Filial piety in the context of "Confucius"

Confucianism, also known as Ruism or Ru classicism, is a system of thought and behavior originating in ancient China, and is variously described as a tradition, philosophy, religion, theory of government, or way of life. Founded by Confucius in the Hundred Schools of Thought era (c. 500 BCE), Confucianism integrates philosophy, ethics, and social governance, with a core focus on virtue, social harmony, and familial responsibility.

Confucianism emphasizes virtue through self-cultivation and communal effort. Key virtues include ren (仁, "benevolence"), yi (義; "righteousness"), li (禮; "propriety"), zhi (智; "wisdom"), and xin (信; "sincerity"). These values, deeply tied to the notion of tian (天; "Heaven"), present a worldview where human relationships and social order are manifestations of sacred moral principles. While Confucianism does not emphasize an omnipotent deity, it upholds tian as a transcendent moral order.

Pietas (Classical Latin: [ˈpiɛtaːs]), translated variously as "duty", "religiosity" or "religious behavior", "loyalty", "devotion", or "filial piety" (English "piety" derives from the Latin), was one of the chief virtues among the ancient Romans. It was the distinguishing virtue of the founding hero Aeneas, who is often given the adjectival epithet pius ("religious") throughout Virgil's epic Aeneid. The sacred nature of pietas was embodied by the divine personification Pietas, a goddess often pictured on Roman coins. The Greek equivalent is eusebeia (εὐσέβεια).

Cicero defined pietas as the virtue "which admonishes us to do our duty to our country or our parents or other blood relations." The man who possessed pietas "performed all his duties towards the deity and his fellow human beings fully and in every respect," as the 19th-century classical scholar Georg Wissowa described it. Cicero suggests people should have awareness of their own honor and must always attempt to raise the honor of others with dignified praise. Furthermore, praise, admiration, and honored actions must be beyond all one's own desires, and actions and words must be chosen with respect to friends, colleagues, family, or blood relations. Cicero describes youth in the pursuit of honour: “How they yearn for praise! What labours will they not undertake to stand fast among their peers! How will they remember those who have shown them kindness and how eager to repay it!”

Throughout Chinese history, "Emperor" (Chinese: 皇帝; pinyin: Huángdì) was the superlative title held by the monarchs of imperial China's various dynasties. In traditional Chinese political theory, the emperor was the "Son of Heaven", an autocrat with the divine mandate to rule all under Heaven. Emperors were worshiped posthumously under a secular imperial cult. The lineage of emperors descended from a paternal family line constituted a dynasty, and succession in most cases theoretically followed agnatic primogeniture. The emperor of China was an absolute monarch, though in the late Qing reforms plans were made to move the emperor to a constitutional monarch.

During the Han dynasty, Confucianism gained sanction as the official political theory. The absolute authority of the emperor came with a variety of governing duties and moral obligations; failure to uphold these was thought to remove the dynasty's Mandate of Heaven and to justify its overthrow. In practice, emperors sometimes avoided the strict rules of succession and dynasties' purported "failures" were detailed in official histories written by their successful replacements or even later dynasties. The power of the emperor was also limited by the imperial bureaucracy, which was staffed by scholar-officials, and eunuchs during some dynasties. An emperor was also constrained by filial obligations to his ancestors' policies and dynastic traditions, such as those first detailed in the Ming-era Huang-Ming Zuxun (Ancestral Instructions).

The veneration of the dead, including one's ancestors, is based on love and respect for the deceased. In some cultures, it is related to beliefs that the dead have a continued existence, and may possess the ability to influence the fortune of the living. Some groups venerate their direct, familial ancestors. Certain religious groups, in particular the Eastern Orthodox Churches, Anglican Church, and Catholic Church venerate saints as intercessors with God; the latter also believes in prayer for departed souls in Purgatory. Other religious groups, consider veneration of the dead to be idolatry and a sin.

In European, Asian, Oceanian, African and Afro-diasporic cultures (which includes but should be distinguished from multiple cultures and Indigenous populations in the Americas who were never influenced by the African Diaspora), the goal of ancestor veneration is to ensure the ancestors' continued well-being and positive disposition towards the living, and sometimes to ask for special favours or assistance. The social or non-religious function of ancestor veneration is to cultivate kinship values, such as filial piety, family loyalty, and continuity of the family lineage. Ancestor veneration occurs in societies with every degree of social, political, and technological complexity, and it remains an important component of various religious practices in modern times.

Mores (/ˈmɔːreɪz/, sometimes /ˈmɔːriːz/; from Latin mōrēs [ˈmoːreːs], plural form of singular mōs, meaning "manner, custom, usage, or habit") are social norms that are widely observed within a particular society or culture. Mores determine what is considered morally acceptable or unacceptable within any given culture. A folkway is what is created through interaction and that process is what organizes interactions through routine, repetition, habit and consistency.

William Graham Sumner (1840–1910), an early U.S. sociologist, introduced both the terms "mores" (1898)and "folkways" (1906) into modern sociology.