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In order to understand Chinese culture and society it is fundamental to understand the Chinese family. The family in China was not only a social unit, but it represented a whole codified ideology that pervaded the state and the society for thousands of years. Many of the differences between Chinese and Western thinking are comprehensible only from the point of view of the unique place that the family has in Chinese culture.
Without doubt, the pillar of the Chinese family structure was the concept of filial piety. In Chinese, filial piety is expressed by the character 孝(pinyin: xiào). The character xiao is made up of an upper and a lower part. The first part is derived from the character lao (老, pinyin: lǎo), which means ‘old’. The second part is the character 子 (pinyin: zi), which means ‘son’. There are different interpretations of the meaning of the character xiao:
1) the old are supported by the younger generation;
2) the young are burdened and oppressed by the old;
3) the purpose of the family is the continuation of the family line (chronological, from top to bottom) (see Ikels 2004, pp. 2-3).
Filial piety was a central value in traditional Chinese culture. Its importance went far beyond that of the biblical commandment “honour thy mother and thy father”. Filial piety was and still is a value based on strict principles of hierarchy, obligation and obedience. It is no exaggeration to say that it was the very foundation of the hierarchical structure of the Chinese family and thus of the Chinese society as a whole. That does not mean that the idea of filial piety has not changed over the centuries or that children are always filial. But we need first of all to understand what xiao means, where it comes from, and how it was practised in the past, before we can examine the exceptions and the changes.
Confucianism, including classical and Han Confucianism, provided a view of the cosmos and social order that legitimated the Chinese patrilineal, patrilocal, and patriarchal family system. Confucian emphasis on obligations to patrilineal ancestors and Confucian exaltation of filial piety contributed to a moral order in which families were central to human identity and to a family system organized hierarchically so that men and older generations had considerable power over women and younger generations (Ebrey 2003, pp. 11-12).
The pre-eminence of filial duty is clearly demonstrated by the following Chinese saying: Of all virtues, filial piety is the first (百善孝為先; pinyin: bǎi shàn xiào wèi xiān).
Table of contents
- Feeding, Obeying, Sacrificing – The Ethics of Filial Piety
- Hierarchy, Authority, Obedience
- Xiao, the Family and the State
- Benign Authority and Love
- Chinese Life Cycles and the Benefits of Filial Piety
Feeding, Obeying, Sacrificing – The Ethics of Filial Piety
The concept underlying the principle of filial piety is simple. Parents gave life to children, gave them food and clothes, an education etc. For all the things that children received from parents, children have an eternal obligation towards them. They have a debt towards their parents, a debt that can never be fully repaid. The only thing that children can do in order to repay at least a small part of this debt, is to take care of their parents in their old age, to make them proud and happy, to obey and serve them.
I think that many Westerners often fail to understand how extreme, at least by Western standards, the concept of filial piety was in traditional Chinese society. In order to show this point, I will quote here two ancient Chinese stories that illustrate the ethics of filiality.
The first story is from the 24 Exemplars of Filial Piety (二十四孝, pinyin: Èrshísìxiào), a collection of tales about filial piety compiled by Guo Jujing, a Yuan Dynasty (1260-1368) scholar from Fujian Province (see Littlejohn 2010, pp. 139-140).The 13th story of the collection narrates how a man called Guo Ju (郭巨; pinyin: Guō Jù) buried his son alive so that his mother could eat.
Guo Ju was a poor man burdened with a wife, mother, and child. One day he said to his wife: “We are so poor that we cannot even support mother. Furthermore, our son shares mother’s food. Why don’t we bury the child? We can have another child, but if mother dies, we cannot replace her.” The wife did not dare to contradict him. He began to dig the grave for his own son, and suddenly he discovered a vase full of gold in the earth – a gift of Heaven to the filial son (see Lang 1946, pp. 25-26).
The meaning of this tale is clear. When faced with the dilemma of having to choose between one’s parents and one’s children (or wife, for that matter), one always has to choose the parents. This is the hierarchical principle of the superiority of the elder over the younger. It is the duty of children to take care of their parents at all costs, even if that means sacrificing one’s own children.
Food is not only in this story a central theme. In fact, it can be found in many, if not most tales about filiality. The word that summarises this aspect of filial piety is the verb yang (養/养, pinyin: yǎng), which means ‘feed’, or ‘raise’. In Chinese culture, food as a symbol of parental care on the one hand, and of the debt of children towards parents on the other hand, is a constant motif in parents-children relationship. In passing, I would like to point out that these exemplars of filial piety should not be dismissed as old-fashioned stories. They were and are still part of children’s education, both in the Republic of China (Taiwan) and the People’s Republic of China (mainland China), as Beijing’s recently updated edition of the book demonstrates.
