Guan Gong is the practitioner of the Confucian concepts of "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and honesty", the bearer of the traditional virtues of the Chinese nation, and the ethical and moral model of "righteousness".
The excellent traditional Chinese culture contains a wealth of moral concepts and norms, embodies the value standards for judging right and wrong, and subtly influences the way Chinese people behave. The core of the spiritual value of Guan Gong culture lies in its moral value. If Confucius, the "Sage of Literature", constructed a system of ethics and morality mainly in terms of ideology, then Guan Gong, the "Sage of Martial Arts", became a shining example of practicing the ethics and morality mainly at the practical level.
Guan Gong culture is a traditional folk belief. In China, there are many temples dedicated to the Sage of Literature, Confucius, and in the past there were such buildings in all cities and towns. However, the number and scale of the temples of the Sage of Martial Arts, Guan Gong, at home and abroad far exceeds that of the Temple of Confucius. It is said that Guan Gong is a kind of culture and Guan Gong is a kind of spirit. Guan Gong, whose real name was Guan Yu and whose courtesy name was Yun Chang, was born in 160 AD and died in 219 AD. Guan Gong in his nearly sixty years of life, galloped on the frontier, fighting against the generals, assist Liu Bei to complete the great cause, writing a magnificent song of the life. He was elected as the moral model of "loyalty", "faith", "righteousness" and "courage", and became an idol worshipped by the emperors and generals, as well as the peasants, farmers, industrialists and businessmen in the late stage of the feudal society of China.
Guan Gong culture means Guan Gong's ideology, moral character, spirituality and its influence on the spiritual life of the society. As a spiritual phenomenon, its most direct significance to social life is in the spiritual aspect, mainly in the ethical and moral aspect. The core of the spiritual value of Guan Gong culture lies in the moral value.
China is an ethical society, and traditional Chinese culture is an ethical type of culture. As an integral part of traditional Chinese culture, especially Confucian culture, Guan Gong culture is also an ethical culture, with ethics and morality as its core content. Guan Gong's loyalty, righteousness, benevolence and courage permeate the ethical and moral spirit of Confucianism. For thousands of years, people have worshipped Guan Gong, essentially worshipping Guan Gong's noble moral character. The spirit of Guan Gong's loyalty to his country, righteousness to others, benevolence in the world and courage in battles embodies the traditional virtues of the Chinese nation.
Guan Yu was a famous general of Shu Han, who was loyal, righteous, benevolent and courageous all his life, and was famous for his integrity. The more than 1,800 years since his transformation from general to king, then to emperor, and finally to saint, is the process of the circulation of the spirit of Guan Gong's story, the emergence of beliefs and customs, and the formation of Guan Gong's culture.
In this process, the official and private sectors jointly created the temple culture——rich in architecture, carvings, couplets, sculptures, paintings, etc.; created the sacrificial culture, well-organized rituals, the phenomenon of pilgrimage of believers from all over the world; created the culture of temple fairs and opera——material and cultural exchanges, opera and miscellaneous performances; created the culture of Shang Shen, the god of commerce. Guan Gong is regarded as a god of peace, wealth, education and advancement by people from all walks of life because of his loyalty and righteousness.
The most fundamental conceptual culture of Guan Gong culture——the spirit of loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and integrity of Guan Gong. Treating things with loyalty, treating people with benevolence, gaining benefits with righteousness, and making progress with courage, this spirit has now become the national spirit and righteousness, and has become the root of social development and harmony; it has given rise to the industrial culture of Guan Gong, and has facilitated the formation of Guan Gong cultural and tourism festivals organized by the official and private sectors around the world and the formation of the related cultural industry chain.
The moral character in Guan Gong's culture of speaking of faith and righteousness, emphasizing commitment, not losing one's heart even though one has a title, not being deluded even though one has gold and silver, and advocating justice, seeing what is right and doing what is right, and not going against one's conscience have always been recognized by the society and praised by the world.
On the one hand, the core spirit of Guan Gong's culture, "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and honesty", helps to regulate the relationship between people in modern society. In the traditional Chinese moral code system, "Zhong" means loyalty, that is, to be loyal and selfless, and to do one's best in one's work. "Righteousness" means appropriate, that is, righteous morality and behavior. "Benevolence" means love of people, and in Confucianism, "benevolence" means love of parents, love of siblings, and love of others. "Bravery" means bravery and fortitude, and fearlessness. "Sincerity" emphasizes sincerity and truthfulness, "faith" emphasizes promise-keeping, and the current concept of "integrity" emphasizes compliance and trustworthiness, justice and fairness. Vigorously promoting the culture of Guan Gong, actively advocating the spirit of "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and integrity" has a positive significance in promoting the construction of ethical and moral concepts of the whole society. Guan Gong's way of dealing with people perfectly fits the heart structure and cultural genes of the Chinese nation, so advocating the spirit of "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and honesty" will help to cultivate a positive national spirit and become an important spiritual impetus for the modernization and development of the country.
On the other hand, the ethical and moral spirit of Guan Gong culture can also provide strong support for the current construction of socialist core values. The core content of Guan Gong culture, "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and honesty", is consistent with the core values of socialism: patriotism, honesty, friendliness and dedication: loyalty corresponds to "patriotism", loyalty to the country, the nation, the collective and the people; righteousness corresponds to "honesty", is a spirit of trust and social morality; benevolence, corresponding to "friendliness", which means loving, respecting, treating, and helping people; and courage corresponds to "dedication", which inspires people to be courageous and to work hard without fear of any challenges.
Guan Gong is revered as a saint from a military general, this phenomenon has never happened from ancient times. Guan Gong has been sublimated from a historical figure to a moral icon of the Chinese nation, and even a bond that maintains the feelings of the Chinese people at home and abroad. Overseas, most communities with a Chinese population have built Guan Di Temples. According to statistics, there are more than 30,000 Guan Di temples in the world, and the belief and worship of Guan Gong has covered 168 countries and regions in the world. People build Guan temples and honor the God of Guan Gong as an agreed way to unite national unity and promote Chinese culture. In Taiwan, China alone, there are as many as 8 million followers of the God of Guan Gong in a population of 23 million; there are thousands of Guan temples on an island of 36,000 square kilometers. Yu Youren, a patriarch of the Kuomintang, once wrote a couplet for a Guan Di temple in Malaysia: "The words of loyalty and righteousness unite the Chinese people; the Book of Spring and Autumn represents the spirit of the nation," pointing out the cohesive power and integrative function of Guan Gong's culture both internally and externally, and fully demonstrating that the common belief in Guan Gong is precisely the bridge and cultural bond that connects the feelings of Chinese across the Taiwan Straits and even all over the world.