The University is one of the four Confucian classics.
With the least text and the simplest content, it is generally considered to be the first of the four books to read.
The order in which the four books are generally read is: Daxue, Analects, Zhongyong, and Mencius.
"University" is mainly about one thing:
Gewu, Zhizhi, sincerity, righteousness, self-cultivation, family, governance, and peace in the world.
As I understand it, it is
Naturalism, enlightenment, discernment, righteousness, self-cultivation, family, governance, and peace in the world.
Naturalism: It means to be well-informed, and only by being well-informed can we integrate and understand the commonality of things.
Of course, this well-informed should also have a scope, for example, before studying, you should understand Buddhism, Taoism, and modern philosophy.
In this way, you can determine which doctrine is good and which doctrine is more suitable for your own study.
Zhizhi: It means to learn a knowledge thoroughly, which is a process of continuous effort, and it is necessary to review the old and learn the new.
In the course of this effort, two issues need to be addressed.
The first is that the knowledge is not comprehensive enough to support the practice.
The second is that you have listened to other people's theories, not realized them yourself.
Discernment: It is the ability to distinguish between right and wrong, that is, to have one's own firm beliefs and not be shaken by them.
To study Confucianism, we must regard Confucianism as the theoretical foundation for understanding the world.
There are many theories in modern society, and if there is no theoretical foundation, you will feel that Buddhism is also very reasonable, Taoism is also very suitable for you, and Western philosophy is more in line with modern society.
This will not work, and it will not accomplish anything.
Heart: This heart is the most difficult work for me, and both naturalism and knowledge can be accumulated over time.
Only you know that only you have the right heart.
Whether you are really right-hearted or whether you are self-deceiving, only you know.
If you want to achieve the right mind, you can't have any doubts, and if you have the slightest doubt, you can't have a right mind.
Self-cultivation: When the heart is right, the external manifestation is that the behavior has become positive, which is self-cultivation.
Confucianism pays attention to cultivation from the inside out, and if the heart is not right, the behavior cannot be right.
Understanding this is the most important thing for me, and it is the foundation of my understanding of Confucianism.
Some people don't understand that using rules and regulations to limit one's own behavior and that of others is pseudo-Confucianism.
Qi family: From the bottom up, using your own behavior to influence your family is the Qi family.
The important thing here is to influence with your own actions, not to teach others how to do it with words.
From top to bottom, rulers must first take care of their own families.
Because ordinary people will follow the example of people with higher power than themselves, a family is benevolent, a country is benevolent, a family is benevolent, and a country is prosperous.
Governing the country: From the bottom up, everyone can govern their own family first, and the country can become better.
From top to bottom, the ruler must first have the ability to Qi before he can have the ability to govern the country.
The foundation of governing the country lies in the fact that we must first do a good job of self-cultivation, that is, we must first have virtue, and the ruler can gather people with virtue, and with talent and land, and with land can we cultivate on it, and only with taxes can the country prosper.
Pingtianxia: If our country is well governed, people from other countries will come to our country, and our country will become stronger and more prosperous.
Other countries that are worse will begin to follow our example and practice benevolent governance.
So the world is peaceful.
This is also the highest level of Confucianism.
Some people say that Gewu, Zhizhi, sincerity, righteousness, self-cultivation, Qi family, governing the country, and leveling the world are the eight stages of Confucianism.
Some people draw the focus of Xinzheng, thinking that Confucianism is the study of the heart, and the focus is on the unity of knowledge and action.
Each has its own reason.
And I believe that the foundation of Confucianism lies in naturalism.
Naturalism is the seed of a big tree, with a seed naturally grows a trunk, and with a trunk naturally grows branches and leaves.
Read a lot of books, go a lot of places, and encounter a lot of things.
There is more knowledge of nature, and the ability to see is more far-reaching than ordinary people, and it is natural to know nature.
Because of the far-reaching view, the insights are more unique, and it will not be the same as the clouds, and it is natural to distinguish between right and wrong, and to distinguish nature.
To be able to distinguish between right and wrong, the mind is of course right, and the mind is natural.
The heart is from the inside to the outside, the ideology determines the action, and the self-cultivation is natural.
From self-cultivation to Qi family, from Qi family to governing the country, from governing the country to leveling the world.
I've already talked about it.
According to the Confucian point of view, it is all natural.
Personally, I agree with the first five points of slimming.
However, there are disagreements with the last three points of alignment, governing the country, and leveling the world, after all, international relations are now more complex, and Confucianism may also have limitations that are not suitable for modern times.
But seeking common ground while reserving differences, for me, it is enough to learn Confucianism to cultivate oneself.
So. It all started with a naturalist.
My Confucianism is about a nature, that is, a natural thing.
Therefore, "University" is about a system of self-discipline and self-cultivation.
Now that we have a theoretical foundation, how do we do it, how do we put it into practice?
The first is Mingmingde.
The first Ming means to make it bright, and the last two words Ming De is a word, which means the goodness that people have since they were born.
Mingming virtue is to get rid of selfishness and distractions and restore the goodness of people themselves.
The second is to stop at the best.
Stop means to stop, and the supreme good is the point where your heart is the best.
It's about stopping at the point where you are most good and grasping at that point.
This is the method of finding the limit in mathematics, in fact there is no such thing as the best point, only the infinite point that is close to the best.
So it's a process of constant effort.
It is important to note that:
The meaning of goodness here is not quite the same as the meaning of 善 in modern Chinese.
Now the Chinese word for goodness refers to kindness, which is the heart of the Virgin.
And the good here refers to the way of heaven, which is the objective law of the development of things.
Heaven is ruthless, there is only truth, and truth is certainly not the heart of the Virgin.
If modern science is also a kind of truth, then Confucianism's pursuit of perfection also respects modern science.
This is the ultimate good, which is also the original intention of Confucianism.
Therefore, those who study Confucianism pursue to stand on the side of justice and the side of truth.