Columbia University Press Confucianism and Sacred Space: The Confucius Temple from Imperial China to Today

Temples dedicated to Confucius are found throughout China and across East Asia, dating back over two thousand years. These sacred and magnificent sanctuaries hold deep cultural and political significance. This book brings together studies from Chin-shing Huang s decades-long research into Confucius temples that individually and collectively consider Confucianism as religion. Huang uses the Confucius temple to explore Confucianism both as one of China s three religions (with Buddhism and Daoism) and as a cultural phenomenon, from the early imperial era through the present day. He argues for viewing Confucius temples as the holy ground of Confucianism, symbolic sites of sacred space that represent a point of convergence between political and cultural power. Their complex histories shed light on the religious nature and character of Confucianism and its status as official religion in imperial China. Huang examines topics such as the political and intellectual elements of Confucian enshrinement, how Confucius temples were brought into the imperial ritual system from the Tang dynasty onward, and why modern Chinese largely do not think of Confucianism as a religion. A nuanced analysis of the question of Confucianism as religion, Confucianism and Sacred Space offers keen insights into Confucius temples and their significance in the intertwined intellectual, political, social, and religious histories of imperial China. Review Chin-shing Huang is one of the most distinguished and discerning scholars in Confucian studies today. His extensive account of Confucian temples as a ritual system in imperial and modern China is a magnificent contribution to the field. Its vast temporal range and its keen analysis of specific historical episodes illuminate the crucial elements that make Confucian temples essential to Chinese religious, cultural, and political life.--Anna Sun, author of Confucianism as a World Religion: Contested Histories and Contemporary Realities<br \><br \>Huang knows the history and culture of Confucius temples best and makes a case for regarding Confucianism as a religion, instead of just a philosophy. Underscoring that Confucianism was a state religion for ruling male elites, he counters a rising trend to portray it as a popular religion among the masses.--Hoyt Cleveland Tillman, coauthor of Cultural Authority and Political Culture in China: Exploring Issues with the Zhongyong and the Daotong During the Song, Jin, and Yuan Dynasties<br \><br \>Cutting through centuries of misguided theological and political debate, one of the world's most eminent historians of China charts the changing cultural, political, and institutional forces at work in Confucianism as a vibrant ritual system. --Stephen F. Teiser, coeditor of Readings of the Platform S tra This is a valuable translation of Chin-shing Huang's decades-long and learned study of Confucianism as a comprehensive historical tradition. Among his many insights, a most significant one is that, notwithstanding later denials, Confucianism cannot be understood unless seen in its religious dimension--albeit an elite and statist one. --Prasenjit Duara, author of The Crisis of Global Modernity: Asian Traditions and a Sustainable Future Confucianism and Sacred Space brings to light the legacy of Chin-shing Huang, a leading scholar of Confucianism and Confucian temples, whose work has not received the attention it deserves in Western scholarship. --James Flath, author of Traces of the Sage: Monument, Materiality, and the First Temple of Confucius About the Author Chin-shing Huang is distinguished research fellow and vice president of Academia Sinica in Taiwan. His books in English include Philosophy, Philology, and Politics in Eighteenth-Century China: Li Fu and the Lu-Wang School Under the Ch ing (1995) and Business as a Vocation: The Autobiography of Wu Ho-su (2002).