tang dynasty times

Sex and the Getty Bronze

--from the Peony archives

It was almost a year ago when he was talking about the exhibition publication of National Gallery of Art's Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, and the Renaissance of Venetian Painting A huge fan of Renaissance painting, he complained that the authors insisted on seeing sex in many of their scholarly interpretations of Renaissance portraits. For example, discussing the book's take on Titian's Flora, he wrote:

"This question in fact summarizes about 80% of the scholarly writing on Titian’s Flora – and about 50% of all scholarly writing on all Venetian women’s portraits, whether nude or not. The question, in other words, is: did this so-and-so, whoever she was, or did she not, have sex? And — would she have it with me?

Which goes to show you that the art-historian’s mind isn’t very far from the lacrosse players’ locker room. The relevant question is the same: is she easy? Can I have her?

I don’t know, dear friends.

This seems some really, really weird stuff. I mean – is someone – er – frustrated here?

In all the years of looking at these paintings it has never occurred to me to ask whether these women are virtuous or otherwise. (I have always assumed them to be like most women I have known in my life – a little bit of both – virtuous for the most part — and thank heavens for that “most”; what would we do without a little doubt in the more shadowy corners of our lives, ahem). And, in any case, in staring at their beautiful skin, and hair, and into their dreamy eyes it has never occurred to ask myself whether they would sleep with me.

They were paintings; portraits of women dead these 500 years. It seemed – well – just a little irrelevant to ask?"

Irrelevant? Perhaps....

More of note, however, is what I would call the slippery nature of the art historian's occupation. To my mind, more dangerous than their call to interpret, is their will to place value; which, I am afraid, is probably a necessary by-product of what they do. That is to say that through the act of interpreting art, they are affecting the way people understand art and therefore are creating certain values (which over time become institutionalized). Their opinions have been-- and continue to be-- not only influential in the way we see art, but more, are instrumental in what art we see at all (that is, what we even view of as being art).

The entire discussion, in fact, reminded me of the Apollo Belvedere; a statue I would very, very much like to make the long trip to see someday. In Joseph Alsop's unique book, The Rare Art Traditions, Alsop uses the Apollo Belvedere to make the same point: to illustrate the profound way our Western way of looking at art has changed over the past 150 years (in great part-- he explains-- due to the decisions and opinions of art historians and the art market). To make his point, Alsop traces the dramatic rise and fall of the Apollo Belvedere.

It is a fascinating story.

The statue has always been believed to be a Roman-time marble copy of a Greek original bronze made by Alexander the Great's court sculptor Leochares. The Romans of imperial times, had a huge liking for Greek art and there was a thriving industry to make marble copies of the original bronzes to be used as decorations in the villas and gardens of the wealthy. They were used like wallpaper or outdoor decorations, explains Alsop.

Jump ahead a thousand years, and again Italy can be seen turning her lovely head toward the East, as once again the ancient Greeks were held up as the great pinnacle of culture, civilization and art. And as they had in the past, Italians of the Renaissance pined more than anything to own an "ancient souvenir." (For the Han connection see this) Anything at all from classical times was coveted and admired, from ancient books to pieces of classical sculpture. Vasari spoke of the vast collection owned by Lorenzo Ghiberti, who was described as being proud to own a single Greco-Roman bronze leg!

To feed the great hunger of the Italians, Rome was under constant excavation. Although classical pieces were found on almost a weekly basis during the early Renaissance, to uncover an almost completely intact marble-- well, the Apollo Belvedere was destined for high fame! Bought by an art-collecting Pope, the Apollo was practically enshrined in the Vatican's Cortile del Belvedere .

For the next 350 years, the Apollo Belvedere was to remain the "statue of all statues;" and the "most admired sculpture in the world." During Victorian times, it will be remembered, people of means, as part of their overall education, went on tours to visit the great sights of France and Italy. Called "The Grand Tour," these trips abroad were thought to be like the crowning of a fine education; providing real life experience which could not be learned from books (読万巻書，行万里路). The trips were undertaken with the aim of enriching both the mind and the spirit. This was a time when people still believed that a person could cultivate their heart and mind through the aesthetic appreciation of beautiful things, and the Grand Tour was a social practice which grew out of this concept.

Not only was the Apollo Belvedere part of the Tour-- it was the main attraction. Goethe claimed to have been "Swept off his feet" by the sculpture while 18th century archaeologist and classical historian J.J. Winckelman said that the Apollo Belvedere was "the consummation of the best that nature, art, and the human mind can produce." It was indeed the must-see for anyone on a Grand Tour. A description of the wig worn by amateur Cellist Count Mateeuz Wielhorski is described in a book I am reading right now as being "curled a l'Apollo Belvedere." The statue had a profound influence during its day.

What happened? As Alsop says, "Few make the lonely trip out to look at the Apollo Belvedere any longer." And for those that do, what do they see? Are we even capable of really looking at ancient sculpture any more? Are these bronzes and marbles any more accessible to our modern eyes than say a Shang dynasty bronze?

In an age of Asian art and impressionism, JP Getty was stunningly unique in his commitment to ancient art. Well, the museum is unique in 2 ways for which it is most famous: one is the content of its collection but the second is its huge purchasing endowment, which I heard (but have a hard time believing) is equal to the total combined purchasing budget of all the other museums of the world! The Getty has a staggering amount of money to play with and no other museum stands a chance. Because it can literally buy the national treasures of a country right under that country's own nose, the Getty has been involved with many scandals as well.

This brings me to the statue that I cannot get out of my mind. The Getty Bronze. Also, mired in scandal, I think the Getty is still trying to fend off the Italian government over its purchase (almost $4 million to Art Investment fund Artemis).  Called "Victorious Youth," it was a classical bronze that the ancient Romans violently pried off its pedestal to drag back to Rome. The ship that carried our boy then sunk in the Adriatic. Scholars think this happened in the first century AD. or BC.

The Getty Bronze is what scholars refer to as a victor's statue celebrating a youth's win in one of the Greek games. Perhaps he was the son of a wealthy family who wanted to celebrate their golden boy's athletic achievements. He is so stunning in pictures that I can hardly imagine what he will be like in real life. People may talk about his hair, but I love his arms, especially the one delicately pointing to the winning garland adorning his perfectly shaped head.

Such a beautiful start. But then the Romans literally ripped his feet off trying to drag him back to Rome (maybe for melting down since so little care was taken to pry him off his pedestal?) Then to sink in the cold waters of the Adriatic. Our boy spent lifetimes down at the bottom of the sea until he was finally pulled up by fisherman in 1964, in the waters of the coast of Fano, Italy. First, the fisherman thought it was a dead body in the water, and then all the barnacles and encrustations had to be pried off. The statue then changed hands several times under murky circumstances until the Getty finally got a hold of him (though the Italians are still laying firm claim to the Victorious Youth). The full story from the LA Times can be read here.

The Getty now keeps him at the Malibu villa. I always try to make it a point to visit him as soon as I get to town. The truth is, I often long to see him when too many months have past. Part of me, though, has been afraid that maybe he will someday leave me cold. I worry that perhaps we really have lost our way of seeing classical sculpture (*). The experts say that originally his eyes were inlaid with bone and his nipples in contrasting copper. The patina left from all his time beneath the sea is exquisite enough, isn't it? I hate to say it, but-- just like those art historians of Renaiisance art that my friend was complaining about-- I do kind of wonder--- about his love life.

_______________

*I am re-reading Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's book, The Art of Seeing. Utilizing his usual socio-science method, he and his team interview a group of curators and educators in the museum world, and then from those interviews, go on to try and pin down (like a frog in biology class) what exactly is the aesthetic experience of the expert?

His conclusion is that the expert response is based on the following 1) Emotional response (which of course differs hugely between people) is the one trait they all unanimously agree, but what was interesting was the variations on stress put on this by historians in different fields of art history (see below).

2) knowledge (the intellectual skills the viewer brings with them that contributes to their experience; this includes an intellectual appreciation of excellence). Yes, I am thinking of Utz.

3) Perception was the next and 4) this was followed by something they (not Csikszentmihalyi) termed “communication” and “transformation (which is what they described as being a direct communication or connection they felt with the creator of the piece and the piece itself. That is; how the piece of art "spoke" to them).

Of interest here is that when Csikszentmihalyi broke down which characteristics had the greatest value placed on them by field, it turns out that museum professionals in the field of classical art all placed the intellectual aspect on top. I believe this is due to the reason I hinted-- that classical sculpture has become in many ways inaccessible to us and no longer "speaks to us;" Dreyfus would most likely say, that is because we no longer live in that understanding of being.... and because of this background knowledge becomes more important for aesthetic appreciation. Csikszentmihalyi found this to be in direct contrast to the professionals working in modern art who claimed that direct perception and emotion were the most important aspects of their aesthetic experience. There is much food for thought in the book-- also recommended is, The Victorious Youth by Carol Mattusch

** Finally, for more on the Grand Tour, I liked this In Our Time Program

**I also like to follow the fate of my boyfriend here and here.

Tyrian Purple 貝紫染

--from the Peony Archives

What should have been one of the greatest homecomings in ancient times, instead ended in cold-blooded murder when the King's wife stabbed him to death that evening in the bath.

How did it come to that? You ask.

Even Odysseus-- the reluctant hero-- finally in the end made it safely home to his loving wife and son, didn't he? 

