CARDINAL VIRTUES IN EARLY CONFUCIANISM

In recent years, the numerous silk and bamboo-slip §texts excavated in various archaeological sites in §China shed new light on the study of the intellectual §history of the pre-Qin era. This book attempts to §explore the early Chinese intellectual world with the §focus on the theory of virtues. The theory of virtues §has been a major concern and a topic of heated §debates among many classical Chinese philosophical §schools. Yet, some puzzling problems with regards to §virtues warrant more careful inquiries. Why is virtue §essential in Confucian ethics? How do the five §cardinal virtues come to be the dominant? Are there §alternative cardinal virtues in the early Confucian §schools? Due to the lack of early materials, these §questions have remained unanswered. By addressing the §models of Confucian cardinal virtues in the early §Confucian classics, namely, the Analects, the Guodian §texts and the book of Mencius, this study explicates §the transition of the ideas of virtues in this period §of development and articulates furthermore the §general foundation of Confucian moral discourse.