Therefore...

Therefore, this Confucian interpretation of yi in terms of yi* indicates an interplay or a dialectical interaction between yi and yi*, between the personal self and its contextual and communal environments out of which an individual person reaches her identity, realization, and accomplishment.(13) Based on this conception of yi as justice and righteousness and as the interplay between individual self and her surrounding communities, Confucians think that fulfilling one's obligations, such as being a lovely parent and taking good care of his/her young children, and/or being a filial son/daughter by taking respectful care of his/her parents when the parents are old, is simply part of the way of self-realization and of self-accomplishment.

Failure to do this will be called "bu yi" (non-righteousness). Our natural and innermost moral feelings of*"xiu"* (shame) and*"wu"* (dislike), according to Confucians, are simply signals of both internal and social disapproval of these non-righteous actions, and thus marks the beginning of the development of righteousness and justice.(14) On the other hand, the interplay between yi and yi* not only asks a yielding or a sacrifice of my personal self to my environmental communities in the way of appropriation, it also affirms my uniqueness in such an appropriation.

That not only includes my duties but also my privileges and rights, which are due to my specific situation in my surrounding communities. Thus understood, the Confucian concepts of social justice and righteousness are not against the idea of equality and fairness among the members of the society. It is rather an affirmation of it if we consider it within a larger social and historical context.

Some Westerners claimed that adult children's moral duty to take respectful care of their aged parents may be seen as an unfair request for the younger generation to make sacrifices for the well-being of the older generation (Daniels, 1988, pp.4-6). But if we, as a Confucian often does, take human life as an organic and dynamic process of birth, growing, flourishing, declining and dying, then the rationale behind the Confucian concept of filial obligation will become clearer.