The heaven–human relationship in Chinese thought and the God–human relationship in the West are foundational categories in their respective cultures. A further comparison between them merits attention. What follows is an outline-style reflection—exploratory, preliminary, and simply offered for discussion, in hopes of prompting deeper work.
I. The Unity of Heaven and Humanity: Heavenly Dao and Human Dao
In Chinese culture, the relationship between Heaven and humanity is a perennial theme, richly interpreted in Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism. In A New Compilation of the History of Chinese Philosophy, Feng Youlan interprets the character “tian” (Heaven) in five senses: (1) physical Heaven (the blue firmament corresponding to Earth), (2) sovereign Heaven or volitional Heaven (a supreme deity with personality and will—“Di” or “Shangdi”), (3) Heaven as fate (fortune), (4) natural Heaven (material nature), and (5) Heaven of principle or moral Heaven (the idealist cosmic law).
“Heaven” can be traced back to antiquity. Scholarship largely agrees that “Di” and “Tian” were the supreme deities of the Shang and Zhou dynasties, respectively; the concept of Tian had already appeared in late Shang, and in early Zhou “Tian” and “Di” were used concurrently. In the Zhou era, “Tian” represented the highest deity with both moral and natural attributes, yet also retained the sovereign quality of Di. The moral aspect of Tian later became the core of early Zhou values—“in Heaven it is decree (ming), in man it is virtue (de).” With Tian confirmed as the Zhou dynasty’s supreme deity, the concepts of the Son of Heaven and “all under Heaven as one family” were established.
From the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods onward, Tian’s sacredness was increasingly held in reverent distance, and attention shifted from Heavenly Dao to Human Dao—from religious transcendence to moral transcendence. The notion of “Heaven and humanity sharing virtue” (tian ren he de) moralizes and idealizes Tian, making it an object humans can communicate with and emulate. Daoism’s view of Heaven and humanity, from a naturalistic angle, complements the Confucian humanistic view, allowing Heaven’s naturalness and morality to coexist with sacredness. As Chen Rongjie (Wing-tsit Chan) puts it, the hallmark of Chinese philosophy is humanism—but a humanism that does not deny or ignore transcendent power; rather, it affirms the possibility of unity between Heaven and humankind. In the Western Zhou, faith in “Shangdi” was gradually replaced by the concept of “Tian.” Though people still venerated spirits, divine personality was superseded by human virtue and effort, and humans, through their own virtue, could determine their destiny. The Zhou esteemed virtue and ritual: “Heavenly ways are distant; human ways are near.” Reverence for humanity was itself a way of honoring Heaven.
As the highest state of the Heaven–human relationship, the unity of Heaven and humanity (tian ren he yi) derives from “sharing the virtue of Heaven and Earth” and “participating with Heaven and Earth.” It contains four components: (1) the oneness of Heavenly and human ways; (2) humans as the spirit of the myriad things; (3) the human mind able to communicate with the mind of Heaven and Earth; and (4) Heaven and humans as one body. Neo-Confucians further stress that “Heaven and humanity are originally not two; speaking of ‘uniting’ is unnecessary,” and “to regard Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things as one body is ren (benevolence).” As Xunzi says, Heaven operates with constancy—stressing Heaven’s non-interference—while human governance emphasizes human action; the human part is “can” (participation), and Heaven–Earth–Human are the three powers. Ultimately, Dao returns to Human Dao, the way of the gentleman. The core of Chinese philosophy is nothing other than Heavenly Dao and Human Dao. In the Daodejing, “Dao” is Heavenly Dao; “De” is Human Dao. The Confucian path approaches from Human Dao yet must involve Heavenly Dao; the Daoist path approaches from Heavenly Dao yet necessarily involves Human Dao. Thus both focus on their interrelation.
But from Heavenly Dao to Human Dao: Does honoring humanity necessarily honor Heaven? Is Human Dao necessarily Heavenly Dao? Is popular will necessarily Heaven’s will?
II. The Union of God and Humanity: Whence and Whither?
In the Christian West, the God–human relationship is likewise a perennial theme. In the Bible it appears on three levels: Father–son, Lord–servant, and lover–beloved.
- Father–son highlights the Creator-Father, the estrangement of the son, the Father’s incarnation for redemption, and reconciliation through Christ—the prodigal returns, emphasizing gratitude.
- Lord–servant portrays the servant working for the Lord God and glorifying Him—manifesting God’s absolute sovereignty and emphasizing humility.
- Lover–beloved depicts post-reconciliation intimacy—you in me and I in you—union with the Lord in Christ, highlighting the redeemed sinner’s joy and grace.
