The Middle Kingdom Wallas

NHK: Very interesting subject. China is one place I have never been to - except Hong Kong, and even there never stayed more than a couple of days. But am familiar with some of the Chinese diaspora in the south east Asia - and they are certainly a hard-working people who like to mind their own business.

An example of how the world can be expected to become a better place as china progresses to become a modern nation is the remarkable spurt of discovery by chinese paleantologists. Just last week, chinese paleaontologists shook the scientific world with their discovery of an ancient mammal, the size of a dog, which had eaten a small dinosaur - till now, all indications were that ancient mammals were timid, mouse-like creatures that were no match for any dinosaur. One can only look forward to the time when 1 billion chinese add their brain power to the torch of human knowledge that for the past few centuries has been carried (speaking broadly) by western people only.

singularity #11 ,

``The Indians are more culturally and religiously stronger.``
Why do you think so? Many hindus don`t even remeber one prayer to God. Many Indians don`t even who the Mauryas were. On the other the Chinese I have come accross know their history and culture to minute details. India is a great society with a wonderful culture, but the chinese have greater historical continuity.

singularity #11 ,

``The Indians are more culturally and religiously stronger.``
Why do you think so? Many hindus don`t even remeber one prayer to God. Many Indians don`t even who the Mauryas were. On the other the Chinese I have come accross know their history and culture to minute details. India is a great society with a wonderful culture, but the chinese have greater historical continuity.

Nice article, Confucius does deserve a lot of material though.Not an easy person to understand, and he is not very well understood in modern China as well. In fact many expat Chinese do not even know his name.
One aspect you missed of Confucianism is hierarchy, just like the ancient India, confucius too preached social hierarchy.I would not be surprised if the divide between the rich and poor is greater in communist China.This is one of the reasons they are such good producers, because of cheap labour in subhuman conditions. It is very diffihcult to know the real facts about contemporary rural china because of the iron curtain etc.
The chinese actually seem to have a feeling of Asian solidarity in North America, from what I see here .An interesting discussion going on about the abuse of an Indian call center employee by a radio jock in the US.I dont think we feel that kind of solidarity towards the Chinese or other Asians.
dost-mittar Going well for the chinese, I dont know if we can call it that in the first place. I really dont buy this GDP HDI data, neither in case of India nor China.There has to be more equity of wealth, and I dont mean through the leftist policies, but through an equal opportunity democracy.China does have a totalitarian regime, and what nhk says that policies are easy to implement because of no democracy,in effect means that bureaucrats and politicians are God in a Godless China. Policies for the benefit of whom? There have been abominal cases of human rights violation in China, and I would be hard pressed to believe that the situation is a lot better now.
Everybody knows about Tiannamen but there are some other horrific incidents about China that we never come to know about because of the tight media control. How many among us have heard about The Henan aids epidemic in the nineties? About one million people contracted HIV according to unofficial sources due to bureaucratic callousness and not a single bureaucratic head has rolled. I mean come on,close to ONE MILLION till date. There are villages in Henan in which NOT being HIV infected is an exception. These people are dying slowly and surely. They do not have enough money to get themselves treated.
A totalitarian regime can never be good for the people, God or no God.
On a side note, I wonder why the heck noone even talks about Tibet any more, not even the great Mr. Dalai Lama.

re # 10 RSridhar

Buddhism was systematically wiped out from India through Brahmin-Kshatriya alliance and later through Islamic invasions. Ambedkar`s works provide an excellent description of how Buddhism ceased to exist in India. Really, a must read for anyone interesed in how a sensible and egalitarian religion such as Buddhism came to be replaced by Hinduism and Islam in India. Brahmanism`s vegetarian lifestyle was a strategy adopted to counter Buddhism`s influence. Before the arrival of Buddhism, Brahmins did not mind chomping on horses and cows. The coup de grace to Buddhism in India was the wholesale ransacking of monasteries and butchering of monks by Muslim invaders (Hindu rajas too indulged in this but not in a wholesale manner). The then world famous library and university in Nalanda burned for weeks after getting torched by Muslim invaders. For your interest, before Ambedkar`s conversion to Buddhism, one of the last remaining pockets of Buddhism in India was in Tanjavur.

