I think you're referring to Shang Zhou's wife?

I had the impression that Confucians were already making noise about the influence of women on politics during the Tang?

As for Empress Dowager Dou of the Western Han, Empress Jia of the Western Jin, Empress Dowager Feng of the Northern Wei, and Wu Zetian of the Tang, the most powerful women in Chinese political history before the Song, it seems that Confucian scholars would, when writing about them, never fail to point out their sexual improprieties. Is this only a Neo-Confucian thing?

D'oh! I meant Shang Zhou.



Perhaps. But that is way late in the development of classical Confucianism.

Weren't all major historians Confucian for starters???

If we had militaristic historians things would be rather different...hee.

I notice some chinese historical critiques on chinese historical/political figures like to shape historical figures into 'good' or 'bad' person. For instance, Cao Cao was often criticised as a 'despicable' subject while Zhugeliang was branded as a loyal servant to Shu-han regime.

Was this somehow also influenced by Confucian historical view?

The use of moral values to decide whether historical figure is good or bad seem to commonly used by Confucian historian. I guess it's unfair to strictly say which historical figure is good or bad, since a person has two sides (he has both good and bad nature).

I actually thought of this for a while.

To me, there are two types of history books, one is like documentary, while the other is the recording and the explaining of history. Most royal historians record documentary types, while other private history or records made by the succeeding dynasty tend to add their view on why they fail/succeed.

Sometimes, writers often express their political ideology for current time but due to political atmospheres cannot use current materials thus they express their views in terms of history; that way, their rear would be covered.

That is just my view.

Certainly, if anyone uses good/bad in a history book other then the sense of 'he died b/c of a bad apple he ate' then its really not history book unless its target audience are children who still view the world in good/bad 忠/奸.

Yun, I can not but marvel at the quality of the content and the skill in the presentation, displayed by your posting. I must say it is unusual to see postings of this depth and quality.

To me it seems all to often the followers of Confucian political thought are not really followers of Confucian thought at all, put cloak themselves in his name in order to promote their own ideas ... similar to an identity theft. They like to use words like money, to purchase the acceptance of their private agenda by others, by using his name.

That is true for most, if not all philosophical/religious teachings. Plato's Republic have little in common with today's republican ideas; the concept of freedom and liberty has been changed multiple times; the idea of justice for all has been fought over in all lands with different beliefs.

I dislike the idea that b/c someone came first, and they with advantage of time, create a large following that those who came thousands years later couldn't possibly change except to join them in names is like a patent that never expires; and since I don't like patents I don't like the idea that Confucius is a Sage and his words are never wrong and any change to his words are theft. Mencius probably would disagree with Confucius, and Dong ZhongShu would disagree and GongYang[s] would disagree and Zhu Xi would disagree, and notably Kang YouWei would also disagree with him, just to name the big people in Confucian thoughts.

I don't think Confucius set out to change the world through a school called Confucian, I think he merely set out to change the word through action, and when that failed, he thought to change the world through teaching; I don't think he would say to the GongYang, 'no, you are thieves who stole my name' or to all the Emperors of China 'no, you use my name and act like Legalists.' Confucius himself promote his own ideas with cloaks that they are TRUE decedents of ZhouLi, his ideas was new at the same time, old; much like most notable Confucian scholars after him, their ideas are old yet with hint of freshness of human thoughts. Such is how philosophical ideas evolve, not through natural selection but through numerous adaptation of the original ideas till its refined like diamonds are refined. Its more like asking is Wang AnShi less of a Confucain then SimaGuang? Or is SimaGuang more of a Confucian then Shu family? Is Zhu Xi somehow less because he change the course of history from Classical Confucian, does that make him any less then Mencius?

I think many historians in the past, in general, branded leaders and historical figures as good or bad using moral values. It's not something unique to Confucians.