And, hadn't the Greeks won the war after their rightful sack of Troy? 

Why did she do it?

The chorus, too, demands an answer.

And, so in a series of stunning speeches, which would be the envy of any Washington speech writer, the queen lays out her case. Her husband-- the King-- has killed their beloved daughter, and for that he must die. That he had brought a concubine home with him from Troy and that she and her lover were already happily ruling the Kingdom ensconced in the castle were reasons as well. But Clytemnestra-- make no doubt about it-- is clear about her reasons: he killed their daughter and for that he must die.

So, she sets him up.

In what is one of the most famous homecoming scenes in all history-- Clytemnestra gives her husband Agamemnon the "red carpet treatment."

Laying out the family's priceless reddish-purple color tapestries, she urges him:

"Walk across, my Lord."

He tells her he will not. For that is the kind of arrogance that Persian Kings show-- believing themselves to be as all-mighty as the gods.

"We are democrats," he responds.

And when she continues begging him to glide across the sea of blood-red tapestries, he retorts:

"These are heirlooms, how can we soil our family heirlooms?"

In the end, exhausted perhaps from the trip, he allows himself to be persuaded and across he walks-- to his death. For this show of arrogance is the all-important piece of evidence that Clytemnestra will need as "reason" of the need she had to get rid of him; for most Athenians would have agreed that an all-powerful monarch in the style seen in Persia was something to be avoided at all costs.

In the translator's introduction, it is stated that "puffed up with ego, Agamemnon walks across the tapestries." (many of you will be more familiar with the translator's brother from his Chongqing days)

Dreyfus, though, is upset-- and it's worse than Heidegger's translator.

"Is Lattimore totally oblivious?" Asks Dreyfus, "Where did Agamemnon show any indication of being puffed up? Didn't he try in vain to argue with his wife till he just became exhausted and walked across to please her?"

Dreyfus has a point.

Judge for yourself:

AGAMEMNON
  Daughter of Leda, guardian of my home,
  your speech was, like my absence, far too long.
  Praise that's due to us should come from others.
  Then it's worthwhile. All those things you said—
  don't puff me up with such female honours,    
  or grovel there before me babbling tributes,
  like some barbarian. Don't invite envy    
  to cross my path by strewing it with cloth.
  That's how we honour gods, not human beings.
  For a mortal man to place his foot like this
  on rich embroidery is, in my view,
  not without some risk. So I'm telling you  
  honour me as a man, not as a god.
  My fame proclaims itself.  It doesn't need
  foot mats made out of such embroideries.   
  Not even to think of doing something bad
  is god's greatest gift. When a man's life ends
  in great prosperity, only then can we declare
  that he's a happy man. Thus, if I act,
  in every circumstance, as I ought to now,
  there's nothing I need fear.      

They debated back and forth. In the end, though, the King gave up and treaded upon the "sea of blood." Scholars continue to argue about exactly why he did finally acquiesce and walk across the tapestries.

But what of "these red tapestries dyed in the sea?"

In the translation above, the English word "cloth" is used, and that is probably a safe translation. I think Lattimore uses the word "carpet" but that doesn't quite seem right, does it? For carpets are made to be walked across. Even the heirloom rugs which one finds hanging in a millionaire's yurt could also probably be walked on without causing too much damage. Dreyfus, I think, prefers calling them tapestries, and that works, I think.

The walls of medieval castles were covered in tapestries of fantastic quality-- in fact, I think I read somewhere that tapestries were among the most costly heirlooms of Medieval Europe.

I have also seen the above translated as robes-- which is perhaps my personal favorite translation. The other day, I was having tea with a friend who had taken out several of her beautiful kimono to air them in the dry autumn weather. Silk brocades with golden threads were only to be out done by the most exquisite embroidery on the thinnest, most delicate silk I have ever seen. It was a splendid fortune in textiles, amassed by a woman who in her youth had been very successful in Osaka's water trade.

Dreyfus says, "It would have been like as if Clytemnestra had taken a dozen Monet paintings down from the walls, and laying them down, had said: Walk across my Lord." Textiles more costly than the finest oil paintings....

My tea teacher as well had warned me to never waste money on jewelry if you can buy textiles.

In the ancient world-- almost no matter where you look-- people who could, spent vast amounts of money on such textiles. And, before the invention of money, cloth formed a large bulk of things which were traded across borders. Indeed, it was the silk trade which was to give its name to the most legendary overland trade routes in history!

Agamemnon's robes were most probably woven from wool. The Persians were known for their exquisite dyed cloth in this material. Still, textile scholars remind us that the silk trade, while it took off in Han or Roman Empire times, actually goes back much further. In 1983 the New York Times ran an article about strips of woven silk found on an Egyptian mummy from 1000BC. Scientific studies showed this silk to be Chinese. Silk was also found in 7th century BC graves in Germany and 5th century BC graves in Greece. This latter date corresponding to Aeschylus' play.

It is not outside the realm of possibility that Agememnon's robes or tapestries were made of woven silk.

II.

More than the material, however, it is their color which intrigues. Many will know that these robes, "the blood red color of the sea," were dyed from the pigments gotten from mollusks-- thousands upon of sea creatures. This was the "purple" dyed linen of the Arc of the Covenant that was later to be the color of the robes of the greatest Roman emperors and the color of Cleopatra's "fragrant sails." Indeed, Cleopatra was said to have dwelled within a world of fragrant incense and a cloud of costly purple.

The color purple has long been associated with emperors and queens. While we say "purple" the term actually encompassed a large spectrum of colors from light pink to very dark fuchsia-- with the most sought after color being a shimmering dark red (sometimes referred to as the color of blood). The most refined-- and therefore the most sought after--  shade was this precise shimmering shade of blood, in fact.

The Phoenicians built their fortunes on trade in the dye-- and indeed, the color is known to us today as Tyrian purple. Based on the coast of Lebanon, the ancient mariners of the Mediterranean delivered cloth dyed in this purple of the sea throughout the ancient world. They say it would take 10,000 dead mollusks to dye one robe the coveted color. 

It was smelly business too-- as dying inevitably is. But so lucrative was it that many peoples gave it a shot. No one, however, achieved as beautiful a shade of purple as the Phoenicians (who are believed to have used two species of mollusks: —the Purpura pelagia or Murex trunculus, and the Purfura lapillus or Buccinum lapillus). 

Victoria Finlay tries to track down the color in her book, Color: A Natural History of the Palette, and it is really the only failed adventure in the book. The species have been hunted to the point of extinction and while she did get a glimpse of the huge ancient vats that were once used to make the luxerious dyes (wisely located downwind of the ancient city of Tyre), she is unable to find much of anything else in Lebanon and so travels to the New World where the Central American Indians continue to dye cloth in a similar color gotten from mollusks of a different species. (See this Post for more about her travels into Blue).

I would love to see cloth dyed this color. I cannot even really imagine what murax silk would have looked like, but it is something I would very much like to see.

III.

Anyway, the Phonecians and their trading...I have been thinking a lot lately about the silk road. In particular, I am-- as many here will know-- interested in the way the silk road is held up today as a symbol of something worth emulating for today's times.

For example, we see scholars in Europe (UNESCO scholars) discussing silk road exchanges as "two way streets" where, perhaps in contrast to monoculturalization or super-power monologues of today, silk road influence worked more like a true dialog. (And, how much of this is being romanticized is not really the point as the interesting thing is not the historical accuracy, but rather what contemporary phenomenon it is being contrasted with)

In history books as well, there is a stress on the manner in which trade led the way for these exchanges. And, sometimes when I read, while I feel that there is an implied contrast at how things occur in today's world, I am left with questions.

Aren't international exchanges even today based on trade? Or has the financial world changed to such an extent that two-way trade doesn't really exist any longer?

But, we know that huge trade imbalances existed during Roman times. Pliny (I seem to recall) took pains to complain about Roman trade deficits with India. Purple silk was banned in part for this reason in ancient Rome (being reserved for the emperor). But, if it is not contemporary trade imbalances, what then is being implied?

Last month, Sam Crane had a post over at his place called Finance is Immoral. He says:

Decades ago, "finance" was generally understood as financing something other than finance itself; that is, stocks and bonds and money were tied to the production and circulation of goods and services, which were for the most part tangible, or "real" in economic parlance.  Beginning with at least the oil crisis of the 1970s, finance has been transformed, now stunningly overshadowing the "real" economy.   Left academics have coined the term "Financialization" to get at these changes.  How big has finance become?  That is a difficult question but think about this kind of statement (from the above linked Wikipedia page):

Thus, [in 2006] derivatives trading – mostly futures contracts on interest rates, foreign currencies, Treasury bonds, etc had reached a level of $1,200 trillion, $1.2 quadrillion, a year. By comparison, U.S. GDP in 2006 was $12.456 trillion.

Indeed, this week "trillion" has become a common reference.  How big is the market in credit default swaps?  We hear reports in the tens of trillions.  Government action valued in the hundreds of billions seems puny by comparison.  Welcome to the world of financialization.

Sam asks, what would Mencius think? I think it's a good question.

The Philosophers Zone had another very good show, by the way, on Bailouts, Capitalism and the Financial Markets. Raghuram Rajan, who brings up some of the same points as Sam, had some really interesting things to say, I think.

