Confucius

Confucius — Kong Qiu, known honorifically as Kongzi — was a Chinese philosopher and teacher of the Spring and Autumn period whose ideas about personal virtue, social harmony, and proper governance formed the foundation of Confucianism, one of the most enduring intellectual traditions in human history. Born in 551 BC in the state of Lu, he worked as a government official before gathering disciples and wandering from state to state seeking a ruler who would implement his political philosophy. He found none, but his teachings — recorded by his disciples in the Analects after his death — became the core curriculum of Chinese education for two millennia and shaped the civil examination system that governed Chinese governance until 1905. The central Confucian virtues of ren (humaneness), li (ritual propriety), and yi (righteousness) remain touchstones of East Asian moral thinking. He died in 479 BC.

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