'Mandate of Heaven'

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandate_of_Heaven

So recently I started reading up about this concept and it's been really bothering me since it seems to me to be not so much a doctrine but just a description of what actually happens in politics in reality. If a ruler is absolute shit at ruling, people will tend to rebel against him anyway, whereas if a ruler is actually competent, people will tend to be more obedient towards him. So really it's just a fancy word for the perceived legitimacy of the emperor. The thing is though, any one that happens to hold power can abuse the term in an attempt to legitimise their rule.
If a ruler is overthrown, it means that they must have lost the Mandate of Heaven, right? How do you know that they lost the Mandate of Heaven? Because they were overthrown, so clearly they were unfit to rule. And why were they overthrown? Because they lost the Mandate of Heaven! Can you see how the logic is going around in circles?

Why is Chinese political philosophy so redundant and superfluous?

New rulers need justification to rule.

Rest people need justification to accept them.

How is it redundant and superfluous? It's based on de-Facto reality.

How can some idiot claim to have "Mandate of Heaven" if he's not ruling all of China?

It's the same as trial by combat. The winner is presumed to have God fighting on his side.

It's meritocracy but for empires, not like divine right is any less artificial

The Mandate of Heaven tends to be declared after its loss/won. New Dynasty gets declared: New Emperor says "The previous dynasty has lost mandate, and after the traditional post-dynastic King of the Hill Deathmatch, we won. Therefore we have Mandate."

In addition, it has some rituals such as respecting the surviving members of the previous dynasty and making sure you honor their ancestors as well. As previous holders of the Mandate the spirits of their ancestors are basically gods over China, similar as to how a person's ancestors watches over their family.

Furthermore nobody takes Mandate declarations *at the start* of any bid for power. If some rebel general aimed at being emperor declaring he had mandate of heaven in the middle of a dynasty that was doing well, people tend to rally and shit on that pretender.

Well it is circular, the whole concept of Mandate of Heaven was invented by the Duke of Zhou a few years after the Zhou conquered the Shang as a method of justifying the conquest after the fact, by saying the last Shang king had lost the mandate of heaven even though such a concept had not yet existed at the time.

>why is Chinese political philosophy so redundant and superfluous
compared to what exactly?

Many chinese dynasties started with common people, so they needed this shit to justify their rule if they didn't have noble blood

It's just the Chinese version of the Divine Right of Kings. Usually dynasties that overthrew previous dynasties would use it as justification. But it worked because it was based on reality - the "Mandate of Heaven" signifies the prosperity of China and the authority of the ruling dynasty, so if someone secures prosperity for China and exercises their authority over the whole empire, then they "have the Mandate" and should be allowed to rule. This makes sense because good governance, in the Chinese system, embodied these concepts - stable, authoritative, bringing prosperity and unity to a naturally vast, chaotic and disunited region of multiple distinct peoples.

So basically all it amounts to is saying that "the winner wins"?

"Heaven is dead" is simply a kickass slogan to start civil war under so why not use it.

The empire, long divided, must unite; long united, must divide. Thus it has ever been.

tranny guild

>Many chinese dynasties started with common people, so they needed this shit to justify their rule if they didn't have noble blood
The Mandate of Heaven started during the Zhou Dynasty.

The reason for which was that the previous hegemon of what was to become China was the Shang Dynasty. The Shang was a straight up theocracy whose Shaman Kings are said to be pretty much appointed by the Supreme God, Shangdi, to rule over the Proto-Chinks.

Well the Shang declined in power that dissatisfaction and revolts forced the people to rebel. Led by the Ji Clan, they toppled the Shang Kings from power.

What resulted next was a WTF moment in Ancient Chinese religious/political thought as pretty much everyone thought they pulled off the impossible by toppling a God-King. What resulted next was
1) The belief that there was a higher power than the Gods (Tian = Heaven).
2) Rule over all under heaven is not mandated by the Gods, but by Heaven. The Shang were corrupt, decadent, and failed as leaders, so heaven saw fit to remove them, and replaced them with us, the Ji Clan.

*why is the concept so superfluous, I mean

>authoritative
But authority based on virtue rather than on use of force, ideally people should follow the directives of the state because the leader inspires them, not because they're being forced to do so.

Many Confucian scholars were deeply disappointed by the authoritarian nature of the Ming rulers.

Everyon'e ignoring the only person to get it right. The Mandate of Heaven was merely a justification used by the Duke of Zhou after taking power, and it was enshrined as "tradition" in the warring states period that followed.

Mandate of heaven is a construct to justify the emperor and his dynasty, it's not a philosophy like communism or constitutionalism or legalism

Though the notion of Tian was a Shang concept, they viewed it as the collective spirit of all the ancestors.

I still don't get what you mean, superfluous how and compared to what? You're talking about a political theory that is over 3000 years old.

>Can you see how the logic is going around in circles?

That's pretty much Chinese history, and arguably history in general, goes.

I mean, it is called the dynastic cycle. Were you expecting a square-shaped flow-chart?

Japanese History
>a fascinating tale, honorbound warriors, poets and nobled struggle for control of this beautiful island chain, a humanistic tale of passions, betrayal and physical courage immortalized in countless epic filmd and novels
Chinese """"History""""
>OOOOHHHH NI HAOOOOOOO CHING LING DONG BING BONG HOHO DING LING LUNG LONG HOHO

such a dilemma

>Why is Chinese political philosophy so redundant and superfluous?
Because you're a typical westerncentric idiot who barely know anything about Chinese culture other than a few webpages you read on internet who likes to belittle and insult Chinese, and your "study" about their history is just to strengthen your preconceived bias against them. Like most of your types here and everywhere.

Your types are filling on

Yeah, such a dilemma that even Japanese are so found of Chinese history, they make countless creations, stories, animes, mangas, video games about them, they even name and write their own history and country with Chinese styles such as "Warring states / Sengoku", "Northern and Southern dynasties / Nanboku-cho", "Nippon",...etc.

Even name their sacred royalties from Classical Chinese texts. Time to know your place, weeb.