溫故知新 Old wisdom, today’s insight — ONGO
What Is the Difference Between Feeding and Honoring One's Parents?
Between feeding one's parents and honoring them, which is the essence of filial piety?
Today filial piety is said to mean merely being able to feed one's parents. But even dogs and horses are fed and kept — without reverence, what would tell the two apart?
Confucius's question dividing support from reverence raised Confucian discourse on filial piety a level. Mencius pressed further, holding that support without reverence is no better than raising livestock, and set "nourishing the will" — reading a parent's true wishes — as the real filial act. Xunzi, by contrast, held that the forms of ritual are the very vessel that carries reverence, weighing procedure and attitude together. This split between form and heart is still weighed today between "what did I do for them" and "in what spirit did I treat them."
Sending money has grown easier, but the question of whether reverence rides along with it cuts sharper still in an age of automatic transfers.
When Ziyou asked about filial piety, Confucius struck with an unexpected image: even animals are fed and grow.
📝I, Too, Stand Before It
When Ziyou asked about filial piety, Confucius struck with an unexpected image: even animals are fed and grow. I read this not as belittling filial duty but as aimed at the ease of thinking a full table settles the debt. Before this line — that support without reverence is no different from keeping livestock — I retrace how much of what I have given my parents was truly heart, and how much was dutiful motion.
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