Publisher's Synopsis
For Sang-Yiing Chang, the mandate of Heaven (Tian-Ming) by Confucius is neither a fate nor the mandate from some authority, or from other mysterious and religious Majesty. Taking both historical and philosophical approaches to investigate the development of its concepts basically upon the original classics; in addition, through the thoughts and life story of Confucius himself, especially during the time of which just before and shortly after the fifties, this Book demonstrates that to Confucius, as a humanist, Tian-Ming is no more a kind of legitimacy from divine approval but one inner mission of Imperative. The 'political turn' of Confucius in the fifties plays a critical role to understand the real meaning of the words by Confucius: "At fifty, I understood the mandate of Heaven."
