In 2020 I hope that you’ve picked up my purpose to welcome you to Chinese culture. This is different from siding with the Chinese politically. Chinese culture is a tight and disciplined culture that through its codified system of symbols and meanings brings people of diverse background and together all over the world.
By comparison, American culture is a looser culture that has welcomed me and my family easily into the fold.
As we Americans continue to learn about each other, I wish that we may live together with respect and a constructive purpose.
和(hé)平(píng)博(bó)爱(aì) = Peace and Benevolence (Chinese characters, like Hebrew, are traditionally written from right to left.)
The first two characters mean Peace, with the latter showing a traditional balance scale in equilibrium平 . While the balance scale invokes a Western symbol closely related to the justice system, in Chinese, it carries far more duplicity in meaning. It may mean an eye for an eye sense of justice. It may mean a win win situation. It may even mean an uneventful, monotonous life as many of us have experienced under quarantine. That stability in itself is a blessing we have learned to appreciate.
The last two characters means Benevolence, with the latter meaning love 爱. In this case, benevolence means love for mankind. Of the many lessons Confucius taught, he himself had asked to be remembered for this one message: be considerate, be good and kind to each other, bear no harmful thoughts to one another, and by aiding goodness to prevail we build a safer, better future for ourselves and our offsprings.
Until 2021, be well.
