Confucianism As An Obstacle During The Qing Dynasty

Confucianism as an obstacle
Overtime Confucianism was molded into different things and were exploited by many different groups for their own agendas. This truly showed during the Qing dynasty. The monarchy used it to rein over people’s lives and to get them to do what they wanted. While Confucianism had strict rules to begin with it became much worse and very different with the intervention of the monarchy “This relationship of ethical hierarchy existed between families (represented by scholar-bureaucrats) and states (represented by entitled lords) and between states and the nation (represented by a king)” (Cui 519). This was considered a sacred relationship but with the ruling class influence it morphed into more of an obligation and a concept that you had to respect and
This relationship was used by the monarchy to keep people from questioning any wrongdoing done by the monarchy or the people they shared their power with. This created a very segregated society between the rich and the poor. The reining monarchies and the ruling elite made people believe that they had to follow Confucianism, which advocates strict relationships and the importance of hierarchy which would keep the Chinese society in order. In order to encourage this types of belief “the Chinese emperors built temples to honor Confucius and his followers, praised the so-called chaste women (lienv)…developed an education and civil service examination system based almost exclusively on the memorization of Confucian classics” (Kung and Ma 133). Confucianism advocated a harmonious society, it does through by noting the importance of relationships and the respect that should be given to the hierarchical positions. However later, it was wrongly used to justify the