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oa Confucian Modernity, Ultimacies, and Transcendence
- Amsterdam University Press
- Source: NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion, Volume 75, Issue 3/4, Sep 2021, p. 397 - 428
Abstract
I want to engage Taylor with a comparative Confucian vision of modernity. In order to do this, I need to present a metaphysics which can serve as a framework for comparisons necessary for a global philosophical historical perspective on modernity and transcendence and in which, in particular, I can represent both Christian and Confucian categories as alternative specifications of ultimate reality. Using non-personalistic metaphors of spontaneous emergence and stressing (dis)harmonies, Confucian philosophy gives its own specification of the ultimate conditions of human life. This will allow me to sketch how Confucian modernists might engage with modernity. I will thus defend in Confucian terms Taylor’s claim that genuine religious transcendence is possible within the conditions of modernity.