Regarding the union of God and humanity, John 17:20–26 records Jesus praying three times “that they may be one.” This can be read on three levels:
- “That they also may be in us.” This stresses union in God as the truth foundation of oneness. The “we” recalls Genesis 1:26–29 (“Let us make man in our image…”). God intends to re-create us in Christ—first lifting us from earthly dust into union with God, then bringing about unity among people. Thus union with Christ is the precondition for God–human union.
- “That they may be one, even as we are one.” This defines the mode of oneness—like God’s, not like human schemes. Christian unity is not worldly coalition but “as we are one.” God is holy; therefore the foundation of unity must be holiness, not impurity or sin. Unity built on lust or merely human ties both offends God and cannot endure. God is also love—the triune God is mutual love—so unity is grounded in love, not compulsion or interest; and God is just—He loves the world yet hates sin.
- Human beings cannot achieve true oneness by themselves; hence Jesus says, “I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one.” The possibility and power of oneness are Christ in us; only by Christ can unity be complete and kept in truth.
From the Christian perspective, measured against the Chinese ideal of Heaven–human unity, that ideal may be the most beautiful vision—yet also a beautiful illusion—because it elevates humans to parity with Heaven. Whatever “Heaven” signifies—nature, morality, or the supreme ruler (God)—human beings cannot unite with Him by themselves, for all have sinned. Only through Jesus Christ, by union with Christ and His life infused into our hearts, can God and humanity be reunited.
III. Heaven–Human Unity and God–Human Unity
Feng Youlan proposed that Chinese philosophy concerns life’s horizons: the natural, utilitarian, moral, and Heaven-and-Earth horizons. The last seeks infinite freedom within finite life; hence Mou Zongsan saw Chinese philosophy as a “learning of life.” Christianity holds that the Heaven-and-Earth horizon is realized beyond this world, whereas Chinese philosophy claims it is realized here and now—“the utmost brilliance yet following the mean”—achieved not by an Other but by self-completion and self-realization, becoming “holy” through cultivating virtue, thus attaining the unity of Heaven and humanity. Transcending finitude is therefore this-worldly in Chinese thought—both immanent and transcendent.
Compared with the West, China lacks a fully independent religious cultural tradition and priestly class, yet it does not lack religious spirit. In early times, faith in Tian was evident; rites to Heaven and Earth remained central. The basic stance was to revere and fear Heaven—never deceiving or defying it. Much of Chinese philosophy centers on the Heaven–human relation. In the Bible, God is the supreme, omniscient, omnipotent, absolutely perfect ultimate reality—the Creator of all and the Redeemer of humanity. God is both transcendent and eternal, and also engages history—manifesting and unfolding Himself within it.
If the “Tian” of the pre-Qin masters expresses a humanistic spirit, the “God” of the Bible expresses a religious spirit. Both “Tian” and “God,” however, embody humanity’s consciousness of self-transcendence—recognition of our relativity, limits, incompleteness, dependence, and inner conflict, leading to a drive to transcend the self. Its ultimate object becomes the source and end of the self—“Tian” in pre-Qin thought, “God” in the Bible. Given broadly similar life goals, do the means coincide? Clearly, Confucianism and Christianity follow different paths—secular versus religious.
Thus Heaven–human unity and God–human union diverge: human-centered versus God-centered; humans act while Heaven watches versus God acts while humans behold; a quest for transcendence versus trust in indwelling grace; worldly utility versus sacred eternity. Confucian literati devoted to self-cultivation and social order may struggle to grasp the Trinity and divine redemption; Christians who hold that without eternal life faith lacks meaning may likewise struggle to see how those who deny heaven can be grateful and do good, or how those who deny hell can be humble and refrain from evil.
Max Weber noted that Confucianism adapts rationally from outside to inside, while Puritanism grasps the world rationally from inside to outside. For Weber, Confucian nobility and elegance are aesthetic values, whereas Puritan dignity, calling, and nature derive from a transcendent, omniscient God. Christians live in the world, not by the world. Purely personal relations are permitted, yet all created relations must never rival one’s relation to God; deifying created ties endangers the soul.
Chinese Heaven–human unity emphasizes sharing one Dao, one body, mutual responsiveness, even equivalence; Christian God–human union presupposes distinction and otherness between God and humans. Beneath the surface differences of Chinese and Western ideas lies a deeper core difference: their distinct understandings of Heaven–human and God–human relations.
