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Published: September 2nd 2007
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Confucius Says. . . Not Much at All These Days
Kong Fu Zi, the venerable Master Kong (Confucius is the Anglicised version of his name) , was born in the year 551 BC in the town of Qufu. He was an educated man who worked up from his lowly status (he wasn’t from a rich family by any measure) to very high official positions within the government of the time. He was renowned for being honest, hardworking, a model member of society and an excellent teacher. When he died he was very respected by his students but he was by no means wealthy.
What happened after his death was where things got really interesting. Master Kong’s students wrote down his sayings, beliefs and stories in what became known as the Confucian Analects. From the Analects future generations were educated and trained to follow the upstanding lead of Master Kong which brought about a proliferation of Confucian beliefs. Over time this coalesced into a religion, what is Confucianism today, as well as an imperial examination system. Up until the fall of the Qing dynasty, students had to pass a series of examinations based on Confucian beliefs in order to get
positions of authority within the state, thus requiring them to study the Analects in depth. All across Asia the Confucian system spread and even now it has a place in folklore and religion around the globe.
As an added bonus, one Chinese emperor posthumously rewarded Master Kong by giving his family a position of quasi-royalty. The Kong family was allowed to rule over the Qufu district, collecting taxes, organising public works and the like, generally becoming a rich and aristocratic family.
Qufu today is an interesting town: a small place with a disproportionate number of attractions. The small town has a full Ming dynasty wall still intact which encloses two of the three Kongs. The three Kongs refer to the Confucius Temple, the Kong Family Mansion and the Confucian Forrest.
The Confucius Temple was progressively built by the emperors of China as a tribute to the great teacher. A series of gates and pagodas lead inwards towards a central hall which is purported to have been built where Master Kong used to teach his students 2500 years ago. The grounds are filled with 1000 year old trees and ancient stone paving. Bright green moss covers the ground
and gives the feel of an ancient and overgrown temple which was lost for centuries within a forest before being rediscovered. Stelae - carved stone tablets - litter the grounds, each a section of the Analects written by an emperor or statesman. The ancient halls and shrines have housed worshippers for millennia and are still serving that purpose as Chinese people come to pay respect to their most revered teacher.
As I walked around I was in a dreamland, the temple really was remarkable. Preserved as it was originally built to the extent that fallen trees are left as they land, plants grow from rooftops and paving is displaced by ancient roots. I was quite dramatically reminded of the temples of Angkor in Cambodia, the lost world feel was identical.
At the very back of the complex, slightly to the side and well away from the places where most tourists ventured, I found a building labeled as the Holy Kitchen. Formerly used to prepare sacrificial meals, the building now houses a collection of Han dynasty stone carvings. That is, the stones were carved between 206 BC and 220 AD (slightly younger than the Terracotta Warriors). I couldn’t fathom
why such an ancient collection was housed in such an out of the way place, but it was good that I had it all to myself. Perhaps ten blocks were there, each with simple carvings adorning their faces. Simple pictures of animals, a court scene, or a dance were on the stones; carved using primitive tools 2000 years ago. That exhibit in itself was worth the trip to Qufu, although they weren’t the oldest carvings in China they were close, and something about them made them alluring. Their simplicity, beauty and random location made them incredible.
The Kong Family Mansion was less exciting, but that is only a comparative remark as they were interesting in their own right. The Mansion is a collection of old buildings connected by paths and alleys which was the house and seat of government used by the Kong family for 2000 years until they fled the country in the 20th century. The myriad courtyards and gardens tell of the opulence and grandeur enjoyed by the Kong family through 77 generations (stelae in the front courtyards document the Kong family tree from Confucius himself down the current generation) and the relics on display gave me
a glimpse of what it must have been like to live there. The Kong family ruled Qufu over a much longer period than any Chinese empire, staying in their Mansion as successive families gained and lost power over the wider country, an astonishing feat to say the least.
The third and last of the three Kongs was the Confucian Forrest; a glorified park slash graveyard. The members of the Kong family have been buried within the dense and verdant forest since Master Kong’s day and their burial mounds, statuary and shrines are clearly visible today. Walking along a path in the forest was rather eerie as graves would appear suddenly from behind a tree or a collection of twenty or more mounds would suddenly be visible though the underbrush. The highlight was of course Master Kong’s grave, along with his son and grandson’s graves which are adjacent. Simple carvings are in front of each grave, one last word of wisdom from the Master.
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annika
non-member comment
Hi Matty - fascinating history, but how do you spell a place with lots of trees?