So, these topics remain on my mind, and I still am not exactly sure how to approach them:
silk road trade versus contemporaray finance
silk road cosmopolitanism versus contemporary globalization
silk road international relations versus the Great Game

**

I am going to re-visit my post (and Sam's comment) on Andre Gunder Frank's book The Centrality of Central Asia. The The Centrality of Central Asia (1992)/ Frank's website.

Checking in at the provincial warlord's homestead, I see someone left a comment here concerning the warlord's preposterous idea that the Tang dynasty is China's #4 most impressive dynasty. I can only say it again: he must be delusional (as clearly the Tang must be either #1 or --if I calculate my beloved's feelings into the calculation-- then, fine, #2) In any case, the comment had some interesting things to say about trade and is recommended reading. Whoever wrote it seems to have similar spelling issues that I have, so at first I wondered if I did in fact write the comment-- but reading it, I realized, no it wasn't me.

**

And, finally sending a kiss:

In Praise of Heroes not Saying Stupid Things

-- In Carthage (again)

Standing beside the large window that overlooked the harbor, they stood silently watching the sea. She stood just behind her lover, trying to gaze out in the same direction in which he was silently staring-- his lips

immobile
like a seashell where the roar is hidden

It was warm and she could feel the sunlight streaming in from the window. Flinging off her shawl, she stood dressed from head to toe in the luxurious purple robes that had made her ancestors so rich that they could send their daughters out across the sea to establish Kingdoms of their own.

A Queen, she stood in a cloud of perfume. Jasmine and sandalwood, frankincense and lemons-- she walked in bare feet over carpets covered in rose petals. Yet, it was the smell of the sea which lingered so undeniably.

Trying to follow his eyes out toward the horizon where he was looking, no matter how hard she squinted, she couldn't see past the intense glare of the sun shining off the water.

The Poet sang of what happened next-- of the Queen, whose

love
was just a fish—perhaps which might
plunge into the sea in the pursuit of the ship,
and knifing the waves with the supple body,
perhaps yet overtake him—but he,
he in this thoughts already strode upon the land.
And the sea became a sea of tears.
But, as one knows, precisely at the moment
of despair, the auspicious wind begins to blow.

And the great man left Carthage.  

And thereafter history has questioned whether he really was all that.

Cut him some slack

my friend, Conrad-- an expert in these matters--once remarked,

is it that we have become so Greek that we are no longer able to understand the Romans?

I mean, I guess you could say, he really had to do his duty, right?

Or, is it that we are no longer able to really daydream? For the Queen, walking in a cloud of fragrant dreams was not really thinking clearly, was she? As Conrad teases:

While Dido in a Bed of Fire,
A new-found way to cool desire,
Lay wrapt in smoke, half Cole, half Dido,
Too late repenting Crime Libido

In complete disgust, Conrad's friend the Count had called him "a sod and a wet blanket," suggesting that, "Dido must have really killed herself because she wouldn't believe that she fell for that???"

Indeed, in her distress

She stood before the bonfire, which her soldiers
had kindled by the city walls,
and she envisioned between the flame and smoke of the fire
how Carthage silently crumbled
ages before Cato’s prophecy

Dreyfus seems to think likewise, complaining that the real nail in the coffin was not only did he say, "Honey, I've got bigger fish to fry," but that he had to gone on and add "but even if I didn't have to obey Zeus and leave, I still wouldn't stay with you as in truth I would probably choose to go back to Troy if I could...."

This is what just baffled Dreyfus, who suggests that, it's hard not to dislike him really.

The Count was similarly annoyed with the invocation of Zeus... for as he remarked :

 Zeus has nothing to do with it. This is the sod part.(And it can be admirable: look at Odysseus, who is always, always, in every instance, the better man. Baby, he says to Calypso, you are everything a man would ever wish, but I love another. Calypso hates it, and can’t come to terms with it for seven long years. But in the end she does. And she does because at least she knows she is not being lied to, made a fool of, cheated. Usually — sometimes — even a woman spurned can admire character in a man).

I tend to agree. Character is everything-- and Aeneas was no Odysseus, that's for sure. Really, is it any wonder that Dido lamented? But as I suggested to Caesar this morning, as the philosophers suggest, fate is probably nothing more than a person's character and their chosen path. Yet, "chosen" is probably itself ambiguous as it doesn't necessarily mean "to choose" does it? As in fact, in the end what is a person's fate but one's charater plus the world one is thrown in? Look at Aeneas. Did he choose what he wanted to do or did he merely do what was ontologically necessary given the man he was and the world he was embedded? 

Amor Fati, whispered Nietzsche.

A man with a mission, and yet, I just cannot help-- in praise of daydreaming; in praise of desire; in praise of heroes not saying stupid things-- to side with the Queen.

**

in epicurus' garden (with caesar)

 

A great friend of this blog, I used to call him Epicurus. Not that I knew much of anything about the ancient philosopher; only knowing that Epicurean philosophy was dear to his heart. And as he is dear to my heart, I suppose it was only natural that my friend's interest would become somehow my own. With "my Epicurus" in mind, I have been utterly delighted to read about the ancient philosopher and his Garden School of Philosophy in Robert Harrison's Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition. 

Many of You may have grown quite tired of my complaining about people who seem to be unable to do anything else but report the news. I like to call it the "what I did last weekend" syndrome. There is a whole lot of reporting, complaining and opinions being stated (but rarely argued)... But what about some old-fashioned storytelling? Sometimes I even begin to doubt whether real conversation even any longer exists....

This is what, of course, first drew me to Caesar-- the way he lingered in delight to tell me about a love affair. Robert Harrison's book too does this: lingering in great delight to tell a story. It meanders in rare sensuality and in great triumph too. And reading it is like being rained on by flowers. 

**

A garden. To achieve this place of aesthetic pleasure and moral cultivation-- Harrison suggest that perhaps more than anything, it is "structure" that is the necessary ingredient. For no matter how natural the garden may aim to be, without some "form" it would never truly become a garden, would it? There must be "katachi" (form, design)-- and this is as true of tea ceremony, theater, dance, the arts, as it is with love, friendship, anything significant that we wish to cultivate in fact requires some kind of form, don't you agree?

So, then, what was the underlying structure of the garden of Epicurean philosophy? Well, rather than virtue or knowledge, Epicurean philosophy posited that the aim of our lives should be happiness or joy. But what is happiness? Epicurus insisted that human happiness is achieved through the attainment of a state of ataraxia (Ἀταραξία): serentity or an absence of anxiety→　安心. This is, a state which-- unlike Buddhist Enlightenment-- is a path with no arrival. And, therefore, it requires, in the words of one French scholar,

“an effort lasting every minute of one’s life"

Gernetin in these words above, had been referring to the Confucian project and explained that,

"by control of the smallest details of conduct, by observation of the rules of life in society (i), by respect for others and for oneself and by the sense of reciprocity (shu)”

I wonder if something similar couldn't be said of Epicurean philosophy-- that the aim of achieving happiness, or ataraxia, required an effort which would last a lifetime; and demanded the cutivation of certain social virtues which included both the measure or limiting of one's own desires with a profound respect and consideration of others.

Like Confucianism, Epicurean philosophy is very this-worldly. And there was also a strong emphasis on Friendship. Epicurus famously stating that it is better to have someone to eat with than to have something to eat; as if to say that we are nothing without friendship. Friendship.

This below is Robert Harrison telling us about Boccaccio's basic Epicurean morality; Yes, human life is rife with pain and misfortune, and as we strive toward increasing joy as much as we can, we do this not just for ourselves, but rather strive to increase overall joy in the world by bringing both pleasure and support to those around us. This is, says Harrison, the minimal moral imperative according to Boccaccio:

To be human means to vulnerable to misfortune and disaster. It means periodically to find oneself in need of help, comfort, distraction, or edification.Our condition is for the most part an affair of the everyday, not of the heroic, and our minimal ethical responsibility to our neighbor, according to Boccaccio's humanism, consists not in showing him or her the way redemption but in helping him or her get through the day. This help may take modest forms, not the least of which is rendering the sphere of social interactions more pleasurable through wit, decorum, storytelling, fellowship, conversation, courtesy, and socialibility. To add to the pleasure of life: that is the arche, or first principle of Boccacio's humanism, which is not the triumphalist humanism of later eras (which saw humankind as the glory of all creation) but the civil humanism of neighborly love. 

**



 

I have lately been thinking of Cleopatra and her carpet.

Remember when the Egyptian Queen first met the love of her life, Caesar? She was snuck in to his palace hidden in a rolled up carpet?  It is funny that that image of a woman being unfurled from a carpet before an emperor is somehow cross-cultural (ancient Rome, or concubines in Qing dynasty China, etc). I don't think I would mind at all being rolled up in a carpet like that. How about you?

Well, that is how I felt meeting the Good Professor's friend Caesar. Two Romans, seemingly as unalike as it gets: a Stoic and an Epicurean. Guess which one stopped to really try and help?

You can see two different Hollywood versions of the scene here and can judge for yourselves. But, I think everything we need to know about their love affair can be glimpsed in that first moment when Caesar pauses and really looks at her. Of course, I say this with the idea that I have been thinking so much about lately of Really Looking at what is right in front of you as the essential factor in virtue.

