Older siblings help out younger siblings with tuition fees, and the boss always pays for lunch. Seniors get obedience, but they also have obligations.Heavy penalties (including physical punishment) are incurred for stepping out of line. Obedience and respect towards seniors – parents, teachers, the boss, older brothers and sisters – is crucial.These are some of the key principles and practices. Not everyone follows the rules, but Confucianism does continue to shape the Korean paradigm. The Confucian MindsetĬonfucianism is a social philosophy, a prescription for achieving a harmonious society. He was the first teacher to open his school to all students solely on the basis of their willingness to learn.Īs Confucianism trickled into Korea, it evolved into neo-Confucianism, which combined the sage’s original ethical and political ideas with the quasi-religious practice of ancestor worship and the notion of the eldest male as spiritual head of the family. Confucius preached against corruption, war, torture and excessive taxation. These ideas led to the system of civil-service examinations (gwageo), where one could gain position through ability and merit, rather than from noble birth and connections (though it was, in fact, still an uphill battle for the common-born).
Confucius firmly believed that men were superior to women and that a woman’s place was in the home. He also urged that respect and deference should be given to those in positions of authority – a philosophy exploited by Korea’s Joseon-dynasty ruling elite.
The Chinese philosopher Confucius (552–479 BC) devised a system of ethics that emphasised devotion to parents and family, loyalty to friends, justice, peace, education, reform and humanitarianism. The state religion of the Joseon dynasty, Confucianism still lives on as a kind of ethical bedrock (at least subconsciously) in the minds of most Koreans, especially the elderly.
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