There is a misconception that China has become ‘materialistic’ due to her opening up under Deng Xiaoping, and because money is increasingly important. There is a certain truth to this idea, but it is a misunderstanding to think that Western and Chinese ‘materialism’ are exactly the same. Western materialism is the desire to acquire material goods, money and power. This kind of materialism does exist in China, too.
However, in Chinese culture there is another, an ancient tradition of materialism based on the concept of filial piety and on the structure of the Chinese family. This materialistic worldview is completely different from a simply individualistic or hedonistic materialism, because it emanates from the moral and hierarchical Confucian ideal of familial interdependence. The Chinese family was founded on a ‘reciprocal bargain’ (Knapp 2013) between parents and children; parents took care of their children, and children would later give back to their parents. It is no coincidence that many stories about filial piety revolve around the subject of food or money.
In early China, besides expressing love or care, the presentation of food, or by extension material support, creates obligation. If one feeds a man, he is obligated to repay your kindness. This sense of obligation was so strong that it could be used as a means to control others. In the same way, a child is obligated to repay his parents for the food and care they provided him as a helpless child (Knapp 2013).
This aspect is very important. The Chinese preoccupation with money and material well-being is in many cases the consequence of this particular understanding of family relationships that emphasizes the idea of service, of rituals, and of ‘providing for someone’. Family relationships are based on age, gender and role-division, not on mutual understanding, equality or emotional closeness. Every family member has to act according to one’s role, and do certain things according to one’s position and obligations within the family. Parents have to provide for their children, and when children grow up, they have to provide for their parents. Husbands have to provide for their wives, and so on. At least, that was the original concept. Nowadays, this concept has somewhat changed, but it still survives in a more modern form, as I will explain in future posts.
For many Chinese or Taiwanese, love is not expressed with words, and it is not simply a matter of feeling. Love is shown and displayed through material care. Chinese parents and children are not so much interested in sharing their emotions through, for example, hugs or words. Filial piety and parental care are shown by ‘feeding’ someone, ‘providing’ for someone, or performing ritualistic acts. This rule applies to many kinds of familial relationships. If a husband is poor, he cannot show his love, because he lacks the material prerequisites to do so.
Shop
An example of filial behaviour is mourning one’s parents properly, if not lavishly. This was and still is a way to demonstrate one’s own filial piety. In Chinese literature, the act of mourning one’s parents properly is central. Here is a passage from the Ming Dynasty tale The Oil Vendor and the Queen of Flowers:
“Shilao was seriously ill, and soon he died. Zhu Zhong [Shilao’s adoptive son] mourned him as if he had been his own flesh and blood, and buried him according to the appropriate customs and rites, so that the whole neighbourhood praised his moral virtues as a filial son. After carrying out his filial duties, Qin Zhong reopened the oil shop.”
(十老病重，醫治不痊，嗚呼哀哉。朱重捶胸大慟，如親父一般，殯殮成服，七七做了些好事。朱家祖墳在清波門外，朱重舉喪安葬，事事成禮。鄰里皆稱其厚德。事定之後，仍先開店。)
It is important to stress the motif of the neighbours praising Zhu Zhong’s filial devotion. This is a topic that is very common in Chinese culture.The emphasis on filial piety shapes the psychological and social identity of children. They are taught that good children must be filial and obedient, so that they experience a sense of shame if they feel otherwise. Filial piety, as it is inculcated in children and as it is viewed by the society, is a key social indicator of a person’s sense of responsibility, maturity and reliability.
Children who display filial devotion properly are regarded by the whole community as trustworthy, honourable and respectable. Being unfilial, on the contrary, can result not only in sense of shame, but also in bad reputation, and bad reputation in Chinese society, where interpersonal relationships are indispensable, is not just a question of how one is viewed by others, but also of how one is treated. Therefore, having a bad reputation can have negative repercussions on one’s life (see Ikels 2004, pp. 4-6). I’ve heard that in Taiwan, people hire young women who cry loudly for their parents, in order to express publicly their filial care.
The aforementioned motif of food as a demonstration of love is particularly interesting because until today Taiwanese and Chinese parents show that they care about their children by giving them food. They might put pressure on their children every day, they might push them and make their lives unhappy, but they will keep on feeding them as a token of parental love.
In one of his early films, Taiwanese film director Ang Lee used the motif of food in a masterly way. In Eat Drink Man Woman he tells the story of a patriarchal Taiwanese family. The father is one of the most famous cooks in Taipei. Every day he prepares sumptuous meals for his three daughters. They have to eat together because that’s what their father desires. But they barely talk with each other, and behind the curtain of family harmony and love, which are shown through the performance of ritualistic acts such as the common meals, there are problems and contradictions that will come to the surface in the course of the film. The visual emphasis placed on the delicious food cooked by the father is a brilliant symbol of the concept of yang, which at the same time represents love, parental power, and filial obligation.
Another consequence of this understanding of love and care, is that resp