Tumbling ungracefully out of the carpet, I crash into him, landing at his feet. Pretty much everything had fallen apart in my life and while looking back I realize that I had, in fact, already come up with the answer in the Roses of Alhambra, I was in no position to process this answer in to any real form-- like that in a garden.

Tumbling out of the carpet, she landed at his feet and at that precise moment Caesar paused to really looked and listen to the Queen of Egypt. An Epicurean through and through, Caesar would remind her again and again and again that no matter what happened in Egypt-- even in the midst of great confusion or suffering-- one must still strive to find pleasure in daily life. Easier said than done, she thought. But Caesar was a delightful conversationist and had a fairly amusing sense of humor as well. All attributes of Roman suavitas-- and true friendship. To delight in the moment, but not just that-- to be like Caesar, she realized the trick is to enjoy the moment in a refined and measured manner based on the gratitude of all the blessings that one has received in the past; for Epicurean philosophy demands patience for the present, hope for the future based wholly on our ability to feel gratitude for the past: 

The life of the fool is marked by ingratitude and apprehension; the drift of his thought exclusively toward the future-- Epicurus

 

With Epicurus' words echoing in my head (and Caesar's teasing bringing a smile to my face), I realize that for many years now, this has been nothing if not my very own life: the life of the fool. 

 

**

To try and end what is the life of the fool, Your devoted Peony will get back in to her rickety boat (with all the holes) and set sail for the Western part of Adonis' Empire-- to California. And, he and I will stay there for as long as it takes.

In addition to family and many friends-- including my imaginary friend Gustavo the Great who has been named Artistic Director of the LA Philharmonic, I am also really looking forward to seeing my lover--the object of my true desire over the Getty Villa. I only go there in order to catch a glimpse of Him and so never realized till just now that the Getty Villa was modeled on an ancient Roman villa which was famous for -- indeed it was named after-- its library full of works of-- what else but-- Epicurean philosophy.

**

Written listening to an opera from the underworld-- conducted by the master Jordi Savall (video clip below). Here is a video of Savall playing ancient music with his divine daughter. Arianna Savall, whose CD is constantly playing at my house.

MW sends these links: Savall suona la viola da gamba (am looking for the CD now) and Tous Les Matins du Monde - Improvisation sur les Folies (a film I would very much like to see now).

And, another gift from Athena (my greatest friend of Epicurean delight), this poem by Wendell Berry on enjoying the present moment:

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS          Wendell Berry

"When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be--
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief.  I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light.  For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free."

Talking to Fingarette: Part 3

 

My friend, the great Gialbo, amidst much singing and partying in his kingdom on the far side of the empire, has at last weighed in on Fingarette. Actually, "weighed in" might be a bit of an exaggeration as really he has only chimed in with the faintest hint of his own predilictions.

Let me start from the place where the King and I agree, which is this: when we talk about self as embedded in society, we are in the end only speaking of normative value. That is to say, Fingarette's presentation seems to me to be less about the fundamental nature of what the self is or about the finer details of ritual content, as it is  ultimately really an exploration of what is excellence in terms of our human lives. Here in Gialbo speak:

Fingarette argues, or suggests really, that for Confucius the ethical value of the individual can only be a “function” (p. 75) of the value of ritual ceremony. The idea, as Fingarette construes it, is analogous to the value that a ceremonial vessel has in the context of ritual ceremony: the ceremonial vessel’s value is merely a function of the value of the ceremony, which does not depend at all on the utility of the vessel outside of that context, but on its ritual significance within the ritual. So, the analogous value of the individual human being would be a mere function of the value that human ceremony (li 禮) has

I agree as this is how I read Fingarette. And, for what it's worth, it is also how I read the Analects. 

However, where the king and I take a different turn is in our understanding of the status of Zhou ritual within this worldview. For while I agree that there is not much in this presentation in terms of universal norms that could ever really satisfy the likes and desires of a bourgeois liberal like Richard Rorty (or the king, for that matter, in his post), on the other hand, I also do not see Fingarette's presentation of Confucian thought as being about some kind of demand to return to Zhou rituals in the way the King seems to be suggesting either.

For as Fingarette went to some lengths to discuss in the proceeding chapter, these rituals stand as exemplery model of a utopian society.

Some of you will no doubt recall that in my man's time too, during the Northern Song dynasty, there was this same call "to return to antiquity" 復古 And, at that time, I confess I sometimes found this to be quite annoying and more than once darkly wondered to myself which he found more interesting: getting his bronzes "right" or having fun with me painting peonies. But he insisted that it was to the past that we should look to find the most valuable hints of how to organize our empire (and I wonder if the other Hero of this story, Daniel Bell does not feel similarly?)

My love Huizong-- like Confucius-- was convinced that utopian society was something seen to have been already realized, solely in the reality of the past. It was never, for example, imagined in any sort of hope in the future or an afterlife as in the West. And it was in the past that one could find the “exemplary models” necessary for all moral actions, including the methods of enlightened government.

In a similar way to the Italians of the Renaissance who held the Ancients to be the “Grand Exemplars” in everything from art to politics, Confucius taught that the problems of the present age could be best solved by a “return to antiquity.” And, one did this by aiming to reconstruct the spirit and content of the rituals.

In this way, then, I think for any liberal who has inherited this notion of utopia as something we all work toward-- something posited in the future-- then, without a doubt, this call to return to (ie, "to reanimate" 68-9) the past as in Zhou rituals would seem irrelevant to our present age.

Perhaps in that way, as the Gialbo says

If Fingarette is right, Confucius isn’t concerned as much with “the family” or “the state” generically construed, but with a particular ceremonialized version of those things. It is the role, very narrowly, that a person can play within the family or state, as ritualized through the Zhou dynastic rituals, that confers upon the individual (as a “vessel” within that ceremony) the kind of value that Confucius champions....

However, to place normative value-- or define excellence-- as "function" is not to say that a human being is nothing but their function, though, is it? (this remains, by the way, my problem with Professor A Ku's reading). Because, in fact, as Fingarette, suggests in this quote below, it's not really the function per se but rather the skillful ability to creatively perform (76) in sacred context that is most at issue (the issue being that of what is human dignity):

Although the individual must cultivate himself, just as the temple vessel must be carved and chiseled and polished, this self-cultivation is no more central to man's dignity, in Confucius' views, then the preparation of the vessel is central. Preparation and training are essential, but it is the ceremony that is central and all the elements and relationships and actions in it are sacred though each has its special characteritstics.

And this is why Confucius goes on to tell us in no uncertain terms:

君子不器 A Gentleman is not a vessel

Because imagine a beautiful man of extraordinary intellect who spends his time in self-cultivation. He reads and writes and has devoted a veritable lifetime to working on his inner self. But in his effort, he does not marry or have children. He parts with his mother and father when they claim to be unable to understand his project. He lives in a foreign land, in no way a part of the community of that place. In one sense, he is to me as beautiful as any Zhou bronze vessel. He is a work of art-- except that if we stand with Confucius and place value on a life lived as the proper carrying out of one's particular connections-- and those obligations-- to others in community then in fact, this beautiful man is in the end a mere beautiful vessel-- ready to hand.  

**

A bit of business but the blog librarian, Senor Borges, has alerted me to the fact that there have been some complaints from a few of you that I have been lately spending far too much time talking about drifting in my rickety boat with my lover the emperor. What can I say? Have I not already explained my philosophy of the need to start one's lover affairs in early spring? So-- of course-- he is much on my mind these days. 

Some of you may be interested to know, though, that I have also been exchanging letters with a handsome prince from Rajasthan. The prince and I live, it seems, in palaces which are separated by precisely 14 kilometers. We will I am sure someday discuss the various transportation options available to find our way to each other, but for now, those 14 kilometers feels as wide as the Pacific Ocean. With so much to say, how much could we ever really communicate in letters so even our missives are more like coins one tosses in a wishing pond: "oh, if only we could talk about that too over tea."

One of those dream journey conversations (that happened in my heart) happened to be about this very topic too. That is, what it means to say that a gentleman is not a vessel. And I told him this:

This idea of excellence as non-specialized skillfulness-- that is the skill of being able to approach things as ends in themselves (never as means) is the standard interpretation in Japanese, by the way, of 君子不器。I think in Paradise, everything is an end in itself, don't you?

A lady of jen is not like a ritual bronze vessel afterall- (saké only in saké containers and each sized ding set aside for a particular use) but rather a truly excellent person knows the appropriate way to behave no matter what the circumstance. As one of my Japanese books explains, the 君子 can basically can "do it all" (filial piety, correct comportment, courage, loyalty, integrity...)

In modern japanese there is the expression 器が広い人　a wide vessel to connote this idea of a person who is very capable (but there are strong connotations of this being in the realm of human relations) No matter what you throw at them, they can handle it well.... I wonder if the opposite wouldn't be a person with a small heart..

Anyway, this entire conversation has made me terribly nostaligic of cooking small fish in bronze dings with Epicurus. I think of all of our many exchanges, this one was my favorite. And, in thinking about the above idea that a gentleman is not a vessel, he suggested we take a look at ddj 29.

