Editing Han Yu (section)

== Thoughts and beliefs ==
Although generally not considered a philosopher,<ref name=cua>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yTv_AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA288 |title=Encyclopedia of Chinese Philosophy|date=5 November 2013|editor= Antonio S. Cua|pages=288&ndash;291 |isbn=978-0-415-93913-3 |publisher=Routledge }}</ref>  Han Yu was an important Confucian intellectual who influenced later generations of Confucian thinkers and Confucian philosophy. He also sponsored many literary figures of the turn of the ninth century. He led a revolt against ''[[pianwen]]'' ({{lang|zh|駢文}}), a formal, richly ornamented literary style, advocating a return to a classical, simple, logical, and exact style.<ref name="barnstone">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aoH11JVHs4AC&pg=PA158 |title=The Anchor Book of Chinese Poetry: From Ancient to Contemporary, The Full 3000-Year Tradition |editor= by Tony Barnstone, Chou Pin |pages=157–158 |publisher=Anchor |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-385-72198-1 }}</ref> He felt that this classical style of writing—called ''guwen'' ({{lang|zh|古文}}), literally, "ancient writing"—would be appropriate for the restoration of Confucianism.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=626CZk84adAC&pg=PA8 |title=The End of the Chinese 'Middle Ages': Essays in Mid-Tang Literary Culture |author= Stephen Owen |page=8 |publisher=Stanford University Press|year= 1996 |isbn= 978-0-8047-2667-2 }}</ref>

Han Yu promoted Confucianism but was also deeply opposed to Buddhism, a religion that was then popular at the Tang court. In 819, he sent a letter, "Memorial on Bone-relics of the Buddha", to the emperor in which he denounced "the elaborate preparations being made by the state to receive the Buddha's fingerbone, which he called 'a filthy object' and which he said should be 'handed over to the proper officials for destruction by water and fire to eradicate forever its origin'.<ref name="liu"/>  Han Yu contrasted the Chinese civilization and barbarism where people were "like birds and wild beast or like the barbarians".  He considered Buddhism to be of [[Four Barbarians|barbarian]] ({{lang|zh|夷狄}}) origin, therefore an unsuitable religion for the Chinese people.<ref name="abramson">{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=-GLGnRspmcAC&pg=PA65 |title=Ethnic Identity in Tang China |author= Marc S. Abramson |pages=65–68 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |year= 2007 |isbn= 978-0-8122-4052-8 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/texts/hanyu.html |title=Chinese Cultural Studies: Han Yu - Memorial on Buddhism (819 CE) |access-date=2013-12-12 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130514043957/http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/texts/hanyu.html |archive-date=2013-05-14 }}</ref>

Again from Han Yu's letter, "Memorial on Bone-relics of the Buddha": 

"Your servant begs leave to say that Buddhism is no more than a cult of the barbarian peoples which
spread to China. It did not exist here in ancient times.
Now I hear that Your Majesty has ordered the community of monks to go to greet the finger bone of the
Buddha [a relic from India], and that Your Majesty will ascend a tower to watch the procession as this
relic is brought into the palace. [...]
The Buddha was a man of the barbarians who did not speak Chinese and who wore clothes of a different
fashion. The Buddha’s sayings contain nothing about our ancient kings and the Buddha’s manner of
dress did not conform to our laws; he understood neither the duties that bind sovereign and subject,
not the affections of father and son. If the Buddha were still alive today and came to our court, Your
Majesty might condescend to receive him, but he would then be escorted to the borders of the nation,
dismissed, and not allowed to delude the masses. How then, when he has long been dead, could the
Buddha’s rotten bones, the foul and unlucky remains of his body, be rightly admitted to the palace?
Confucius said: “Respect ghosts and spirits, but keep them at a distance!” Your servant is deeply
ashamed and begs that this bone from the Buddha be given to the proper authorities to be cast into fire
and water, that this evil be rooted out, and later generations spared this delusion."

Han Yu was also critical of [[Taoism]], which he considered to be a harmful accretion to Chinese culture. He nevertheless made the distinction between Taoism, a homegrown religion, and Buddhism, a foreign faith.<ref name="abramson"/> In "The Origin of Dao" (原道, ''Yuandao''), he argued that the monasticism of both Buddhism and Taoism to be economically nonproductive, creating economic and social dislocation. He also criticized both of these beliefs for being unable to deal with social problems.<ref name="cawley">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2UAlDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA274 |title=Encyclopedia of Chinese History |editor= Michael Dillon |author=Kevin Cawley |date=December 2016 |pages=273–274 |publisher= Taylor & Francis Ltd|isbn= 978-1-317-81716-1}}</ref> He considered Confucianism to be distinct from these two beliefs in linking the private, moral life of the individual with the public welfare of the state.  He emphasized [[Mencius]]'s method of assuring public morality and social order,<ref name="cawley"/> and his concept of the expression of Confucian spirituality through political action would later form the intellectual basis for neo-Confucianism.<ref name="de bary">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IYh9-Yl3cTkC&pg=PA301 |title= Sources of East Asian Tradition: Premodern Asia, Volume 1 |author = William Theodore De Bary |pages=301–305 |publisher=Columbia University Press |year= 2008|isbn= 978-0-231-14305-9 }}| Here "Origin of Dao" is translated as "Essentials of the Moral Way"</ref>  Han introduced the ideas of the succession of the Way (道統, ''daotong''), as well as the concept of the "teacher" (師, ''shi'') who embodies the Way as expressed in "Discourse on Teachers" (師說, ''Shishuo'').<ref name=cua /><ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iKjsm-JUbD0C&pg=PA38 |title=Confucian Ethics in Retrospect and Prospect |editor1= Qingsong Shen |editor2=Kwong-loi Shun |isbn=978-1-56518-245-5 |series=Cultural Heritage and Contemporary Change Series III Volume 27|year=2008 }}</ref> Although Han Yu attacked Buddhism and Taoism, some of his ideas have Buddhist and/or Taoist roots; for example, the succession of the Way was inspired by the Buddhist idea of transmission of the ''[[dharma]]'', while his concept of the "teacher" originated from the Buddhist and Taoist idea of religious mentor.<ref name=cua />

In his "Discourse on Teachers" (師說, ''Shishuo''), Han Yu discussed the necessity and principles of learning from teachers, and criticized the phenomenon of "shame to learn from the teacher" in the society at that time.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Liu|first=Qingwen|title=Prose Appreciation – Eight Masters of the Tang and Song|publisher=Beijing Education Publishing House|year=2013|page=19|translator-last=Han}}</ref> He stated that "a disciple need not be necessarily inferior to the teacher, [while] the teacher need not be necessarily more virtuous than the disciple. The only fact is that [one may] acquire ''Dao'' earlier or later [than the others], [and there may be] specific field that one specialized in."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lee Ming Zhi|first=Thomas|date=2017|title=Title: A Translation of the Shi Shuo (Discourse on Teacher) by Hanyu |website=Academia |url=https://www.academia.edu/35903850}} Original text: 圣人无常师。孔子师郯子（tán）、苌弘、师襄、老聃（dān）。郯子之徒，其贤不及孔子。孔子曰：三人行，则必有我师。是故弟子不必不如师，师不必贤于弟子，闻道有先后，术业有专攻，如是而已</ref>