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• 1 2022-03-05T16:34:00-08:00 Historical Differences Between Confucianism and Vodou 10 plain 2022-03-08T10:26:21-08:00         The first historical difference between Confucianism and Vodou is how they originated. As Xinyi Zhang claims, the creation of Confucianism related to Zhougong and Taibo, two famous people with significant influence on the Zhou dynasty; Confucius worshipped Zhougong and Taibo and interpreted their philosophies and ideas to his students, then, students of Confucius combined what they learned from Confucius and what Confucius taught to people to form Confucianism (Zhang, 288). The origination of Confucianism was based on people's philosophical experiences of understanding life, behaving morally, and accepting and understanding everything.         Differently, the origination of Vodou was the syncretism of multiple traditional religions from West Africa, Europe, and Roman Catholicism (Desmangles, 13). During the 16th century, Vodou was created when Haitian people were suffering; therefore, Vodou believers saw Vodou as the religion they could get something from it. Thus, The origination of Vodou was different from Confucianism in essence.
          Based on different intentions, the second difference between Confucianism and Vodou is that two groups of believers expected different paybacks from their spiritual belief systems. Followers of Confucianism were trying to seek a way to maintain harmony and order within selves, families, and societies through moral standards and ethical living guidance spread by Confucianism. Therefore, the purpose of Confucianism followers was unified and simple. Differently, the expectations of Vodou followers were more complex and various. Claudine Michel claims in her article that Vodou followers asked for various paybacks from their spiritual belief system, which included satisfaction of demand, the basis for living, help when experiencing hardship, hope, and recovery from illness (Michel 99). In addition, Vodou followers expected their beliefs to bring them a healthy body, love and marriage, finance and work, and crops and children (Michel 102). In comparison with Confucianism followers, the expectations of Vodou followers were from multiple perspectives, while Confucianism followers did not expect as many as they did; Confucianism followers did not seek to find things like finance and health from their spiritual belief system. Therefore, differences between Confucianism and Vodou indeed existed.
          Due to inconsistent levels of development of societies, Confucianism and Vodou did not spread in the same way. Yao claims that The government of the Han Dynasty sponsored Confucianism, and it became the official learning of the country; therefore, Confucianism was recorded on textbooks for people to learn (Yao, 50). Through oral and text transmissions, Confucianism spread successfully not only in China but also in countries around China. On the other hand, the spread of Vodou was not the same as how Confucianism did. Claudine Michel claims that 80% of the Haitian population did not have the ability to read; therefore, Vodou transmission relied heavily on oral and social performance and its rituals (Michel 104). Without texts, the spreading of Vodou was slow and laborious; parents passed down their understanding of Vodou to their children through tales, prayers, images, and songs. In comparison, the spreading of Confucianism was relatively more straightforward and successful with the help of written materials and documents.
  
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