Here he sends it with Ivanhoe's translation:

 將欲取天下而為之，
吾見其不得已。
天下神器，不可為也，
為者敗之，執者失之。
故物或行或隨；
或歔或吹；
或強或羸；
或挫或隳。
是以聖人去甚，去奢，去泰。
 將欲取天下而為之，
Those who would gain the world and do something with it,
I see that they will fail.
For the world is a spiritual vessel, and one cannot put it to use.
Those who use it ruin it, those who grab hold of it lose it.
And so
Sometimes things lead and sometimes they follow;
Sometimes they breathe gently and sometimes they pant;
Sometimes they are strong and sometimes they are weak;
Sometimes they fight and sometimes they fall;
This is why sages cast off whatever is extreme, extravagant, or excessive.

And hence we arrive at the idea that moral action should be seen as the appropriate performance of those actions which are always ends in and of themselves. This, of course, being how things happen in Paradise.

**

Also see: Talking to Fingarette: Part 1 & Talking to Fingarette: Part 2

I am still hoping, by the way, to learn more about the Song dynasty poem (a poem which has been lovingly preserved in Japan) that I wrote about in this post picnics and other persian pastimes.

As before, all paintings, by Bui Huu Hung, are lacquer on wood.

Borges recommends checking out this documentary of 1930s Colorful Jaipur (also in the documentaries at right). I recommend the article from Japan Focus US Bases and Empire

So, that's it-- except, well, am still dreaming of Jaipur:

Talking to Fingarette: Part 2

 

子曰,德之不修 學之不講 聞義不能徒 不善不能改 是吾憂也
Confucius said: having virtue but not cultivating it; studying but not learning; hearing but not following-- things such as these cause me grief

Reading along in Fingarette, I have to admit I hit a kind of stumbling block last night in chapter three: "the locus of the personal." Let me start by re-stating my note to Chris concerning his Fingarette: Confucius Hates Choice:

To say that Confucius did not philosophize in terms of “pychological concepts” seems like a very wise and helpful thing to say. But to then extrapolate from this to say that there was no inner theater or that there is no choice– could be seen as inappropriate. The reason being is that the notion itself is so firmly based in the psychological ontology that you would only get a partial answer since the question is in a big sense missing the point (a point of emphasis).

Others have made this same point far better than I ever will be able to do, but Fingarette is going through elaborate steps to present the analects in such a way as to bypass the ideas of self that are inherent to our modern, secular understanding. I don’t think, however, by trying to bypass modern understandings of self that means there is no self (no self meaning a self is comflatable to a person’s action which seems to be the move you are/or Fingarette are trying to make) .

Responding to this Patrick S O'Donnell left a very interesting and persuasive series of comments at Chris' place to explain the way in which-- indeed-- this is not behavioralism. The Fingarette quote that O'Donnell provided, I think, very nicely illuminates the way in which agency is in fact essential to moral choice in the analects according to Fingarette. Here is the quote:

Consider a fine violinist’s presentation of the Bach Chaconne, or consider Zhi, the Chief Musician, and his performance of the ‘Ospreys.’ Plainly what governs–especially when this is an artistic performance and not an excuse for mere showmanship–is the musical conception brought forth by Bach, the poetic-musical conception of the ‘Ospreys.’ It is this musical concept, corresponding to the dao, that transcends individual will, and that constitutes the ground of the will for each ideal performer. The essential conception is *encoded* in the musical score, or in the Book of Songs; but the musical concept itself is embodied, actualized, in the developing structure of sound, or word-in-sound, through time. Ideally, the performer’s willed conduct is the medium *through* which the musical concept get embodied, becomes actual.

Yet we know that there are legitimate personal aspects of the musical performance, aspects that are irreducible and valuable. Without the wholehearted and and unwaveringly diligent will to follow through properly, there is *no* performance, or it simply breaks down. Beyond this, the personal dimension of style, temperament, and interpretation shine in and through the embodied Chaconne. Zhi’s performance is singled out by Confucius for its special brilliance. Yet, although style and interpretation may be unique to the performance, that is, personal, it remains basic that the true artist’s style *serves* the work; the personal interpretation is a genuine interpretation *of* the work. Style and interpretation must not dominate, obscure, or distort the concept of the Chaconne or the ‘Ospreys.’ Confucius remarks that though the musicians in ancient times were given a certain liberty, the tone remained harmonious, brilliant, consistent, right to the end.

Unique personality has a role because, no more than any concept, even that of the dao–the musical concept cannot resolve unambiguously *every* aspect of the concrete reality to be actualized.”

Unfortunately, we are still left with Fingarette's own words in Secular and Sacred in which he says:

The thing we must not do is to psychologize Confucius' terminology in the Analects. The first step is seeing that this is so is to recognize that jen and its associate "virtues," and li too, are not connected in the original text with the language of will, emotion and inner states. The move from jen as referring us to a person on to jen as "therefore" referring us to his inner mental or psychic condition or processes finds no parallel in the Analects.

This is what could perhaps be described as Fingarette's own ambiguity on the issue of self and agency. And indeed, I utterly disagree with this characterization of the Analects-- for in fact we see over and over in the analects that our moral strivings are connected to our inner states. They are just not evaulated as good or bad via our inner states (more on this below). Just look at the quote at top for example-- a quote which is nothing if not about a person's moral will and emotional response.

＊

I want to go back, however, to Fingarette's presentation of jen as the opposite of "yu." It is here where I think Fingarette gets himself into trouble. The charcater "Yu" （憂） is surprisingly ancient (another 会意文字）and is thought to have started out its calligraphic life signifying the appearance of someone in mourning. For my translator associates, it has an interestingly good mapping on to the old Japanese classic image of a "confused heart" 心が乱れる→擾（みだれる). And for those who haven't noticed, this is also the image par excellance for Huizong's poor long-suffering lover, the mistress of this blog (that would be me, MW!).

To suggest that the opposite of jen is yu, would be to suggest somehow that jen is a state of such perfect bliss- whereby action and self are so integrated that no such worries or sadness or upheavals of heart/mind any longer arise for that person. Patrick S. O'Donnell in his comments at Chris' place is persuasive when he compares this to a Master craftsman. And, it is probably true, for example, that a master potter no longer has to think about each and every step when throwing or applying glaze as its all become somehow like second nature-- that is, embodied know-how. OK. That makes sense. Like a master potter a Lady of Jen no longer experiences kokoro-midare (worry, hesitation, grief, etc.) except for the fact that again the quote at top shows that the Master does in fact experience just these emotions. Fingarette himself I am pretty sure suggested the same thing when he said, there is never any "arriving" when it comes to dao.

What, then, is the word jen, really signifying?

Is it not really about human excellence? And more is it not a descriptive way for evaluating human excellence?

To me, this is the absolute key point in this issue of agency. And, it is to ask whether jen is nothing other than the definition of "excellence" vis-a-vis human relations? Japanese books gloss it as "affection and love expressed in terms of others"-- but, of course these "others" are not just anyone, but it is in terms of the context of that person's human relations, right? Yes: 人間関係. 

Jen-as-human excellence (vis-a-vis our treatment of others)- is one of the "5 cardinal virtues" 五常の徳 often coupled with "yi" 仁義

I would like to feebly attempt to compare the Lady of Jen with my man Senor Borges (the librarian of this blog). As many of you are no doubt aware, my man Borges spends his days in the ziggurat painting pictures of red roses in beautifully cultivated Persian gardens. He actually appears to think that if he can just get the perfect image of a persian rose that he would be able to express the perfecton of God. He doesn't care to eat or sleep-- he doesn't even much care about me (leaving me alone for weeks on end as he goes about his painting of roses). For Borges the end result can only be evaluated by his inner state. And, because Borges lives in such a world where-- like Augustine suggested-- when we want to look for God we should look within our own self-- his mission in the end will be thusly evaluated. Did he find the perfect image of God within himself?

Whether Borges finds this image or not-- this does not mean the outer world does not exist but rather speaks of the way his moral strivings are not necessarily evaluated by how well he treated his mother or his loving girlfriend Peony.

Confucian excellence is the opposite. Jen is evaluated precisely by the way we treat others and to achieve this, in the words of one French scholar, requires

“...an effort lasting every minute of one’s life, by control of the smallest details of conduct, by observation of the rules of life in society (i), by respect for others and for oneself and by the sense of reciprocity (shu)”

A task to last a lifetime; the cultivation of self as expressed through our social interactions, relationships and contributions. The key word being "as expressed" because I do not think that the self can ever be conflated to our actions alone; will and motivation being very key concepts to this philosophy. 

**

Whether for Sartre or for Kongzi I think choice/motivation/the state of the heart was ultimately of the highest importance-- as their expression was in fact tied up with notions of self-building (and walking the line). In both cases, valid or invalid/ authentic and inauthentic choices were bound up with cultural norms and personal creativity. In neither case were they seen as the mere expression of preference nor as strictly deteremined behaviorally.What is different, to my way of reading this, is their standards of evaluation; particularly are these standards found in an individual person's heart or are they collectively existentially understood? In either case, making choices is an essential aspect and expression of person-making, I think.

For more see:
Talking to Fingarette Part 1
Talking to Confucius

**

Happy Holi-- and for some of Namit's photographs see here

Talking to Fingarette

   

Last night, I started reading Herbert Fingarette's Confucius: the Secular as Sacred. A mystery man without even a wikipedia page, I have been unable so far to find out much about his background in philosophy-- other than that he appears to be really well known for his work in the philosophy of psychology (addiction, etc.)

