The Conquest of the Shang and the Mandate of Heaven

2018 ◽  
pp. 68-111
Keyword(s):  
Mandate Of Heaven

Mozi and the Dates of Xia, Shang, and Zhou: A Research Note

Early China ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 175-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
D.W. Pankenier
Keyword(s):  
Research Note ◽  
Previous Article ◽  
Mandate Of Heaven

In a previous article in these pages (EC 7.1981-82:2-37) I reported on the discovery in the jinben version of the Bamboo Annals of verifiable records of the planetary conjunctions of 1576 and 1059 B.C. I argued that literary and chronological evidence drawn from a variety of Zhou and Han sources indicates that the two celestial events were taken at the time to signal Heaven's conferral of legitimate right to rule on the new dynasty, first Shang and then Zhou.If this view is correct, the discoveries not only establish the historicity, and indeed the great antiquity, of certain chronological and atronomical records in the Bamboo Annals, they also prove that a concept akin to the Zhou “Mandate of Heaven” must have existed as early as the founding of the Shang in the midsecond millennium B.C., just as implied in the Shangshu. Equally noteworthy is the finding that numerous Zhou and Han works, including those of a notoriously “soft” variety such as the apocryphal “weft” commentaries of mid-Han date, contain mythicized though recognizable accounts of the same celestial phenomena.

Ritual and Ren in Confucius’s World

2021 ◽  
pp. 53-112
Author(s):  
Tao Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Moral Foundation ◽  
Core Concepts ◽  
Mandate Of Heaven ◽  
Political Project ◽  
The Way

At the very beginning of Chinese moral-political philosophy stood Confucius, who attempted to maintain a continuum between partialist humaneness and impartialist justice in his articulation of ideal personhood, family, and polity. This is reflected in the way two core concepts, i.e., ritual (li) and the virtue of ren, in his philosophy are formulated. In his effort to rescue the collapsing ritual order, Confucius formulated the virtue of ren, usually translated as the Good, humaneness, humanity, human-heartedness, authoritative or consummate conduct, or benevolence, and touted this newly formulated virtue as the new moral foundation for the ritual order that used to be grounded in the Zhou kings’ claim of the Mandate of Heaven. Confucius’s ren contains both a partialist element favoring one’s family and an impartialist element when dealing with others. Confucius’s effort set the parameters for the mainstream moral-political project during the classical period, but his vision would be seriously challenged and significantly reformulated.

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