溫故知新 Old wisdom, today’s insight — ONGO
Are Filial Piety and Brotherly Love the Roots of the Great Tree Called Humaneness?
Does a broad love for others (humaneness) grow, in the end, out of the small love shown first to one's own family?
Filial piety and brotherly love — are these not the very root from which humaneness grows?
Youzi's claim that filial piety and brotherly love are the root of humaneness became the starting point of Confucian ethics. Mencius carried it forward, refining the logic of extension from root to branch: extend the reverence you feel for your own parents until it reaches other people's parents too. But Mozi challenged this very root, arguing that love beginning in family inevitably ends in favoritism, and countered head-on with a case for love universal from the start. Does humaneness grow out of family, or is family itself, as a root, already the beginning of bias? This question was the fundamental point of contention in the Confucian-Mohist debate.
Whenever we see someone whose behavior at home does not match their words about society, this old insight — suspicion of a rootless tree — comes to mind again.
Youzi observed that no one who delights in defying elders also delights in stirring up disorder, and held filial piety and brotherly love as the very root of the great tree called humaneness.
📝I, Too, Stand Before It
Youzi observed that no one who delights in defying elders also delights in stirring up disorder, and held filial piety and brotherly love as the very root of the great tree called humaneness. I learn from this that even vast love begins in a small place. Someone who claims to love all humanity yet is careless with their own family is like a tree without roots. Before speaking of love for humankind or justice, I look first, honestly, at how I treat my own family right now.
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