I was also-- I may as well confess-- not in the best mood when I started the book since the rain had prevented me from buying more plum wine. Thus, still in a bad mood from before, and way too sober for my own good, I picked up the book, which opens like this:

The remarks which follow are aimed at revealing the magic power which Confucius saw, quite correctly, as the very essence of human virtue.

It was not what I was expecting and if we had all been in a Japanese movie, I am sure at that precise moment a bell would have been rung at a temple down the road: gooooong... Beautifully written, I found myself drawn in almost immediately. I am also reading, by the way, the Ames and Hall book, and Fingarette in comparison, I think you could argue, really takes the road less traveled. And that is, he is basing a lot of his arguments not on what the texts says, but rather was the text does not say. And, by looking at the obvious metaphors or conclusions that a Western thinker would make, and seeing these things absent from early Confucian thought, he goes on to make extrapolations from there.

For example, we have the great Chinese metaphor of a path 道 However, says Fingarette: no "crossroads." Fingarette uses this "absence" to explore issues of path as "A Way without a Crossroads;" that is morality without conflicting obligations or inner crisis and guilt. My first response was: nonsense. One just has to go to literature or drama to seek out these cases of tragedy or conflicting obligations as giri-ninjo (義理人情）-- since that is the usual place where such expressions of pre-modern crisis and drama are more often found, right?

However, the more I thought about this notion of the "absence of the choice-responsibility-guilt conplex of concepts" that Fingarette posits, the more an experience I've had here in Japan felt somehow very clearly illuminated in this light. In fact, this is something I was trying to describe to Beijing when he was here as we were talking about Japanese-style moral education, which starts in first grade in Japan. Beijing is interested in such matters and I was trying to describe to him what is a real noticeable absence of what Fingarette calls litigious punishment. To an American, it comes a surprise that when a child does something wrong, instead of a kind of one-for-one punishment (to teach "consequences") --other more indirect methods are used to try and improve behavior. 

Trying to describe it to him, I said, in the short term it seems so ineffective. I mean, to keep a child in at recess after they disrupted class seems like the easiest way to get the child to understand the consequences of their actions. And, yet these methods are stunningly absent. But then I said, "concerning long term goals, I don't know; I mean look at this place, isn't it beautiful?" And, he looked around, no doubt notiving the tidy recycling cans and the safe, beautiful streets. As we were talking a big beautiful egret descended and seemed to be walking on the surface of the water in the perfectly kept pond.

When I think of it, I realize that this idea of 道 ("Way") versus 法 ("Law") is not unique to education but is something Adonis' violin teacher also speaks so much about as underlying the difference between Western classical music and Japanese traditional music. (Or think of the memorized "patterns" of the more ritualized forms of gamelan).

When Adonis was younger, we spent much more time in the Western part of his empire. When he was 3, in fact, he spent about six months at a ritzy preschool in LA. During the first parent-teacher meeting, the teacher mentioned that Adonis had a very developed "moral sense." That is, he was always concerned about being good. I rememeber he was always talking about who were the good boys and who were the bad boys and continually asking me if I thought he was a good boy.

Returning to Japan, however, his father immediatly noticed how he kept using the Japanese expression .."fault" (to have responsibility); as in "that was his fault." People just don't talk that way here, and Adonis' father was very worried that Adonis would never cut it in school if he was always casting blame on people. "Even adults hesitate to use that expression." Over the years, I have tried to get him-- when he speaks Japanese-- to just indirectly express dislike for the action without casting blame on the person who commits the action, but sure enough this came up this year at his first parent-teacher meeting for 1st grade.... his teacher said that he gets very upset when someone breaks a rule and will blame the person. And in her words, "to blame a person will then cast blame back on Adonis and ruin the harmony of the group." 

Of course, Adonis probably gets this all from me since I have such legalist tendancies, and I stupidly said, "Well, maybe if you inacted swifter punishments....?" To which she said, "When a child misbehaves, it is just because we have not educated them enough. I promise, give it time and as a group they will all improve together."

"It just may take some of the boys longer," she added giggling.

Fair enough. 

Do you all remember that scene at the end of the Last Emperor when Puyi was made to write unending, hansei-bun 反省文 (essays repenting past misdeeds)... I don't know about in China, but here those essays start the moment the kids learn how to write. And, no self-recrminations are involved.  Hansei 反省 is always about the action-- not the person. It is interesting but basically, the children are to write what the misdeed was, and why it was unacceptable. No where is any fault cast on the person, but rather it is always in the hope of improving behavior by talking about the misdeed in terms of the context in which it was performed.

We mothers, by the way, have 反省会 (meetings to discuss our mis-deeds) after each and every event. It is a disaster for me since I never see the tiny mistakes and usually smile, "Didn't we do a great job??" To which no one responds and other people step up to point all the mistakes that I never even ever would have noticed.... Everything is mentioned and discussed in the passive tense so there is no actor just action), and then we vow to do better next time.

So, I suppose what I am trying to say is that I do think Fingarette is on to something interesting. There is perhaps something inherent to the Confucian concept of education and ethical Way that really does not have an end-goal in mind but rather provides "a socially oriented, action oriented view which provides for personal dignity." Or to use another quote from the 2nd chapter: "It is a moral sentiment focused upon one's status and conduct in relation to the world rather than an inward charge against one's stained corrupt self."

My little legalist though, he just gets so mad. Last night, we were snuggled up in our futon-- both of our heads on the same pillow as always and he said, "Seiya-kun has to write hansei-bun every single day-- why is he such a bad boy mommy?"

This was before I had read Fingarette's book, so I could only sympathize: "Oh, you mean that stupid kid with the humungous head? That kid is a damn fool."

To which Adonis said, "Teacher wouldn't like to hear you talking like that Mommy...."

Oh well. I guess I remain all about personal responsibility and grief.

Speaking of which, I think I mentioned the Philosophers Zone program (you all know how I love the host) with Genevieve Lloyd last week? Well, Lloyd has a new book out called Providence Lost. I definitely am going to read it-- anyone care to join me? (I'm lookin' at you A Ku!)

The first thing that really struck me about the program was this idea of the centrality of the concept of Providence to our Western Heritage, and I could not help but wonder if the under-emphasis of personal responsibility and choice that Fingarette sees as characterizing the Analects was not all that dissimilar to our own tradition until Augustine?

Contrasting this to the modern secular age, Lloyd says that we are left now with what can only be described as an unending sense of responsibility-- it never ends (this human cause of fault in everything) because we no longer have Providence (God or Luck or Spinoza's nature or even Fingarette's Holy Rites to fall back on as blame) so that now it's always up to Us. And that this never ending sense of responsibility is too much for some people. You know, I actually felt very close to tears as I listened to this and have been thinking of it a lot. My new friend in Hawaii keeps suggesting that sometimes people just need to let go ("to release")... and I think we can find this same sense of Providence in Fingarette's idea of "human community as holy rite" and that this is in fact, just as he suggests a situation whereby the secular is sacred. 

OK, to be continued....

All paintings, by Bui Huu Hung, are lacquer on wood.

**

Also see: Fingarette I: Confucius Hates Choice at A Ku Indeed!
And for those who may have missed these: Talking to Confucius and 西遊記 & Translators of the Silk Road

Finally, I had recommended this book to Beijing, but am now recommending it to Professor A Ku as well (Have not read it but have wanted to read it): Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China and the United States

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Dream Journeys: Part 2

 

The last we met, I was in my rickety boat, traveling through the painting. My lover the Emperor, as you may recall, was in the boat behind me, drunk and painting peonies. He was singing an old song from the Tang dynasty that good old Mi Fu had taught us. I may as well confess this to you now, Dear Readers, but sometimes, on days and moods like this, I almost feel myself falling out of love with the Emperor. For, in fact, there was something about Mi Fu that drew me. Perhaps it was his style of clothing. I mean, how many men, I ask you, would dress in the Tang fashions popular hundreds of years earlier for no other reason than they simply liked the styles back then?

For Mi Fu--- like your devoted Peony-- loved the Tang dynasty. And really, was it not the most impressive dynasty in all history? And, to a certain provincial Warlord I would say this: I did not name this blog Tang Dynasty Times because it was #4. Not to mention, it is very bad form to use ancient bronzes for an ashtray.

Anyway, back to my boat.

Did you notice, Dear Readers, the dream journey of the painting's title?

Dream Journey over Xiao Xiang 瀟湘臥遊図巻

Written in Chinese as "sleep/rest" 臥 and "play" 遊. My new friend, Master Wang laments the way "play" has been belittled in the West. Interestingly, the philosopher I work for in Hiroshima says the same thing. And one third person as well. Many of you will recall that I have been happily debating with Grand Historian Bao Pu about the legendary kanji scholar Shirakawa Shizuka. After an impressibly long lifetime (even by Japanese standards) of studying kanji, do you know what kanji he famously said he prefered above all others? His most beloved kanji was "play."

It turns out, though, that originally, 遊 didn't mean "play" in the sense that we know the word today but rather meant "journey." Hence the title of the painting. Shirakawa explained that the character displayed the image of a man going out on a journey, carrying a tall flag, perhaps not unlike that of China's first great traveler Zhang Qian who was dispatched by the emperor on a secret mission in the 2nd century BC. Luce Boulnois describes his travels:

Zhang Qian led his horse, carrying the insgnia of is imperial mission: a bamboo pole over two meters long, with three tufts of yak-tail hair attached to it. This yak tail hair can reach two meters long and has always been an emblem of power across a large part of continental Asia. 

