The Heaven-Earth Cosmic Faith and the Universality of Confucian Ethics

Abstract

Abstract The ritual practice of making sacrificial offerings to Heaven and Earth, named respectively Jiao and She, existed in the Western Zhou period. In classical Chinese culture, Heaven and Earth were paired and named “father” and “mother” of humanity and all things. This points to the “this-worldly” nature—vis à vis “other-worldly” nature—of the highest deity in Chinese faith, who existed in a “continuity of being” with humans on the Earth. “Heaven and Earth are parents of all creatures, and of those, Man is the most highly accomplished.” Such a notion synthesizes the cosmic law of nature and human centric ethics, creating a unity of nature and human society through “oneness of virtue.” The Confucian tenets proposing that human nature is innately good, and the need for the pursuit of moral self-cultivation, are fundamental to the ideology. More importantly, so too are such universal virtues as “being lovingly disposed to people in general, and kind to all creatures and things,” and the affirmation that “all people (are) brothers and sisters of oneself; all creatures and living things one’s equals,” as well as “all under Heaven (is) one family, and the nation, one person.”