Comparative Analysis: Buddhism and Confucianism - Religions

This essay provides a comparative analysis of Buddhism and Confucianism, two major Eastern religions. It begins by outlining the origins of both religions, tracing Buddhism to Siddhartha Gautama and Confucianism to Confucius. The essay then examines the core teachings and philosophies of each, highlighting the Buddhist focus on enlightenment and karma versus the Confucian emphasis on social structure and ethical values. It further explores rituals, scriptures, and the impact of these religions on society. The comparison extends to festivals and practices, providing a comprehensive overview of similarities and differences. The essay utilizes scholarly sources to support its claims, offering a well-researched exploration of these influential belief systems.

Running Head: COMPARISON BETWEEN BUDDHISM AND CONFUCIANISM
Comparison between Buddhism and Confucianism
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note

1COMPARISON BETWEEN BUDDHISM AND CONFUCIANISM
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Buddhism.........................................................................................................................................2
Confucianism...................................................................................................................................2
Comparison......................................................................................................................................3
References........................................................................................................................................4

2COMPARISON BETWEEN BUDDHISM AND CONFUCIANISM
Introduction
Buddhism and Confucianism, both the religion consists of deeply embedded cultural and
ethical values and written in foreign language and both originated from Eastern part.
Confucianism deals with social and spiritual elements and Buddhism, on the other hand focuses
on the self and the cultivation of good karma as the way of spiritual enlightenment.
Buddhism
Buddhism was founded by the prince of Nepal, born in Lumbini, a small town in
Northern India. The story of Siddhartha Gautama and the origin of the religion is widely known
for the king was known for his emphatic nature and was deeply saddened by the sorrow and
suffering he witnessed around his kingdom. Those sights are known as the four sight which
finally drove him to the point of leaving his luxurious life at the palace. The four sight was that
of an old man, a sick man, a funeral procession and finally a sadhu (a monk). Gautama was
married and had a son when he finally gave up the worldly life and travelled to Bodh Gaya,
where he sat under a Bodhi tree for meditation in the hope of finding a middle path, a path of
peace and enlightenment (Huxter, 2015). The name given to hum was derived from the name of
the tree and is now known to us as Gautama Buddha. He sat there for forty days, fighting all
odds and when he finally got enlightenment, returned home to teach people what he had learnt.
Confucianism
The founder of Confucianism is Master Kong or commonly referred to as Confucius and
is considered to be an effort to revive an unnamed religion from the Zhou’s dynasty. The he was
born in Lu of the Chinese province and travelled similar to Buddha to attain the enlightenment.
Due to the fact that it was based on the political and moral doctrines, it is considered by the

3COMPARISON BETWEEN BUDDHISM AND CONFUCIANISM
western philosophers as a civil or diffused religion. The religion consists of ethical values based
on the development of an ideal religion which embodies the Chinese culture (Cokelet, 2016).
Comparison
There are a number of practices which are similar in both the religion with a considerable
amount of differences as well. Buddhism as a religion when it started was mainly focused on the
attainment of enlightenment, had to no supreme deity and was based on the fact that the
construction of the universe was the result of the self-conscious or in other words personal god
(Yang, & Zhou, 2017). But Confucianism was not as much of a religion as it was social structure
whose main motive was the formation of a structured society embodying the ethical values of a
Chinese society (Vuong, et al., 2018). Buddhists has specific temples and shrines where they
establish idols of Buddha and worship him where in Confucianism earlier it was simply a site of
administration with no appointed priests. Buddhism religious practices if seen from a practical
point of view, is also pointing towards an establishment of ethically aware society by following
the Eightfold Path.
Both Confucius and Buddha’s birthdays are the most important festivals of the religion.
Buddha’s birthday is celebrated on the first full moon day in the month of May. And the
celebration of Confucius’s birthday continues for ten days staring from 28th September.

4COMPARISON BETWEEN BUDDHISM AND CONFUCIANISM
References
Cokelet, B. (2016). Confucianism, Buddhism, and virtue ethics.
Huxter, M. (2015). Mindfulness and the Buddha’s noble eightfold path. In Buddhist foundations
of mindfulness (pp. 29-53). Springer, Cham.
Vuong, Q. H., La, V. P., Vuong, T. T., Nguyen, V. H., Ho, M. T., Nguyen, T. H. K., & Ho, M. T.
(2018). Cultural additivity: Behavioural insights from the interaction of Confucianism,
Buddhism, and Taoism in folktales. Palgrave Commun, 4, 143.
Yang, D., & Zhou, H. (2017). The Comparison between Chinese and Western Well-Being. Open
Journal of Social Sciences, 5(11), 181.