Kidnapped not once but twice by the deadly Ziongnu, Zhang skirted the Tariim basin, traveling south of the Kunlun Mountains, making it as far as Ferghana-- place of the heavenly horses. He was gone over 30 years and having lost all of his men except one, he finally made it back to the capital. And, they say that he somehow brought back that flag. I think in China, Silk Road history begins with his remarkable journey to open up the West. I personally have always been astounded by the flag: he lost all his men, was kidnapped twice, married, had children, but somehow, he kept that flag with him right till the end.

The image of a journey. 

Shirakawa loved the kanji for "play" because of this. (Stele at left was erected in his hometown in Fukui). He also loved the inherent idea of freedom-- since he said in ancient times, the idea of "freedom" was thought to be how the gods "played" and lived-- in perfect freedom.

遊ぶものは神である。神のみが遊ぶことができた。
遊は絶対の自由と、ゆたかな創造の世界である。それは神の世界に外ならない。この神の世界にかかわるとき、人もともに遊ぶことができた。（中略）
遊とは隠れたる神の出遊をいう。
（遊学論）

"Play is something sacred. Only the gods could truly play. Play signifies absolute freedom and a rich world of the imagination that existed only for the gods. When people came to access this world of the gods, they too were able to play. And when they played, the gods would come out and join them"

I, too, like the idea of play as a journey-- not necessarily a journey of geography (in time and space) but rather the idea of an inner journey of absolute freedom and rich imagination. Like traveling through a painting, really.

This week, Alan Sanders did a really thought-provoking program on Providence called, Philosopher's Zone: Providence Lost? The guest philosopher, Genevieve Lloyd, talks about her new book in which she tries to

recapture what I think of as a lost set of interconnections in philosophy, especially, I mean the interconnections were always very strong in traditional philosophy; they've been lost largely in more recent philosophy, which sees its connections, its affinities more with science. There's nothing wrong with that, but I think in losing touch with those old connections with literary writing, philosophy has lost the opportunity of engaging directly with non-philosophers, with non-academics, about issues that they have a right to expect philosophers were always concerned with. So one of my agendas is to try to re-establish those lost connections with imagination, and with emotion, that were very much part of older philosophers' writing.

Perhaps one thing that can be fulfilling about studying ancient philosophy in general-- East or West-- is precisely this connection that philosophy once had with imagination and emotion.

And, by the way, the notion of providence, I think will come in handy when looking at Fingarette. I am still waiting to hear from our man who is MIA... but I think we will be starting next week at the latest? Alexus, I have given you fair warning about Spinoza so no hair pulling!

Sam also responded at his place on the idea of "bad virtue"... so more there as well.

Finally, I would be remiss to not mention the anniversary of Orchid Pavilion. In China, I think you all celebrate-- along with the Qing Ming Festival (清明節) -- according to the lunar-solar calendar. Here, we celebrate by the Gregorian calendar on March 3rd.

Below is Master Wang's  游目帖 ("play" "eye" "book")-- in the cursive script.

 

virtue & a little dostoevsky

 

Our man in Singapore is a polyglot extraordinaire. This morning, utilizing the usual cipher, he sent the following missive:

I was inspired by your post to pull out my 字形図解辞典, by a scholar and calligrapher from Shanghai (http://www.gujianping.com). I have
attached a digital photo of the entry on 徳

It's interesting that the Japanese version of the character lacks the
一 for 一心で徳を為す and "the beginning and the end are as one",
始終如一。Scholars of kanji migration can probably tell us about the
significance of this.

I also find this lack of "one heart" interesting. First, let's take a look at how Gu Jianping deconstructs (解字) the kanji. The first thing we notice is that he too categorizes 徳 (de) as 会意字 (character composed solely of semantic elements). Second, we learn that the character only got the 心 (heart) element during the time of bronze inscriptions. Gu sees the character as originating in the idea of a straight road (that is, virtue as a moral person "walking the walk and talking the talk" (ie, walk the talk). See Derek's comments below.

You will notice that this follows the Japanese wikipedia entry but differs slightly from Shirakawa. It also looks like, according to Gu, it was during the Han dynasty (楷）that the character received its final element: the "one" 一 which Derek explains: 一心で徳を為す (achieving virtue by one heart) and "the beginning and the end are as one",
始終如一 .

The Japanese never incorporated this idea of "one heart" (一）and I am assuming the Chinese lost it somewhere along the way (is that correct?) That "one" does make a nice case for the good professor's preference for "Integrity" as a translation for 徳、though, does it not?

Anyway, back to our man in Singapore:

What I find fascinating is the evolution of the character and the unit
of meaning it has come to signify through time. It comes to mind that　different languages employ different metaphors to talk about the　metaphysical qualities, and in Chinese (and its derivatives, of which　I consider Japanese to be one) "straightness" is often the desired　quality in the discourse about ethics. (English has a bit of this in　phrases like "the straight and narrow", but nowhere as predominant as in Chinese, to my knowledge.)

So while it was enough to see (know) the straight road (and presumably take it) initially, the conditions for virtue expanded to include "thinking virtuous thoughts" and then eventually to doing so *all the time*. And this doesn't even touch the topic of what virtue *is*, which is the problem of the philosophers. The Church struggled with the question of whether it was a sin to think evil thoughts or whether one actually had to act upon them -- I wonder if we can read the Chinese answer to this question in the character they have chosen with which to write virtue.

I also looked up the entry on 直, which . . . derives its meaning from
a property of light (viz., that it travels in straight lines). The 甲骨文
(is this what you call the Oracle Bones?) has but an eye and a
straight line leading from it to represent 視線 (目光 mu4 guang1 in
Chinese). 金文 (Bronze?) adds the line to mean the line on the face (of the eye socket).

I concur, as in Japanese as well, so central is this metaphor of "straightness" that you cannot even really talk about virtue without it coming up. 真っ直ぐ。 In fact, before Adonis was born, I had considered using that kanji "straight" (直) for Adonis' name before I was vetoed...

And while I had never thought of this myself, I do think it's true that, compared to Roman (Stoic) and Christian thought, there is not the same emphasis on avoiding "vice" in Chinese philosophy, as the stress really seems to be on "walking and talking (誠＝言+成）on the straight and arrow"　（真っ直ぐ=信・心・真+直）

Hence my unbounded dislike of interpreting 15.13 as some sort of admonishment against sex. (Rather than avoid this or that, is the Master not simply making a case for focused self-cultivation? So, even if we accepted that 色 is sex, even still, it is does not sound to your Peony's ears as any kind of "lament.")

**

Finally, this all reminds me: do you see the 2nd citation above: 恩徳? Well, as some of you might recall the last time we met, I was just praising the Hall & Ames book. Well, famous last words. For last night, I ran into a huge brickwall with their presentation of Yi (義)-- which was to me at least, completely incomprehensible. I had written this to Professor A Ku a few weeks ago, and I maintain that this Japanese-inspired approach may be a much better way to understand the concept of 義.

義  is one of the 五常  （tatoo version: 仁・義・礼・智・信） and I like the translation of “favor, grace and kindness” This is the so-called “seat of shame” and is supposed to be the faculty that restrains the less pleasant human emotions like greed or lust, and it is what governs “correct behavior toward other people” Hence: “benevolence” (恩)

Interestingly, the same 漢字　is used to translate the Greek word used in Christian philosophy diakonia ("benevolent service")… and it can be read in Japanese 義しい＝”tadashii= correct” Not surprisingly, it is a popular character used in boys' names as well.

So, what informs “correct behavior”? I would guess a delicate combination of 1) 質 (acting in a simple and as close to natural way as possible) and 2) learning 文.

Is 質 equivalent to Aristotle’s physis? How is it different? Is it the seat of human agency? Those are my questions. But it is true, perhaps, that Ivan Karamazov never got anywhere in all his dazzlingly elaborate philosophizing because he relied so heavily on 文. While his brother Dmitri, who "loved humanity but hated his neighbors," lacked a certain– how shall we say??  "義"。It was only Alyosha, who embodied Christian  恩 or 義,　who acted from both 文 and 質。Hence, I think it could be argued that Alyosha is the 義人 (⇒恩徳）par excellance in the Christian and Confucian story.

So, 徳 as ①Path　道徳→美徳 ② Benevolence or uprightness 恩徳 and ③　Beliefs, our morals 信念→　同心同徳

Anyway, I am turning my thoughts back to Dream Journeys and will be continuing with part 2 (one of these days)....For anyone interested in thinking more about filial piety, I highly recommend watching the Ozu film Tokyo Monogatari. This was the film that famously influenced Wim Wender's work-- and well, I cannot recommend it enough; especially for those interested in 親孝行 as 美徳。

Here is the opening scene from Wender's Tokyo Ga (a tribute to Ozu) "Just to look, without wanting to prove anything..."

This is perhaps an even better-- even more beautiful-- tribute to Ozu though: Late Spring Appreciation

filial piety

 

We have been talking here and there the past few weeks about love and desire in terms of virtue. The truth is, however, this entire time something else has been bothering me. And that is this, more often than not when we read about Confucian philosophy the concept of filial piety 孝 is being translated-- and or interpreted-- into our English concept of "family." In Japanese, too, it is glossed as family,  but in Japanese "family" does not strictly signify the nuclear family-- so in the Japanese presentation there is no real alteration of the basic foundation of the philosophy.

