The so-called "spiritual humanism" consists of two levels. First, humanism, that is to say, Chinese culture is not based on the worship of gods and religious beliefs. Its roots are humanistic (so China's modernization process and enlightenment process have its own particularity. It does not have the humanistic enlightenment of the medieval religious fog in the modern sense of the West.). We know that there are elements of religion and belief in Chinese cultural traditions. In fact, there have been religious madness in some stages of Chinese history (some scholars have defined it as “the era of the gods”), but at the core and root of culture, it is a rational consciousness. Instead of treating "the God" as a mysterious, authoritative supreme will, it is regarded as a natural, reasonable, and ethical-oriented "Tian Dao" or "Tian Li". Although this kind of "Tian Li" is very profound, it can be continuously recognized and experienced through study, thinking and life practice.
The second level is “spirituality”, which means that this kind of humanism is not centered on the life of a secular person. Matter, consumption, and capital are important, but they are not the power of domination. Behind the real life of man, there is also a spiritual pursuit of high and transcendence. Our modern people live in a society with highly developed material and instrumental rationality, and it is especially easy to get lost in the whirlpool of worldly desires created by capital. Therefore, the "spiritual" core of the Chinese humanistic tradition, such as conscience, benevolence, tolerance, endless life, people and things, etc., is a very important ideological resource and the key to human beings.
So, if today we use a sentence to briefly explain the reasons for
Chinese culture learning, I think it can be summarized by Learning to Be Human. This concept was proposed by Mr. Du Weiming at the World Philosophy Conference in Athens in 2013. He used this formulation to summarize the characteristics and universality of Chinese culture and immediately gained high recognition from the international ideological community. This concept was unanimously selected as the theme of the 2018 Beijing World Philosophy Conference.
