The Duke of Zhou
The Duke of Zhou, 周公, Zhōu Gōng (early Zhou dynasty, around 1000 BCE) is known in China as the benchmark of Confucian integrity.
Zhōu Gōng (Duke of Zhou), a member of the royal family of the early Zhou dynasty played a major role in consolidating the kingdom established by his elder brother King Wu who died young leaving a minor son with him as regent. Amid both internal and external attacks including challenges for power from family and scattered local warlords of the Shang Dynasty, he solidified the dynasty and established formal procedures for social order. At the nephew’s majority he turned the whole thing over to him. He is also know for establishing the principle of The Mandate of Heaven — Heaven “allows a person to rule ” when they meet the standards of Heaven which was later developed by in more depth by Confucius..
Calligraphy gives you a “graphic feeling” about how the artist feels about what they are drawing. Artistic appreciationy does not require one have to know what the characters mean. You my have your own emotional response such as you might have to an oil painting.or pencil drawing and compare to the “literal meaning” to see if they are similar or different.
周公之禮— Calligraphy for The Rites of Zhou by Janney—calligraphy of words-“周公之禮or 周禮”（Zhou Gong Zhi Li or Zhou Li)
The Rites of Zhou are a formal set of written rules for behavior established, organized and enforced. which dealt with most aspects of behavour in society. .One of the Rites stated people refrain from sex until married. The influence of this rite can still be seen in contemporary times when a couple is married their parents and grandparents congratulate them saying :”you will have ‘周公之禮‘ tonight”. On other hand, parents will tell all who attend the marriage, the couple were virgins and they set a good example for the community.
The Rites of Zhou were known in Japan and Korea, below a cover of a very old Korean copy of the book.
Alameda Creek
A news television broadcast presented a documentary which included a woman from a “third world country” excluded from the economic benefits of a society which was destroying the traditional way of life for her village as it increased the quality of life for the increasingly encroaching urban neighbors.
She could not read or write and probably did not have an “educated vocabulary” to express herself. Yet, she owned and could use a camera phone and had photographs which she used to show the history of her village and her family.
The photographs were “snapshots” by which I mean they were made spur of the moment with little regard for professional considerations. Without being able to read or write she presented a documented history acceptable as more accurate than many “written histories” from Greek or Roman times or even from much of the history of the United States or the world in general —all histories which even from “primary sources” have undergone diverse interpretations.
The nagging element, for me, concerning electronic world ,is that makes civilization dependent on electricity which at this time has to be produced by people..
Most of us can see written letters and marks in daylight.We do not have to create the light its here naturally. A note, early forms of of written human expression such as most cave paintings were made in cave, where there is no natural light.Maybe the intention was to keep them hidden.
The light bulb enabled people to read and write without the sun but still its not enough, electricity still needs to be generated to run the light bulb while the sun is there everyday, no on/off switch, no electrical bill—we just have to make it through the night.
Engineered energy, produced by humans, generates electricity in a usable form but its not always there. It requires mechanization such as a dam, windmill, etc. that will interact with nature, such as wind or water, when nature is behaving appropriately,
.Donovon sang about love, “Ah but I may as well try to catch the wind.”
Natural forms of energy, such as the sun, water and wind are always there unless a major catastrophe occurs but they are not always accessible to people when needed. At this time electricity is not accessible in nature to human beings like air, water or wind.
We can use “natural energy” to do most everything but not always when we need it and a much as we need.If we have access to electricity we can use it whenever we need it, as long its being produced by people. Still the more people use electricity the more timely it needs to be generated closer and closer to the time of use. Rolling black outs in times of heat are such a disconnect between electricity generation and human use.
We do not have the capability to store electricity for durations later needed for human use.
With a gasoline powered car, you can buy $32.58 worth of gas, you can drive home, park the car over night and when you use it tomorrow its got the same amount of gas in it as when you turned the engine off. I can buy some batteries, store them in a closet and when I got o use one it has less power than when I bought it. When you do not use an automobile for an extended period of time, the battery may not start the car. Is human dependency on electricity
The global economy may well answer that question. Through history access to energy has been a foremost driver of the best and worst of human behavour. With electricity becoming the common form of energy the world is increasingly becoming the same. On TV you can get news with images from all over the world— floods in Japan, earthquakes in Iran—and with each video coverage we see overweight people on the street, everywhere traffic signs in English, Toyota trucks and white plastic lawn chairs. As people’s lives become increasingly organized around electricity their behavour increasingly approaches similar and same.
EndPapers
Is there such thing as a “Real History?” and does it have meaning for the present ? Do past effect the present regardless of what people think? Or does it only matter what people “believe” what happened.
The previously mentioned woman who could not read or write and probably did not have an “educated vocabulary” to express herself.had , her photographs which she used to show the history of her village and her family.
Without being able to read or write she presented a documented history acceptable as more accurate than many “written histories” from Greek or Roman times or or even from much of the history of the United States. or the world. Call it “The Civil War” or “The Southern Insurrection” tells us even with something that happened 1 1/2 centuries ago there are contrary and contradictory stories taught as“ Real History,” much less the stories about January 6, 2021, only six months ago—still interesting in the case of the latter one side refuses to accept the “the reality of the visual images.” which are accepted as “reality” by courts of law.
Is there a “Real History” a set of facts which describes the events? If so does “Real History” determine or influence the present or is the present only determined by what people“ believe” it is regardless of what “really happened?” Can we look at today and understand what happen in the past without knowing a “written history?”
We all have different life experiences, though most differences are of quantity and not quality.
After all every person’s experience, not just in the present but even through history, is unique. How is it that we even come to speak the same language?
Our life is experiencing the world through our biological senses and through Reason. Its easy to understand our sensual experiences; we see, hear, touch, smell and taste and we all share the same basic biological capabilities.
But Reason is another thing— it can only activate after our senses experience. We do not “know by Reason ” until after we experience.
if we experience the same set of things resulting in more common experiences of life for more individuals the more likely people are to have a common view of “reality” and the electronical world is spreading a commonness around the Globe merging us into one culture with no place to hide.
Look all over the world, television and DVDs, tall buildings, automobiles, clothing styles, FaceBook and Amazon, drugs, suits, —these were not common experiences of peoples of the world in the past No matter how fast society moves, increasingly the world becomes more of the same things and people want more of the same things— style unites with supply and demand.? Is it a natural condition of humans that they want what others have? Or maybe people just naturally want things and its just coincidence that the things they want are the things other people have.
A monk asked, “What is the proper way?”
Fay-en answered; “The first thing is to practice. The second thing is to practice.”
The Mind of Chinese Ch’an The Chan School Masters and Their Kung-Ans Yi Wu
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