#17 dost-mittar:

Bodhi Dharma was a kshatriya prince in Kerala and was well versed in Indian martial arts. He received Buddhist education, primarily Dhyana Buddhism, from Prajavatna(sp?) and was invited to China. There, overcome by the feeble and weak monks at the Shaolin monastery, unable to protect themselves from bandits, he taught them the martial arts he learnt as a Kshatriya Prince. His Dhyana Buddhism is called Chan Buddhism by Chinese and Zen Buddhism by Japanese. He can be thus said as the father of Buddhist philosophy in those countries, even though other Buddhist monks from India and Central Asia went to China before him. He was once so upset with himself for sleeping while meditating, that he cut out his eyelids. That is why Chinese and Japanese descriptions of Bodhi Dharma show him as a fierce man, but in reality he only looks like that because he is portrayed without his eyelids. Indians have forgotten him, but he is revered all over South-East Asia.

Kabuli

Dost # 17

There is certainly ancestor worship. The closest Confusianism comes to worship of any kind.

The 18 year limit for religious education is a good solution to nurture cool heads. First the temporal education - then the religious education when the mind is mature.

The Chinese also have some other traits like us - like the Urbanites consider themselves to be superior to the rural folks - the Shanghai guys look down upon the guys from backward provinces like the Shinjan.

The men are tough with women with all the macho traits. In a famous movie `The Lantern`, the master lights up the lantern outside the room of the concubine that he is sleeping with that night.

There was also a famous & a very touching Hollywood movie about a Chinese family settled in America. Forget the name.

nhk

nazar saheb:

You are continuing with your mission of enlightening us desis about our areas of darkness.

``The families are close and elders, dead or alive, are highly revered.``

One can say, even worshipped, both among chinese and hindus. It is common to see the pictures of dead parents hanging in the homes of even non-practising hindus, with a garland around the picture frame. And if they have a temple in the house, you may also see the garlanded picture added to the pantheons of gods and godesses there.

``Over this mixture of two philosophies, if we pour in a bit of Buddhism and sprinkle it with some Marxism/Maoism, we get what could be loosely described as the Chinese belief``

I think that it is too early to say if Marxism/Maoism has entered the Chinese belief system or is merely a passing phase. Maoism, perhaps, has a better chance of doing that.

``Religious education is banned until the age 18.``

If the world has to learn one lesson from China, this would be it. If possible, one would wish to extend it even to homes. Then, faith will be based on reason and not the other way round, and one could even change it as one matures, unlike carrying it as an albatross around one`s neck all of one`s life or justifying everything by quoting from the quran, bible or the vedas (vedanta literally means `end of knowledge` though fortunatley very few hindus know that and even fewer believe that!)

One of the lesser known contribution of Buddhism to China is the martial arts. Strange though it may seem, these arts developed in the Buddhist monastery in China by monks to defend himself against rowdy elements (goondas). This is why there is such great emphasis on discipline and the spiritual in Kung Fu and othe martial arts. Legend has it that in 350 AD Kalaripayattu, an ancient martial art originating in the Kerala state was taken to China by a Buddhist monk, named Bodhi Dharma. Recently, I believe, Jackie Chan was in Kerala to learn Kalaripayattu.

Isphahani # 15

These CIA facts are just some of the indicators for general information and are not the basis of the thrust of the arguements.

The main thrust of the article is about the historical perspective and some of the factors that affected the society and culture.

nhk

Kaalchakra

Thanks. -:)

Passage to China

by Amartya Sen

The intellectual links between China and India, stretching over two thousand years, have had far-reaching effects on the history of both countries, yet they are hardly remembered today. What little notice they get tends to come from writers interested in religious history, particularly the history of Buddhism, which began its spread from India to China in the first century. In China Buddhism became a powerful force until it was largely displaced by Confucianism and Taoism approximately a thousand years later. But religion is only one part of the much bigger story of Sino-Indian connections during the first millennium. A broader understanding of these relations is greatly needed, not only for us to appreciate more fully the history of a third of the world`s population, but also because the connections between the two countries are important for political and social issues today.

Certainly religion has been a major source of contact between China and India, and Buddhism was central to the movement of people and ideas between the two countries. But the wider influence of Buddhism was not confined to religion. Its secular impact stretched into science, mathematics, literature, linguistics, architecture, medicine, and music. We know from the elaborate accounts left by a number of Chinese visitors to India, such as Faxian in the fifth century and Xuanzang and Yi Jing in the seventh,[1] that their interest was by no means restricted to religious theory and practices. Similarly, the Indian scholars who went to China, especially in the seventh and eighth centuries, included not only religious experts but also other professionals such as astronomers and mathematicians. In the eighth century an Indian astronomer named Gautama Siddhartha became the president of the Board of Astronomy in China.

