Confucius Temple and Imperial College 孔庙和国子监
国子监街13– 15号
Part of A Better Guide to Běijīng’s coverage of North and East of the Imperial City
As a former Assistant Imperial Tutor put it:
‘Emperors have gone. Republican Generals come and go, but our Chinese people rise and fall according to how far we continue to live by the good sense and reasoned behaviour taught by the Sage. Now, as you, Hsienshêng [Xiānshēng — Sir], can see, we are falling headlong into plain barbarity. When you reach his temple you will probably find only herons for company.’
John Blofeld, City of Lingering Splendor, London, 1961
The herons are gone — although other birds inhabit the ancient trees — but it’s true that visitors to the Confucius Temple are few, and the site is generally peaceful and quiet.
The temple is about 60m down Guózǐ Jiàn Jiē (Imperial College Street), a turning off Yōnghé Gōng Dàjiē almost opposite the entrance to the Lama Temple. This street contains three of Běijīng’s few surviving páilou (arches commemorating individuals who demonstrated Confucian values).
A thorough pre-Olympic renovation repaired and rebuilt the Imperial College and reconnected it to the neighbouring Confucius Temple. From the Mongol Yuán dynasty onwards, it was the focal point of an academic system based on the classics. First built in 1306, the college honoured teachers and texts as well as providing state-sponsored instruction. A magnificent glazed archway dates from around 1784, and Qiánlóng’s calligraphy front and back encourages students to study hard.
The main sight is a wonderful central hall called the Bìyōng Gōng, or Hall of Classics, rebuilt in the Qīng. It’s a square, yellow-tiled two-storey pavilion with finely carved and perforated wooden screens and a deep verandah. It’s reached by bridges over a circular moat at each of the four compass points. Here the emperors would come in the second month of each year to expound the classics to the students.
Until recently the site was also a functioning library, and the quiet courtyards were dotted with modern students, all now driven away. The side halls have been given modern interiors ready for exhibitions still incomplete when last seen.
The rear building is the Hall of Sacrifice for Ethics, a stack room during the Yuán dynasty. The emperor sat here before the Hall of Classics was built.
The Confucius Temple is through an arch to the right as you enter the Imperial College from the street, or you may enter it directly. Around the first courtyard stand 198 stelae bearing the names of all those who passed the highest level triennial civil service exam. Altogether the stelae carry 51,624 names, places of origin, and position numbers, from the Yuán, Míng, and Qīng dynasties. The Yuán, like the later Qīng, learned that to conquer China on horseback was one thing, but the country could not be governed without using Chinese administrative skills. It was a Mongol not a Chinese emperor who in 1307 conferred on Confucius the title ‘Sage of Great Accomplishment’, the highest title he was ever awarded (although Confucius — 551–479 BCE — had already been dead for nearly 1800 years). Once every community from the size of county town upward had a temple to Confucius, but only that at Qǔfǔ in Shāndōng Province, Confucius’ birthplace, is larger and more magnificent than this.
It was also the Mongols who built the original temple in around 1302, but the stelae listing the graduates of their day were removed and buried by the Míng, who probably considered that examinations held under barbarian rulers did not count. These were rediscovered and re-erected in the time of the Qīng Kāngxī emperor, who also restored the buildings in 1689. Another restoration was carried out under Qiánlóng, who replaced the roofs with imperial yellow tiles.
Having the results written in stone has not saved the candidates’ names from oblivion, many of the stelae being heavily weathered or damaged. The last graduates, of 1905, had to pay for their stelae themselves. Signs next to individual stones tell the stories of some of the graduates they name, including one who passed at the age of 98.
One display gives a clue as to why Confucius might have been so thoroughly rehabilitated of late: ‘The Confucius thought established by him was conducive to building a harmonious society.’ ‘Harmonious society’ is one of the political catch-phrases that former President Hú Jǐntāo had been trying to promote as part of his legacy. Perhaps he hoped it would be added to the long list of guiding principles for the Party that begins with Marxism-Leninism and so far ends with ex-President Jiāng Zémín’s lightweight ‘Three Represents’ statement, which is overly dignified with the label ‘theory’.