In Chinese culture, Heaven is immanent: the great virtue of Heaven and Earth is to generate; Heaven and Earth produce the myriad things. Heaven is not outside things but within them—within persons. Heaven is the people; popular will is Heaven’s will; human nature is Heaven’s decree. Heaven’s value is fully invested in humanity—to know ren-yi-li-zhi (benevolence, righteousness, ritual, wisdom) is to know Heaven; “the world is the self.” Like the moon reflected in myriad streams, all is interpenetrating: person, life, cosmos, and Heaven are a single whole of ceaseless generation. But “generation” is not the same as the Christian creation. In Christianity, God is Triune—not the anthropomorphic Tian of Chinese thought—and is transcendent. To seek transcendence is to believe—to aim at ultimate value rather than at moral utility, which tends toward social or personal instrumentality. God created the world and time; God chooses His people, not vice versa. God is the cause of causes—He who was, is, and is to come, sovereign and free, not constrained by anything. Humans cannot be saved by their own good deeds—that would make God subject to humans.
In this sense, not only do Tian (in Heaven–human unity) and God (in God–human union) differ greatly; the human in each framework also differs greatly.
Before God, the human is created—a person, a self, not merely a social role. The self is the unique “I,” endowed with spirit only from the Creator. Under Tian, the human is primarily a communal being; an isolated individual is not yet “fully human.” In Chinese culture one is not born already “a person,” but becomes one by doing—through roles and ethical bonds (ruler–minister, father–son, elder–younger, husband–wife, friend), thus becoming a social person and achieving ren. Though both traditions speak of body–mind–spirit, the Chinese shen/xin/ling differ from the Christian body/soul/spirit. Faith grounded in the God–human relation is individual: each person stands before God, communes with Him; the soul is personal and sacred. In the Heaven–human relation, the human’s communal meaning leads to social instrumentality, yielding different social, value, and ethical outlooks.
IV. “Heaven” and “Di” in Tiandijiao (Religion of the Heavenly Emperor)
For Chinese intellectuals, Heaven–human unity has long been the highest life pursuit—whether “becoming sage and worthy,” or as “true person,” “immortal,” or “Buddha/Bodhisattva,” all exemplars of the highest human form. Tiandijiao seeks this unity through cultivating both nature and life (xing–ming) as its overarching principle, with illumining Dao and verifying Dao as practical work, aiming at the highest state of life-cultivation. Its doctrine and praxis constitute a practical Heaven–human learning whose ultimate goal is Great Unity of Heaven and humans, guided by a human-centered principle of equality between holy and ordinary. This spirit combines China’s traditional self-transcending “self-power” with the Western theological stress on God’s compassionate “Other-power.” In short, Tiandijiao’s practical learning fuses self-power and Other-power.
Discussions of Tiandijiao’s relation to Confucianism and Daoism are extensive; its relation to Christianity is less explored. Yet, as one founding teacher summarized, Tiandijiao’s “Heaven-centered” system fuses Chinese and Western elements: Confucian responsibility, Daoist view of life, Christian spirit, Catholic organizational model, and Buddhist mind-nature.
In a sense, Tiandijiao’s “natural Heaven” is closer to Daoist Heaven, its “moral Heaven” closer to Confucian Heaven, and its “holy Heaven” approaches the Christian God. Thus its “Heaven” shows the imprint of pre-Qin Confucian destiny (tianming), the Daoist Heavenly Dao, and even Christian spirit. Compared with Daoism, its Heaven has more morality; compared with Confucianism, more naturalness; and compared with both, richer sacredness—yielding stronger worldly responsibility and mission than classical Daoism, and a broader cosmic outlook than classical Confucianism. Hence its Great Unity of Heaven and humans is more explicitly ultimate and transcendent, and while completing its own theoretical framework it also articulates a pathway toward “religious concord.”
Notably, Tiandijiao’s “Heaven” ultimately moves from God-centered to human-centered—a “new horizon” of human-centered theology. Here, the unity of natural/moral/holy Heaven is re-cast as the unity of scientific Heaven, philosophical Heaven, and religious Heaven. In the New Horizon doctrine, Tiandijiao establishes three systems: science (natural Heaven; probing cosmic ontology; realizing Heaven–human culture), philosophy (moral Heaven; probing life’s ultimacy; realizing Heaven–human unity), and religion (holy Heaven; probing ultimate concern; realizing Heaven–human intimacy). These intertransform and integrate, culminating in Great Unity of Heaven and humans—a human-centered theology of Heaven–human learning.
