The Ledgers of Merit and Demerit

Brokaw, Cynthia J.

doi:10.1515/9781400861941

Cited by 154 publications

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“…The idea of making daily deposits of love to ensure marital longevity has an antecedent in the late imperial practice of recording moral points on the "ledger of merit and demerit" (gongguoge); these points are reckoned monthly and annually to determine one's reward and punishment. Significantly, as Cynthia Brokaw (1991) showed, this approach to life as quantifiable and manipulatable became more pronounced during the Ming-Qing transition period, a time when commercialization, the rise of the merchant class, and the erosion of state authority profoundly undermined the stability of the social and political order.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

All the Feelings That Are Fit to Print

Lee

2001

Modern China

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

All the Feelings That Are Fit to Print

Lee

2001

Modern China

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“…166 According to Liu's biography, Renpu was originally named Zhengren xiao pu 證人小譜 (Pamphlet for Realizing Humanity), 167 and is said to be used as a guide to self-cultivation for the members of Zhengren huei. 168 Given Renpu as the basic guide for personal cultivation, Zhengren huei yue 證人會約 (Constitution for the Members of the Association for Realizing Humanity) can be seen as moral rules in public life.…”

Section: Liu Zongzhou's Scheme For Moral Reformationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Liu Zongzhou's Criticism of Wang Yangming's Followers and his Scheme for Moral Reformation

Pan

2010

Ming Studies

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After Wang Yangming died, different interpretations of his doctrine emerged, and thus the factionalization of the Yangming School of Mind also occurred. To Liu Zongzhou, who is considered the last master of Song-Ming NeoConfucianism, accompanied with this factionalization there came the degeneration of Wang Yangming's followers. In this study I discuss the following fi ve issues: fi rstly, Liu's sense of the degeneration of Wang Yangming's followers, secondly, the debate on Wang Yangming's "Four Sentences of Teaching," mainly the debate between Qian Dehong and Wang Ji, and the one between Xu Fuyuan and Zhou Rudeng, thirdly, Liu's criticism of Wang Yangming's "Four Sentences of Teaching" and the debates on it, fourthly, Liu's criticism of moral decay in the circle of Wang Yangming' followers, including Wang Ji, Wang Gen, Tao Shiling, and the scholars of Mount Baima, lastly, Liu's scheme for moral reformation, including his Renpu as a basic project and the founding of Zhengren huei. From the discussion of these fi ve issues I will elucidate how Liu, as a master of Neo-Confucianism, refl ected to the intellectual problems of his time, and his scheme for moral reformation related to the intellectual climate in the period from late Ming to early Qing.

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“…3 Due process completion accords the family, especially the elite, with propriety and prestige-and, otherwise, with indignities-under the Confucian ethics of li (禮, ritual, propriety, courtesy). Overlapping with li are the resulting merits or demerits for the surviving family and their descendants (Brokaw 1991). Keeping the corpse as an intact whole is: (1) to follow filial piety since one's body is bequeathed from one's parents; 4 (2) to contain the pollution attributed to the liminality of the dead body; 5 and (3) to avoid the connotation of a "bad death" that turns the soul into a ghost (Weller 1985(Weller , 1987.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Becoming Silent Mentors: Buddhist Ethics Regarding Cadaver Donations for Science in Taiwan

Huang

2023

Journal of Religious Ethics

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Since 1995, thousands of people in Taiwan have pledged each year to donate their cadavers to the medical college run by the Buddhist Tzu Chi (Ciji) Foundation. The “surge of cadavers” seems intriguing in a society where ancestor worship continues to be salient. Drawing on my fieldwork in 2012–2013 and 2015, the purpose of this paper is to describe a series of practices involving the transformation of a cadaver into a Buddhist moral subject: the donor, the family, and the medical school engage in various endeavors and rituals involving “emotional practices” to honor the deceased; situate the donation as a “good death”; and fulfill the family's obligations to ancestor worship. I argue what makes the ritual transformation efficacious is the dominant currency of emotional practices. Emotional practices “authenticate” the ritual transformation. The main ethic for commemorating the cadaver donation is not generosity or dāna but equanimity.

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The Ledgers of Merit and Demerit

Cited by 154 publications

References 0 publications

All the Feelings That Are Fit to Print

All the Feelings That Are Fit to Print

Liu Zongzhou's Criticism of Wang Yangming's Followers and his Scheme for Moral Reformation

Becoming Silent Mentors: Buddhist Ethics Regarding Cadaver Donations for Science in Taiwan

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