This is not so in English however, is it?

The other day, I stumbled on an article written by a German scholar working in Japan on Shirakawa's oracle bone script research. My attention was focused on the way the author described the manner in which many ancient peoples-- no matter where-- placed great emphasis on ancestor worship. He really stressed the point that worshipping one's ancestors--as an extention of loving one's parents- is a profoundly human desire. And, that while in East Asia this has continued being central down to today (you know most japanese "heads of households" have butsudan in their homes even today), in places where organized religion has reigned supreme, ancestor worship was replaced by a universal (non-particularist) god. This scholar felt that it is this which has led to so much strife in the world. I mean, it made my head spin, because I am not sure how he connects one with the other... and yet-- just on a personal level, I do also believe that this is indeed a deep human need.

I have written here about my own feelings all those years ago concerning the near impossibility of trying to mourn my father without real rituals or any kind of collective practice beyond a one day funeral-- about how long it hurt: 

It had not even been two years since my own father had passed away. Since we were not raised within any Church, my father's funeral had been conducted hastily and truly uncomfortably (as if we were all wearing clothes that did not fit right). After the funeral, pictures of dad were slowly removed from here and there around the house and that was that. There were no real rituals to help us get through the days, weeks and months-- well, let's just say it-- there were no rituals to get us through the years following his death. Because there were no real rituals, my grief was never given a voice. I had no way to collectively express grief-- and no where was I more aware of this than in Tana Toraja.

With Adonis, this bond of parent with child has become even more central in my life. It is, I think, The bond. And I cannot think of another philosopher who writes so beautifully about it either.

Indeed, for two thousand years, filial piety (親孝行）has remained a foundation for an entire moral theory-- maybe even an entire civilization?

Since reading the essay, this has been on my mind and the day before yesterday, I had emailed a friend (who perhaps is an expert on such matters):

 

Of course, you know that I really do believe that the relationship to parent is the very foundation of the way we treat others-- or to say this in another way, to not make this clear is maybe to miss the point? It is not about "family values" in the American sense... I don't know-- is it even possible in a culture that does not place the bond to parent as the very essence of morality to say much of anything anyway about "family"?

 

Well, not one day after writing those words, the good professor was writing on his blog about Confucian values being based on "our loving relationships." Well, it was too much of a coincidence (or excellent timing?), so I took the opportunity and asked him this below:

 

 

Often when you write about Confucius here (and other places) you (indeed, many English language thinkers) stress this idea of:

"keeping our attention on cultivating and preserving our closest loving relationships (that is how a Confucian Way is realized)"

I agree with this and yet I think you are brushing over a very important aspect of the concept (maybe because it does not ring well for some American ears?) And that is, that to my reading it is not that cultivating our "closest loving relationships" is the key but rather that honoring and caring for the bond we have to our parents (and extending backward to a certain extent to ancestors) is the true foundation of this philosophy.

Out of this love and honoring of our PARENTS, we then love and honor ruler, spouse, child and friend. It is not a matter of picking and choosing loving realtionships to be committed to but something much more basic to our human nature-- loving our parents.

If this a correct reading (and honestly I am in a far less secure place than you to say as this was never my field in the 1st place) then I think the english language presentation should reflect that. Why? because it perhaps is really an important point-- indeed, it makes all the difference.

**

The good professor was in a rush but he did respond-- with the promise of more later:

Yes, Peony, you ask a good question.
"closest loving relationships" is my formulation. I am working to adapt Confucian ethics to contemporary questions. So, while you are right to point out that there is an especial emphasis on a child's duties to parents in Confucianism, I would press back and argue that, in The Analects, we can also find duties that parents have to children ("cherish the young") and that friends have to friends, and even that one has to strangers. Duty toward parents is important, but it is not exclusive. I will provide more on this in a post, perhaps early next week. But for now I have neither the time nor my texts here before me.
Suffice it to say that if one wanted to press the point you are making here, it could lead to a rejection of modern applications of Confucian thought. I have thought about that and, while I obviously reject it (or my book would dissolve before my very eyes), I recognize a certain validity to the concern.
Again, more later...

It actually made me a bit sad to think (see me at left) that talking about filial piety had become alien to our culture as to make his book somehow irrelevant. I have been in a rather gloomy mood since. Not that I don't understand how he feels, but is this not a case of throwing the baby out with the bath water?

Well, actually, the first point to be made is that to say filial duty is the foundation of a moral philosophy is not to say that no other duties existed for clearly they did. But, what I am arguing is that it was this particular duty out of which the others are to be based. So that if the professor was, instead, for example to have glossed over the duty that exists between subject-and-ruler, that would have been a different-- far less significant-- matter.

The other point is this idea of throwing the baby out with the bath water. As many of you are by no doubt aware, discussing the New Age Movement is taboo on this blog-- and anyone who tries to engage me on it will be cruelling censored: not by me but by the Librarian, Señor Borges (are you there, darling?) However, I will say this (and I hope my Borges allows this one statement): Confucian philosophy-- as I read it-- is not about a kind of New Age picking and choosing over which values or which loving relationships are to be emphasize, but rather it is about an understanding of where we came from (that is, we are all born from parents).

Manyul, I don't know if you remember this professor at Cal but she had studied under Dreyfus and then stayed on (at least when we were there) to teach in the psychology department-- I tried to look her up but could not find the name-- but she was absolutely an amazing lecturer on Winnicott's approaches to development and also on Naikan therapy (which she was very interested in).

As I described briefly here in a comment to Sam, Naikan thereapy is a modern Japanese approach to psychotherapy which has been used particularly successfully in prisons. Interestingly, while its name literally means "self-reflection" (内観療法）in fact the "practioner" is made to sit and reflect on what other people have done for him or her in order to cultivate a feeling of inter-connectedness out of which healing is achieved. This is from the wikipedia article:

Its structure uses our relationships with others as the mirror in which people can see themselves. We reflect on what we have received from others, what we have given, and what troubles we have caused.

In particular, great stress is placed on the Mother. So, practioners are to sit in zazen and reflect on what they have received from their mothers. In some of the literature I read, I remember the issue was brought up that not all mothers are necessarily Good Mothers (ie the Emperor Shun), however all mothers at least provided the 1st Buddhist maternal kindness, right? This absolutely, I think, gets to the fundamental point of Confucian filial piety. No matter how you look at Confucian  philosophy, it is not teaching some kind of blind devotion but rather it is urging that we recognize the debt that all children owe their parents (and yes, I realize that no one asked for this debt to be paid).

Actually, it is probably really to say that if this conscious appreciation is not paid, then moral happiness might in fact remain elusive.

For indeed, as I suggested to my friend: the relationship to parent is the very foundation of the way we treat others-- or to say this in another way, to not make this clear is maybe to miss the point??

But, believe me Sam, I know this is a hard sell.

Not that long ago I was having a conversation with Madame Huizi in which she was complaining yet again about her man:

He is such a mama's boy! Now wouldn't you think after all this time, I would come first?

My mouth dropped open. You've gotta be kidding, I thought-- thinking of Adonis' future wife I became increasingly annoyed but diplomatically mumbled:

Well, no matter how long I am married, my husband would never take the place in my heart that my mother does. My mother and my son-- no one else comes anywhere near in importance.

Now, you would think that would have persuaded her-- as she is of course my mother! But no, it stopped her only for a second (I think she said, "that's nice to hear, dear" or something like that...)

The thing is-- and this is just my personal opinion, but-- just as the Master taught-- a stress on duty to parent actually strengthens all the other relations. For believe me when I say, it is a lot harder to get the hell out of Dodge when you think about the logical conclusions of your actions based on the way the entire family is connected. (Of course, we hear rumors that the Sage was himself divorced...) Still, your spouse (if you have children) is the parent of your child-- and the grandparent too will always have an opinion based on their feelings, right?

Anyway, the last time Adonis and I traveled across the Pacific, I was sitting next to a woman who had moved to California the exact year and month that I had moved to Japan. She said, "It's like we are living mirror lives of each other." Well, not really since she was less than thrilled with her new homeland! Getting increasingly tipsey on red wine, she started making her feelings known pretty loudly too...

Working as a specialized nurse in a university hospital, she spoke of the many added complications that make medicine more complicated-- and yes, frustrating-- in the US. Obesity being the single biggest problem, but she also said very sadly, "In Japan, I think, families are more there for each other so things don't spiral quite so out of control." She was speaking in Japanese, and so of course it was clear that by "families" she was not talking about spouses but rather parents and children, uncles, aunts and the way the young will take care of the elderly. She was from a small town in Japan and it is not as if I could not understand where she was coming from-- for I did. And yet, I think that this idea of filial duty is in fact not alien to people in California, nor would it make the professor's book somehow dissolve in front of our eyes either....

In the end, is this not the central point of Confucian philosophy? Further, to take this point away, are we not removing the logical foundation for which the entire normative ethics governing human relations of Confucian philosophy is based? And in the end, is it not perhaps true that the way a person treats their parents is somehow essential to any discussion of their Character?  

You know what I think.

**

All paintings, by Bui Huu Hung, are lacquer on wood.