Great Learning

The "Four Books" were selected by the neo-Confucian Zhu Xi during the Song dynasty as a foundational introduction to Confucianism.

[3] During the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhu Xi rearranged the Great Learning and included it in the Four Books, along with the Doctrine of the Mean, the Analects of Confucius and the Mencius.

[6][7] Such critics such as Lu Xiangshan and Wang Yangming later disliked the Great Learning because of the stress on scholarship rather than action.

Ma Rong edited the Great Learning in the Han dynasty, giving his views of the general meaning.

[9] 大學之道，在明明德，在親民，在止於至善。知止而后有定，定而后能靜，靜而后能安，安而后能慮，慮而后能得。物有本末，事有終始，知所先後，則近道矣。 What the Great Learning teaches, is to illustrate illustrious virtue; to renovate the people; and to rest in the highest excellence.

To know what is first and what is last will lead near to what is taught in the Great Learning.The text sets up a number of controversies that have underlain Chinese philosophy and political thinking.

[10] The Great Learning as we know it today is the result of multiple revisions and commentaries by a number of Confucian and Neo-Confucian scholars.

Both were removed from the Book of Rites and designated as separate, and equally significant, works by Zhu Xi.

In the winter of 1190 CE Zhu Xi published the Four Masters, a collection of the Great Learning, Doctrine of the Mean, the Mencius and the Analects.

Zhu Xi was prompted to refine the Great Learning and incorporate it into the curriculum as he felt that the previously utilized Classics were lengthy and too difficult to comprehend by the common individual to be used as an educational foundation for Confucian thought.

[11] To aid in comprehension of the Great Learning, he spent much of his life studying the book and published a series of commentaries explaining the principal teachings of the text.

Unlike many scholars before him, Zhu Xi presents the Great Learning as the way of self cultivation and governance that is to be studied by all people, not only those in, or seeking, political office.

The Great Learning was written and later published as its own book, to serve as an introduction and foundational guide for the further study of Confucian texts.

The Great Learning provides a step-by-step illustration of how all aspects of society, ranging from the refinement of the self to the order within one's household or state is ultimately dependent upon the expansion of one's knowledge.

The Great Learning played a major role in Chinese politics as it comprised one of the texts incorporated into the Imperial service examination system.

In addition to self-cultivation and the expansion of one's knowledge, the Great Learning goes into significant step-by-step detail with respect to the qualities of a proper ruler.

The Great Learning, on the other hand, requires action on the part of the individual towards the ultimate goal of self-cultivation through the "expansion of knowledge and the investigation of things."