She wrote that Confucianism, “although characterized as a system of social and ethical philosophy, is in reality a system built on an ancient religious foundation to establish social values, institutions, and transcendent ideals of traditional Chinese society,” that is, a system that modern scholars would call a “civil religion.”
The founder of Confucianism, Master Kung Fu-Tzu, known in western society as Confucius and named Chiu Chung-Ni by his parents, was born in the state of Ku, which is known today as Shandong province. He lived between 551 B.C. and 479 B.C. During his lifetime, Confucius was a teacher of history, a low and high-level public official and, in his later life, wandered for 12 years with a few of his disciples from place to place. Confucius described his own lifetime, as recorded in the Analects, 2:4:
“At fifteen I set my heart on learning. At thirty, I was firmly established. At forty, I had no more doubts. At fifty, I knew the will of heaven. At sixty, I was ready to listen to it. At seventy, I could follow my heart’s desire without transgressing what was