Merton & Confucianism

Thomas Merton has become a model and guide for the faithful and committed Christian response to other religions called for in Nostra Aetate, the 1965 Declaration on the Relationship of Christianity to Non-Christian Religions issued by the Second Vatican Council, which has served as a kind of Magna Carta for developing positive and creative relationships with other religions, rooted in the remarkable assertion that "Christianity rejects nothing true or holy in these traditions, and that often they reflect a ray of that light that enlightens every person." While neither as extensive nor as developed as his explorations of Zen, or his versions of the writings associated with the Taoist sage Chuang Tzu, Thomas Merton's discussions of Confucian texts and ideas are an integral part of his overall interaction with Eastern religious thought. This eighth volume of the acclaimed Fons Vitae Thomas Merton Series, Merton & Confucianism: Rites, Righteousness and Integral Humanity, is a compendium of all relevant material for a thorough consideration of Merton's knowledge and appreciation of the Confucian tradition. The first of its two sections provides extensively annotated versions of the three distinct resources for investigating Merton's engagement with Confucianism in the context of his wider studies of East Asian spiritual traditions: his correspondence with Chinese-American scholar Paul Sih; his extensive reading notes on Confucian and related material; and transcriptions of the five conferences given to young prospective monks on the pertinence of Confucian wisdom to their own spiritual development. Part two gathers together five previously published studies exploring Merton's interest in Confucian and (in one case) related Chinese traditions, by John Wu, Jr., Paul M. Pearson, Wm. Theodore de Bary, volume editor Patrick F. O'Connell and Robert E. Daggy, that provide various perspectives on Merton's engagement with what he calls "Classic Chinese Thought." Merton's profoundly "catholic," holistic Catholicity, open to the broadest and deepest sources of authentic human insight, explicitly embraces Confucianism along with the other major streams of Chinese wisdom, and demonstrates his recognition that "the tone and value of my own interior world . . . is open also to China, to Confucianism and to Zen, to the great Taoists" and that this "openness to other cultures and spiritualities . . . is not only relevant to my life and salvation but has crucial significance in my whole vocation." It is hoped that making these materials on Confucianism much more readily accessible will stimulate and encourage further research and publication on this fascinating but hitherto somewhat neglected aspect of his interreligious thought.