A Comparative Study Of Filial Piety In Chinese And Western Family Moral Education

There are a lot of differences between Chinese culture and western culture. Today, withthe world cultural exchanges are becoming increasingly frequent, it is quite important to studythe cultural differences. The views of filial piety, which are also exchanging between Chineseculture and western culture, hold an important status in cultural differences. Filial piety is thecore of Chinese traditional ethics, and as an old saying goes,“Among all the good deeds, filialpiety comes first.” It plays an irreplaceable role in Chinese traditional civilization.Most of Chinese children are quite obedient to their parents. While in western countries,the relationship between parents and their children are often equal, sometimes they even canbe good friends. This kind of relationship seems to be unbelievable to Chinese. The twodifferent relationships among family members have caused a great attention from manysocialists.At the very first of this essay, the writer defines the core definition of filial piety, whichis “be good to parents”, that means children should not only raise their parent, but also honorthem. Honor includes two aspects, to worship ancestors and to care parents. The westernviews of filial piety have different manifestation, in western counties, the people honor theirparents more. And the filial piety culture there has more religious meaning than socialmeaning. Why there are two kinds of views of filial piety? There are many reasons. First of all,it is the cultural aspect. Since ancient times, the Chinese people admire etiquette, which isrecognized as the sign and also the important symbol of Chinese culture. While the westernpeople admire power, which meanings force, intelligence and knowledge, etc.. Second, it isthe differences of the natural and social aspects. Ancient China was agricultural society, theknowledge of how to farm needs to be passed from one generation to another. During thisprocess, people have to honor the elders and care the children. But the western countries werecommercial countries. The tradesman paid more attention on the gains and profits. Socompared to Chinese people, the westerners are more like freedom and personality. As a result,in western cultural system, the filial piety is barely mentioned.As the development of times, Chinese culture and western culture crashed regularly. Atthe background of globalization, China and the western should learn the view of filial piety from each other. For example, the westerners could learn to honor and care elders likeChinese, while the Chinese elders and the young could get along with each other in a moreindependent and equal way like the westerners. In this way, the two kinds of views of filialpiety could mutually improve and promote the joint development.