rebellion and virtuous bandits, The Water Margin is essentially a story about the expression of Confucian virtues. Despite the brutality and the violence on the surface of the story, the inherent values of Confucianism lend gravity and meaning to the story that remains one of the most beloved of the Four Classic Novels of Chinese literature some 650 years after its first publication. Even today, despite the best efforts of the radicalism of the Chinese intellectual revolutions of the 20th Century, these themes still ring at the core of the Chinese system of values.
At its core, the Confucian socio-political order is an ethical system based on a framework of reciprocal moral obligations and the observance of core values, based on the foundation works of Confucius (551–479 BCE) and Mencius (372–289 BCE). By the time of the Song Dynasty, through a syncretic adsorption of metaphysical concepts derived from Buddhism, Taoism, and folk beliefs, Confucianism had developed into an all encompassing ethical and moral system which emphasized social order and the role of the individual as a part of a greater social and cosmological whole. The individual’s role in the Confucian system was however, critical to the greater social whole and the Confucian system was based on an internalized individual self-regulation, rather than a system of external regulation such as a binding legal system. In the Confucian socio-political system, the individual was required to cultivate and regulate “the self,” ethically and morally through the observation of the virtues of benevolence, righteousness, propriety (eg ritual or etiquette), loyalty, wisdom, trust, and filial piety. The Confucian socio-political system was grounded in the Five Cardinal Relations, that is the key relationships between the ruler and minister; father and son; husband and wife; brother and brother; friend and friend. Socio-political order could only be brought about by the act of the individual actively cultivating these cardinal virtues and acting ethically and morally within the framework of the Five Cardinal Relations. Therefore through self-regulation, in accordance with Confucian values, socio-political order would radiate and diffuse outwards into the complex web of interpersonal relationships of society. It would begin with self-regulation then extend into the family and then outwards still between members of society, through the rigid strata of society between the ordinary people and the scholarly civil service (who were selected by merit on their knowledge and interpretation of the Confucian canon) and ultimately through to the Emperor himself. It was a system of socio-political order that was not only based upon the family, but moreover, it was a social-political system that was an extension of the family. This was not however, a one way flow of obligation. Harmony in society could only be obtained by the mutual and correct conduct of reciprocal obligations by all members of society. As in a family, the Emperor and the ruling elite of the Confucian scholars were expected to demonstrate, instruct, and exemplify Confucian virtue. Indeed above all others, the Emperor and his ministers were expected to be the paragons of Confucian virtue and behavior.
In a socio-political order based on the web of mutual expectations and reciprocal obligations, the political implications of this system are quite clear. While society was obliged to demonstrate loyalty and maintain a subservient, filial position to higher authority as in a familial structure, just as critically, there was an expectation that the Emperor and his ministers would rule in accordance with the Confucian virtues of benevolence, righteousness, wisdom, propriety and trustworthiness. In the Confucian socio-political order, the failure or the absence of ethical and moral example from the Emperor and ministers resulted in a systemic discord throughout society, leading to a breakdown of not only ethical and moral values, but of ethical and moral behavior, leading to civil and social disorder. It was in effect, a loss of the Mandate of Heaven.
The concept of the “Mandate of Heaven” is one of the oldest of political concepts and it was developed during the Shang (1600–1046 BCE) and the Zhou Dynasties (1045–256 BCE). The Mandate of Heaven was the legitimization theory of rule which determined that political legitimacy of the King (and later Emperor) was derived from the approval of “Heaven.” Accordingly, the King, or the “Son of Heaven” (Tian Zi), was charged by Heaven to rule “All Under Heaven” (Tianxia) and to care for the people. Conversely, if this socio-political contract was not fulfilled; if the King did not rule wisely or care for the people, Heaven would indicate the loss of the Mandate of Heaven through signs and portents such as natural disasters (such disasters as floods from neglected levee banks, famine from failed crops and the absence of famine relief, may be interpreted in the modern day as the results of the neglect of public infrastructure and administration). Just as importantly the loss of the Mandate of Heaven would also be demonstrated by the loss of the approval and support for the King from the ordinary people. It was Mencius, the “second sage” of Confucianism, who consolidated much of the pre-Confucian and early Confucian thought and articulated the concept of the Mandate of Heaven in Confucian terms which would persist to the present day. In articulating the Mandate of Heaven in Confucian terms “Heaven sees as the people see, Heaven hears as the people hear,”10 Mencius entrenched the concept of “the right to rebellion” within the Confucian socio-political framework. Therefore, the failure or the absence of Confucian virtues from the King or the Emperor would ultimately lead to socio-political chaos, with a systemic failure of society and order. Consequently these human indications, along with the signs and portents directly from Heaven itself, would point to the loss of the Mandate of Heaven, and signal the right of the people to rebel and install a new leader chosen by the people and approved by Heaven.
It is here in this reciprocity of the Confucian socio-political order and the loss of the Mandate of Heaven that lies at the core of The Water Margin story. In The Water Margin we see the breadth of these Confucian virtues laid out for our heroes to display, and the lack of those virtues in our villains and wider Song society. Just as the villainous ministers, corrupt officials and the cruel and uncaring society demonstrate the loss of Confucian virtue, The Water Margin portrays the bandits of Liangshan Marsh as rebels within the Confucian political framework. The Liangshan bandits are loyal, virtuous, righteous and benevolent rebels, committing their crimes and sometimes atrocities against the unjust (and paradoxically, many innocent bystanders) in the name of loyalty to the Song Emperor and the Song state. Similarly, there also the bandits who commit crimes of astonishing barbarity and brutality in the name of Confucian virtues such as filial piety, loyalty, and righteousness against adulterous women and their lovers and against those who have exploited or harmed the innocent. Their acts of violence, their atrocities, and even acts of sadism are carried out on the unjust and unvirtuous as acts of virtue, righteousness, and loyalty in themselves, without any sense of contradiction.
While the Liangshan heroes serve to illustrate uncompromising expressions of Confucian virtue, the fates of the victims of their “crimes of virtue” serve to illustrate the consequences of when even the most virtuous behaviors are taken to the extreme. The most obvious examples of this form of “extremist Confucian virtue” are clearly found in the fates of the adulterous women, Yan Poxi, Pan Qiaoyun, and Madame Lu. Each are not only murdered in the name of Confucian virtue, but they are also subjected to the most barbarous and brutal of treatment, including disembowelment and dismemberment (and in one instance, being literally torn apart by bare hands). Likewise, the inherent barbarism of extremist Confucian virtue can also be found in the form of officially state sanctioned punishment. The associated stories of the corrupt and unvirtuous, while serving a purpose of highlighting the Confucian virtue of the heroes, also provide a glimpse of the drudgery and misery of life in a society of a dynasty in decline.11 We see women such as Yan Poxi forced by poverty to act as mistresses for rich men, while other people such as Old Jin and his daughter are mercilessly exploited by bullies such as the Butcher Zheng.12 In the notionally virtuous Confucian state with a meritocratic civil service, we find the unvirtuous promoted to the highest offices in the state, such as Prime Minister Cai Jing, while the worthless are likewise promoted to high office through flattery and patronage, such as the idler Gao Qiu, whose only skill is his ability to impress the Crown Prince (and later Emperor) at football.13 We find that a lack of virtue is systemic throughout the corrupt state and government, with almost every level of senior and minor civil servants,