The full text of the article is at here

Nazar Khan

Thank you for an informative article.


labyrinth1

Could you figure out why they feel like that toward the Indians? Were these only political reasons, or did people also offer some cultural reasons?

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I haven`t been to Mainland China lately, but from what I see and read and observe and hear, there are a few ``new`` Chinas arriving, with demographic changes occuring in notably:-

China - Southern Star (Australia)
China - Japanese Maruta (Taiwan)
China - Northern Voids Inhabit (The border areas with Russia)
China - Metro Edition (HK, Singapore, Macao)
China - Ocean Rulers (Merchant Navy)
China - Teak and Poppy (Myanmar)

I have always admired the way the Chinese community makes the business of supporting demographic movements so clinically perfect. Just the right amounts of sentiment, family and business.

One generation more at the most before they acquire good English skills, and then?

Nazar Khan,
The chinese are ethnically united coz they are all Han chinese majority. That is their unifying factor. The Indians are more culturally and religiously stronger. And the Indians who are majority hindus have seen the worst of times and come out more or less united. The chinese have never really been tested that much. So we still dont know how much adversity the chinese can take, especially the religious onslaught of the christian and Islamic variety. The Hindus are inherently freedom loving and so democracy comes naturally to them. India cant be anything other than a democracy.

The chinese are pragmatic, so i would bet my money that they would evolve their own working version of a democracy , eventually.

Well, today there is only 2 modern nations,China and India, which represents the historical entities of China and Bharat. So in that sense they both have gotten back to their civilizational roots. There is no other modern examples with dynamic link and continuity to their historical entities. Not Egypt or Persia or Greece or any other modern nations.

re:#1 by nikki7777
I am not even sure if u ever went to school or perhaps u were not a serious student of history.
India did not ditch Buddhism. It assimilated it into its own folds, so that Buddha is one of the pantheon of Gods albeit not a very popular one among Hindus today. Buddha Jayanti is celebrated in India even today.
Buddhism is an atheistic religion. India was a buddhist country for a 1000 years, good enough time to know which is better.
As somebody rightly said: Buddhism is like a castle without a well: u will feel great but will go thirsty!
Sridhar

singularity # 4, Bbabu # 6

The article is basically about the Chinese people & the society. Not really a comparison with others.

There has been a deep one China ethos - and this civilization has been reuniting again and again after break ups. This has not happened in the case of the Greeks, Persians, Romans, Arabs, Indians.

China was the most advanced civilizatuion between 7-14 century. I believe Quran says `seek knowledge even if you have to go to China`. The Arabs also had a good spell during this period.

Other unique aspect is obviously its not having come up with any cosmic ideology.

But all is not hunky-dorey - presently it is running jumping towards Westernization - and historically, it has displayed a period urge to get back to its origin & culture; and shun foreign cultural influences.

Similarly, ther is another big question mark on its democratization - something that is alien to its history & society - and if democracy can ever be introduced. It is place where the civil society is replaced by the civil service.

So despite its economic growth, one still has to keep one`s fingers crossed. (India is better placed in this respect)

nhk

I have travelled to China several times and lived in Hongkong for couple of months. What I found their good points were :

1. Very pragmatic wrt business.
2. Extremely hard working.
3. Due to lack of democracy, implementation of ideas does not face any hurdles such as court cases to get a stay.
4. More equality amongst women as compared to the sub continent.
5. No religious baggage.

The aspects which I did not like about them are

1. Strong concept of their being a superior race. They tend to look down upon all foreigners including whites. This is very strong in Hongkong. Much less in China.
2. Inability to face the truth in certain cases. Believing in statements such as `There is no homosexuality amongst Chinese etc.`
3. Police state and lack of civil rights.

I remember asking a snior economist in Shanghai, as to what is communist about the Communist Republic of China, and he started laughing syaing that he could not answer this question.

They have had a horrible experience with Britain, when Britain destroyed the people of China by making them opuim addicts and destroyed any opposition. The japanese brutality during WW2 and the period before that is very well remembered. The Japanese used to look down upon the Chinese as the inferior race.

The idea which has tremendous appeal is that of a coalation of China, Russia and India to form a strong common market. This will constitute 35-40 % of the world population, and will be a very strong entity if this idea gets implemented.