Concept of Heaven (c. 1045 B.C.)

During the mid-Zhou dynasty, the idea of Tian or Heaven developed as a way to explain the Zhou dynasty's victory over the Shang. Tian was considered to be an abstract idea of the cosmos that brought peace and justice to humanity through the king, who was the only one able to communicate directly to Heaven. The idea of Heaven entering into Chinese culture signified the rise of rationalism in Chinese society, as opposed to the arbitrary rule of the earlier Shang high god.

The concept of Heaven legitimated the Zhou's overthrow of the Shang because Heaven was punishing the corrupt last Shang king. At the same time, the Zhou kings needed Heaven's approval to rule the land because Heaven rewarded the moral and virtuous. Kings would tell their officials to be just because Tian would become displeased. However, over time, the idea of Tian as the king's High God would also change to include the idea of Tian as the adversary of the polity, especially during times of disaster and suffering. This amoral version of Heaven would be close to the idea of fate in the West. The Confucians would later incorporate the idea of Tian as the basis of ritual practice, once again shifting it away from an amoral, abstract conception, and back to an ethical imagination of Heaven. (Michelle Louie)

Robert Eno, The Confucian Creation of Heaven (New York: State University of New York Press, 1990), 23-29.

Frederick W. Mote, Intellectual Foundations of China (New York: Aldred A. Knopf, 1971).

Patricia Buckley Ebrey, Cambridge Illustrated History of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).

Mandate of Heaven (c.1045 B.C.)

The Mandate of Heaven (Tian ming) is the belief that the kings and emperors of China have been chosen to rule through the will of the supreme deity Heaven. The king remains in power only so long as he governs with virtue and, in this way, retains Heaven's favor. A recurring narrative can be discerned in the history of kingship in China . The king at the beginning of every dynasty is thought to be most virtuous but as the succession passes through multiple generations, great-grandsons become less honorable, and thus less worthy, indulging themselves in alcohol-fueled excess and sexual affairs.

When a ruler manages to lose the Mandate of Heaven, the dynasty falls into chaos, resulting in both socio-political and natural disasters. The longer the period of misrule lasts, the more horrific are the disasters, ranging from comets and floods, to the eventual overthrow of the ruler by the people. Of course, this concept of the mandate was often used as an ideological justification, a way of legitimating dynastic conquest. The concept of the Mandate of Heaven was crucial to the Zhou justification in their conquest of the Shang. (Darrah Haffner)

Patricia Buckley Ebrey, The Cambridge Illustrated History of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 30-32.

Brian Hook, ed., The Cambridge Encyclopedia of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 303.

Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe, The Cambridge History of China , vol. 1, The Ch'in and Han Empires, 221 B.C.-A.D. 220 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 223-4, 259-62.

Last modified: October 23, 2004