Hú received a bit of a rebuff at the 17th Party Conference in 2007, but his pet phrase entered the vocabulary of the modern cynic, used as a euphemism for ‘stolen’ or applied when topics are labelled politically sensitive and suppressed. For instance: Wǒ de bókè bèi héxié le (我的博客被和谐了, ‘My blog has been ‘harmonised’). The propaganda machine is now promoting his successor Xí Jìnpíng’s ‘Chinese dream’ slogan, so there may be some rewriting here soon. Some already use it in the same way.
Eleven Qīng-era double-eaved stele pavilions in the second courtyard formerly in a poor state of repair and roughly bricked up, their roofs more heavily overgrown with grasses than most other temples, have been rendered gleaming and fresh, as if built yesterday. You can enter to pat the heads of the massive bìxǐ, already polished by earlier visitors. The stelae texts contain accounts of repairs to the temple, edicts related to Confucian teachings, and stories of various Qīng military campaigns during the reigns of four emperors. Statues of Confucius and his principal commentators stand around, among cypress trees of considerable antiquity, one nearly 700 years old.
Imperial representatives would come several times a year to the temple for ceremonies in honour of Confucius, most importantly on the sage’s birthday. The main hall of the temple, the Dàchéng Diàn, or Hall of Great Perfection, stands on a broad terrace and contains a central shrine to Confucius, surrounded by a think tank of tributes to 60 top scholars. The hall also contains several Chinese classical musical instruments (and sometimes someone playing them), as well as incense burners and other artefacts.
A passage at the rear left-hand corner of the compound gives access to the Qiánlóng Stone Scriptures, with the stones arranged in five long rows in a recently modernised shed, to which they bring a certain library-like quality. These are the classics produced by Confucius and his students during the Spring and Autumn period (770–475 BCE) and other texts that were the subjects of the imperial examinations. The stones originate from the desire of one man to produce a perfect copy of these classics, amounting to some 630,000 characters, which he undertook between 1726 and 1738. His finished version was presented to Qiánlóng, who later had them thoroughly proofread and caused them to be carved on stelae in around 1790. Of the 190 stelae, 189 contain the text, and the last is a copy of the emperor’s order that the work be undertaken. The stones were relocated from the neighbouring Imperial College and restored in 1988, joining the Dàxué Shì, a large stone incribed with a classic text on developing moral character.
In 2013 the temple administrators placed a plaque in the calligraphy of controversial 2012 Nobel Literature prize winner, Mó Yán, above the door, although public scorn ensured it did not last. Objections included that the board read left to right instead of right to left, Mó’s novels have a pungent earthiness not appropriate to the Confucian classics, and his award was too Western. His calligraphy wasn’t much to look at, either.
▶ Kǒng Miào hé Guózǐ Jiàn, Guózi Jiàn Jiē 13–15, t 8401 1977, www.kmgzj.com, 8.30am–4.30pm. ¥30. m Yǒnghé Gōng (Lines 2 & 5) exit B. b to 雍和宫: 13, 116, 117, 684.
West down Guózǐ Jiàn Jiē there’s been extensive gentrification, with the pleasant Zhā Zhā Coffee, assorted other cafés and restaurants, some boutiques, and one or two shops with traditional toys. Sadly, Bannerman Táng, one of the last survivors of pre-revolutionary Manchu society, and his traditional toy shop, are no more. Keep well clear of anywhere around here that has an English sign saying ‘tea ceremony’. The entrance to the Lama Temple is just across the road from the east end of the street after passing under one of the city’s last remaining páilou (although others have now been erected to make it prettier). If you’re on a horse, you should dismount to show respect. Alternatively, walk west to the first crossroads and turn left (at a police box) into zig-zagging Gōngyì Xiàng (公益巷), which brings you to 46 Fāngjiā Hútòng (方家胡同46号). This light industrial courtyard had been taken over by several arts and design-related businesses, with some exhibition spaces, a theatre, and several small restaurants, cafés, and bars, many of which received a short-notice shuttering in 2017, or suffered having their main doors and windows concreted over as part of a supposed improvement in the hútòng environment, regarded as the reverse by the businesses, local residents, and expats alike. It is said that Rickshaw Boy author Lǎo Shě was headmaster of the neighbouring elementary school at the age of only 19.
See also:
Next in North and East of the Imperial City: Civil Service Examinations (story)
Previously: Sōngtāng Zhāi
Main Index of A Better Guide to Beijing.
For discussion of China travel, see The Oriental-List.
