Editing Great Learning (section)

==The ''Great Learning'' and education in China==
The ''Great Learning'' as we know it today is the result of multiple revisions and commentaries by a number of Confucian and Neo-Confucian scholars. The ''Great Learning'', along with the ''[[Doctrine of the Mean]]'' had their beginnings as chapters within the ''Book of Rites''. Both were removed from the ''Book of Rites'' and designated as separate, and equally significant, works by Zhu Xi. In the winter of 1190 CE Zhu Xi published the Four Masters, a collection of the ''Great Learning'', ''Doctrine of the Mean'', the ''Mencius'' and the ''Analects''.<ref name="Gardner, Principle and Pedagogy">Gardner, Daniel K. "Principle and Pedagogy: Chu Hsi and The Four Books." ''Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies'', Vol. 44, No. 1 (Jun., 1984): 57–81.</ref> These four texts soon became the initial basis of study in the [[Imperial examination|Chinese imperial examination system]]. Zhu Xi was prompted to refine the ''Great Learning'' and incorporate it into the curriculum as he felt that the previously utilized Classics were lengthy and too difficult to comprehend by the common individual to be used as an educational foundation for Confucian thought.<ref name="Gardner, Principle and Pedagogy"/> Utilizing the much shorter and more comprehensible Four Books would allow Zhu to reach a much greater audience.<ref name="Gardner, Principle and Pedagogy"/> To aid in comprehension of the ''Great Learning'', he spent much of his life studying the book and published a series of commentaries explaining the principal teachings of the text. The ''Daxue'' itself gets its name from {{zhi|p=dàrén zhī xué|c=大人之學}}, referring to the education of adults. Unlike many scholars before him, Zhu Xi presents the ''Great Learning'' as the way of self cultivation and governance that is to be studied by all people, not only those in, or seeking, political office.<ref>Gardner, Daniel K. "Confucian Commentary and Chinese Intellectual History." The ''Journal of Asian Studies'', Vol. 57, No. 2 (May, 1998): 397–422</ref>
{{anchor|Impact on the education in China}}