Neo-Confucianism

Neo-Confucianism is the revival of Confucian thought in Song and Ming China that joined ethics to a metaphysics of principle (li) and vital energy (qi).

It began in the eleventh century with Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai and the brothers Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, and was systematised by Zhu Xi. Wang Yangming later taught that the mind itself is principle and that knowing and acting are one, and Wang Fuzhi stressed qi. In the twentieth century the New Confucians Xiong Shili, Feng Youlan and Mou Zongsan restated it in dialogue with Western philosophy. It also shaped Korea and Japan. On this site it answers questions on substance, universals, laws of nature and moral knowledge (3.1.3).