Researchers compile complete works of Confucianism

More than 400 years ago, two eminent Confucian scholars Sun Yuhou from Central China's Hunan province and Cao Xuequan from East China's Fujian province lamented that the country did not have the complete works of Confucianism.

"Buddhists and Taoists have their complete works, but Confucianists have yet to have their own," said Cao, who feared that some works of Confucianism would become forgotten if they were not collected and compiled.

Confucianism, named after the Chinese philosopher, is one of the three major components of Chinese culture, together with Buddhism and Taoism.

In the late Ming Dynasty (13681644), when the country's economy went from bad toworse, the imperial authorities could not realize Sun's and Cao's hopes for a complete compilation of Confucian works.

But now, after more than a decade's work, researchers of the Institute of Ancient Books at Sichuan University in Sichuan province, have compiled Ru Zang, which literally means "Treasure of Confucianism". It is the complete works of Confucianism.

"The complete works will comprise 600 books with 350 million Chinese characters. Of those, 274 books have been published and the rest will come off the press by 2017," said Shu Dagang, president of the institute and editor-in-chief of Ru Zang.

In 1997, the institute decided to compile Ru Zang. With an initial sum of 3 million yuan ($490,000) from the China Confucius Foundation in Shandong, the home province of Confucius, it started compiling Ru Zang in 2004.

The institute has since received a total of 6 million yuan from the foundation.

"The 600 books have collected the major achievements of Confucianism, from Confucius (551BC479BC) to the late Qing Dynasty (16441911).They consist of three parts; the classics, theories and history of Confucianism," Shu said.

The classics include famous works such as the Book of Changes, Book of Songs, Book of Rites, and Spring and Autumn Annals. Theories touch upon Confucianism, politics and ethics. The history section covers the biography of some 10,000 Confucianists, descriptions of different schools of Confucianism, Confucian schools and the national imperial examination.

"China is now in a new period of cultural construction. Ru Zang is the fruit of that construction and the most important landmark of cultural rejuvenation after nearly a century of criticism and vilification of Confucianism," said Professor Wu Guang of the School of Humanities at Zhejiang University.

Confucianism boasts a history of more than 2,500 years. Emperors of most feudal dynasties treated it as the cornerstone and guidance of traditional Chinese culture.

But Confucianism witnessed a sharp decline early last century. Under the banner of science and democracy, the New Culture Movement in 1919 attacked the feudal system, including its core ideological system of Confucianism.

"The New Culture intellectuals blamed Confucianism for the country's decline and tried to emulate the West to find new doctrines that could replace Confucian teachings to rejuvenate the Chinese nation," said Yin Bo, a researcher with the Institute of Ancient Books at Sichuan University.

Against that backdrop, compiling Ru Zang did not mean simply collecting ancient books. Researchers had to correct the mistakes they found in the works, Yin said.

Sichuan University is known for its focus on traditional culture. Its two predecessors, the Jinjiang Academy of Classical Learning, established in 1704, and the Zunjing Academy of Classical Learning, established in 1875, focused on researching the Confucian classics, Chinese history and literature.

Since the Institute of Ancient Books was set up in 1983, it has compiled many literature and large-scale reference books. These include the eight-volume Dictionary of Chinese Characters and Complete Works of Literati in the Song Dynasty (9601279), which consists of 360 books and contain 100 million Chinese characters. It is considered to be the country's largest collection of Chinese literati works.