Ritual and Ritual Obligations: Perspectives on Normativity from Classical China

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to explore some of the theories that arose in classical China concerning the ways in which normativity could be construed in ritual terms. I focus particular attention on the theories that were developed in portions of the Book of Rites (Liji), which would become one of the most influential bodies of ritual theory throughout East Asia. I will argue that some of these theories deserve to be incorporated into our contemporary philosophical understandings of normativity. To make this argument, I will be turning to some rather-given my ultimate goals in this paper-counterintuitive material, including early Chinese discussions of mourning rituals. But I will try to argue that this material has something to offer contemporary discussions. 1 Rituals and Norms Let me begin by mentioning one of the common criticisms made against the argument that we should take theorists of ritual seriously when discussing norms. Perhaps one of the reasons we often denigrate the significance of rituals is that we think rituals essentially function to socialize us into a way of thinking and acting. In other words, rituals tell us what to do. So, if the norms embedded within a given ritual are good, then the ritual would perhaps be acceptable. But what if the norms are not, from our point of view, acceptable? Following them would then entail submitting ourselves to "traditional" values, as opposed to having norms that could at least potentially be rationally adjudicated and altered. It is, of course, entirely possible to have ritual traditions that become rigidified and function in a top-down way to instill values on a population. But thinking that

Why Confucianism Matters for the Ethics of Technology

“…12 Moreover, the bodily-performative dimension of Confucian Li allows people to internalize norms and values and enables them to react ethically to different situations in spontaneity, which is crucial to individual ethical life because many of our everyday ethical judgment and behavior are pre-reflective and influenced by the situations (Olberding 2016;also, see Hutton 2006;Slingerland 2011;Seok 2012). Alternatively, it has also been suggested that the practice and performance of Confucian Li creates an "as if" space, in which people's dispositions are trained and refined (Puett 2015). According to this understanding of Li, the bodily-performative dimension is also essential because it is through the (re-)enactment of critical events in the "as if" space, individuals acquire the emotional and physiological experience and learn to modulate them.…”

Rituals and Machines: A Confucian Response to Technology-Driven Moral Deskilling

“…The capacity to (re)act in the wuwei way is essential to Confucian ethics, as it conceives our everyday ethical encounters as most often pre-reflective and influenced by situations, and thus, an ethics that merely focuses on reflection and/or deliberate actions is insufficient insofar as it cannot account for the pre-reflective and situational influences [25,33,34]. Finally, Michael Puett [35] also argues that Confucian li creates an "as if" space, in which people can train and refine their ethical dispositions. In other words, the bodily-performative dimension is essential because individuals could acquire physiological and emotional experiences and learn to modulate them through (re-)enactment of the critical events in the "as if" space of Confucian li.…”

El <em>Xué Ér</em> en el horizonte conceptual confuciano

“…Por la misma razón, mi comentario sólo se propone introducir al lector a las nociones que he considerado medulares en el Xué Ér y en su relación con el resto del Lúnyu . Asimismo, para una https://doi.org/10.24201/eaa.v56i1.2506 comprensión más íntegra del Lúnyu , remito al lector a la bibliografía citada, y en particular a las investigaciones de Peimin Ni (2008Ni ( , 2009, Michael Puett (2006Puett ( , 2010Puett ( , 2015, Alexus Mc-Leod (2012), Li-Hsiang Lisa Rosenlee (2006Rosenlee ( , 2014 y François Jullien (2001Jullien ( , 2010Jullien ( , 2016, las cuales han sido un apoyo primordial al evaluar el resto de las traducciones modernas del Lúnyu y al elaborar mi propia exégesis del Xué Ér. 2 Finalmente, transcribí los términos en chino según el sistema de romanización pīnyīn.…”

“…Michael Puett (2006, 2015 ha propuesto con considerable respaldo textual que el confucianismo clásico (al menos en el Lúnyu y en el Mèngzı ) no reconoce un orden natural o dào hacia el cual deba retornar la viciosa e infeliz conducta humana.…”