Eun+Soo

  

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 * Filial Piety**

Soo Suh Asian studies D

Filial Piety, which was the major concept that created Chinese culture is still can be found in China and other neighboring countries such as Korea. As a daughter living in Korea, I can clearly relate to myself and my culture as well. Living under my grandfather who is a very old Korean guy, I was always taught that no matter what the elders say even when they are wrong I should always listen, obey them, and never talk back at them. After reading the stories mentioned on the website I understood why the sons were taking such action and not behaving in such a way would be thought as weird and not right. My grandfather, too, a lot of times how I should respect elders and should always think of my parents before thinking about myself because they are my only parents and never can have another one.

Western folktale vs. Filial Piety

From reading western folktales one can clearly see the different perspectives of the two cultures of western and eastern people. One of the famous western folktale, “Cinderella” deals with the issue of stepmother like the stories of filial piety on the website. However, in the story “Cinderella” the mother and the two daughters, not Cinderella, equally give respect to each other. They do not care if their mother is a widow or sick but only cares about their dresses and their future marriage. Also, the mother does not take this issue very serious but rather a very normal thing that happens in the western culture. ======

1) I think this quote means that the given words and ways are easy to understand to follow however it often seems opposite and paradoxical just like experiencing is different from understanding the knowledge. This quote relates to the scholars in the Tao of Pooh, because the scholars make things difficult and complicated. 2) According to the poem on page 30, Pooh seems to think that the scholars are not very efficient to provide abundance of knowledge and information. Because he thinks that the scholars just make things more complicated than what they really are. And how the scholars think about the view of knowledge is very much different from the Taoist’s view of knowledge because the Taoist believes that simplicity is the most important thing to have in common. 3) I think this message behind Cottleston conveys a definition of inner nature. As it says bird can fly but fly can’t bird there is always a limitation and purposes of usage of words.