The Story of Daoism and Confucianism

The Right "Way" or "Road" to Live

As I continued to read Chapters 13 and 14 of Bresnan's Awakening: An Introduction to the History of Eastern Thought, I encountered two influential non-Buddhist traditions native to Asia's eastern region, Confucianism and Daoism. Both of these traditions focus on one's self-improvement through discovering positive-negative (yin & yang) energies of the world's natural order for universal harmony. Although Confucianism and Daoism share some subtle qualities, they are not the same. Daoism was formed later after the lifetime of Confucius, and appears to be the "antithesis of Confucianism" (Bresnan 335). Daoism focuses more on balance and the natural forces of life, while Confucianism focuses more on social order and it's relation to the environment. 

Disruption in Our Universal Harmony

The Teaching of Confucius
Portrait by Wu Daozi
685 - 758 CE

Confucius said that human society had gotten out of harmony with the larger natural order that is it apart of. When we hear the term natural order, we think of a moral source driven by unspoken rules of the universe, but it is much more than a set of unspoken principles. Natural order comes from the balance between our environment and our human nature. From Confucius judgement, he saw men as apart of nature, and we as humans must not be in conflict with that natural order. He believed that "there is a right ordering of society that is natural to it, in the same way that there is a right ordering to all of the things of nature" (Bresnan 308). Confucius witnessed the imbalance of harmony between the evolution of human's society and it's part in the larger natural order. Meaning that human's selfish and evil acts are what corrupts the harmony within our universal nature. During Confucius's day, society was organized through rank and generation, which lead authority to be taken advantage of. He found living under leadership and Government, which is established for men to feel protected, felt more oppressive. In Confucius's eyes, the highest concern was reestablishing the ordering in society. And before we can reach "Confucianism's system promise to fashion a society that is harmonious, peaceful, and prosperous" (Bresnan 301), it must begin within family and applying the wisdom we learn and encounter with our present situations. Confucius's vision of a reestablished human society, will bring back the universal harmony within our larger natural order.

The Basic Forces of Nature

Yin&Yang Symbol

Have you ever heard the saying "opposites attract and complement each other"? You could compare this with the Philosophical Daoist concept of yin&yang, that "harmony is the result of the innerworkings of the basic forces of nature" (Bresnan 352). The term originally comes from the Chinese words for moon and sun. The black and feminine-side of the symbol Yin, is the passive force principle that maintains and regulates, in which is also characterized as the dark and negative side. The white and masculine-side of the symbol Yang, is the active force principle that initiates action, also characterized to be the light and positive side. One cannot exist without the other, they are the balance within the forces of nature. 

Work Cited

Bresnan, Patrick. Awakening: an Introduction to the History of Eastern Thought. 6th ed., Routledge, 2018.

Daozi, Wu. The Teaching Confucius.

Mnmazur, Klem. Yin and Yang Symbol. 7 Dec. 2007.