In Christianity, God creates human beings and ultimately glorifies God through humanity. In Tiandijiao, Heaven–human relations are harmonized: Heaven is the Heavenly Emperor, the Heavenly Deity, representing the cosmic law, Heavenly Dao, Heavenly mandate, and Heavenly principle; Heavenly Dao is Human Dao, Heavenly mandate is worldly and timely mandate, Heavenly principle is Heavenly will, and Heavenly will is popular will. Though each term is context-specific, in Tiandijiao these concepts ultimately unify: Heaven and humanity are originally one. Relatively speaking, Heavenly mandate is more sacred, Heavenly will more moral, and Heavenly signs more natural. In Tiandijiao’s scheme, natural Heaven, philosophical Heaven, and holy Heaven manifest as Heaven–human culture, Heaven–human unity, and Heaven–human intimacy, ultimately moving toward Great Unity. Through a return from God-centeredness to human-centeredness, it aims to establish a new cosmic horizon of Heaven–human unity: equality of holy and profane, Great Unity of Heaven and humankind—the highest, farthest, and final goal of the New Horizon. This encompasses Heaven–human culture, unity, intimacy, and Great Unity, reflecting cosmic ontology, life’s ultimacy, ultimate concern, and human-centered theology, thereby transcending both Heaven–Earth and sage horizons to stand upon the highest cosmic horizon.
As the Declaration on the Founding of the Society for the Study of Religious Philosophy (by Master Hanjing) stated: we should welcome the age that integrates religion, philosophy, and science, “study and collate religious philosophy with scientific methods, and promote scientific development with religious spirit,” aiming at the unity of mind and matter, so that humanity, by its wisdom, may in the highest metaphysical realm be united with supra-human wisdom in higher dimensions—achieving the unity of Heavenly and human Dao, promoting religious concord, world concord, and ultimately the Great Unity of Heaven and humanity.
In other words, Tiandijiao’s ultimate pursuit of the “Trinity” of Heaven is finally realized in human value. Hence its ethos of striving: “My fate is determined by me, not by Heaven,” and “First fulfill Human Dao, then fulfill Heavenly Dao.” In this sense, may we say, for Tiandijiao devotees, Heaven is among humans?
V. Between the Two Shores: This World and the Beyond
Human history can be read as the history of the Heaven–human or God–human relationship. Over millennia, Heaven and humanity—or God and humanity—draw near and drift apart. Humans swing between helpless anxiety and arrogant pride because their hearts lack God and their faith lacks Heaven. We too often stamp the world and its works—the very things God made—with our own mark, yet fail to humbly recognize the Creator’s achievement. We focus on how the world exists and ignore the simpler, more mysterious fact that it exists at all, neglecting to ask about its ultimate source.
Today’s flood of pragmatism and utilitarianism betrays a danger within human nature. Spiritual hunger grows alongside a longing to rebuild the God–human or Heaven–human relationship. But if we mistake this-worldly goods for the ultimate concern, enthrone rulers as “Sons of Heaven,” elevate descendants to the status of ancestors, equate popular feeling with Heavenly Dao, treat servants as masters and creatures as Creator—deifying the human and sacralizing the secular—we become self-centered, shortsighted, and presumptuous. The result is the dissolution of the divine, the sacred, and the very basis of earthly order—and estrangement once again in the God–human or Heaven–human relation. This is secularization’s drift. At root lies the absence of Heaven. We must recall: what is seen is temporary; what is unseen is eternal.
East and West—this shore and the other—comparing the two relations is not to exaggerate differences. On the contrary, the “differences” are less natural than human-made. All under Heaven are one family; within the four seas, all are brothers. The motive force of civilization is self-transcendence; its object is the highest, farthest, and deepest—Heaven or God. Here there is no essential East–West divide: humanity everywhere seeks ultimate value and universal concern. “There is nothing new under the sun.” If we lay down self, whence conflict? Clinging to self manufactures divisions and thus strife. The cosmos itself has no intrinsic East/West; any spot on Earth is both east and west of somewhere. While highlighting its own features, Chinese civilization should also, in a global context, develop values shared by all humanity. If a nation that prides itself on harmonious inclusion loudly proclaims East–West separation and “barbarian–Chinese” boundaries, is that not self-contradictory? If scholars refute the other with one hand while—perhaps unwittingly—helping fulfill predictions of a “clash of civilizations” with the other, is that not absurd? The Creator has many attributes, yet love is foremost; if we quarrel because others name Him differently, is that not inverting ends and means?
Confucian reverence for Heaven, Daoist cherishing of life, Buddhist cultivation, and authentic Christian spirit can indeed resonate. But if faith is subservient to worldly ties, its capacity for independent reflection and critique remains on paper, lacking real power. Only with courage for self-reflection, self-critique, and repentance can society advance and hope for progress.
Today, equal dialogue instead of self-absolutization is the collective conscience of religions—embodied in great love exercised through small deeds, aiming at justice and fairness, not worldly success or political power. The foundation of faith is believing in the power of belief. Humanity’s future must be built upon love: only love returns us to first things; only love makes us humble and respectful; only love reconciles and tolerates; only love transcends all groups, parties, ideas, doctrines, and traditions; only love grants enduring joy and peace.
But where is love? Whence does it come? People on this shore still gaze toward the other…
Wang Jun, Department of Philosophy and Department of Religious Studies, Peking University