How does one define religion? What characteristics does a view need to have in order to be considered a religion? Questions similar to these have been asked many times, and no concrete answer has been universally accepted. Some characteristics have been found common in most world religions: an afterlife, a notion of sacred, rules or guides for behavior (i.e. how to lead a "good" life), and almost universally, an explanation or rationalization for death. There is a debate, nevertheless, on whether Confucianism should be considered one of the world's religions. Confucianism lacks significant explanation of either death or an afterlife and is behaviorally hard to distinguish from a mere ethical institution. It is possible that some of these shortcomings in the Confucian viewpoint can be explained, and perhaps a better understanding of religion may be gained in the process.
             The criticism that a given religion must have some notion of salvation is ambiguous if not unwarranted. The Christian sense of the term salvation deals generally with deliverance from sin and the effects of sin. Definitions like this cannot be applied cross-culturally because many of the world's religions have no notion of sin yet they are still considered religions. It seems necessary to modify the definition of sin to fit a broader range of religions; salvation as a way or means to lead the full (good) life appears to satisfy this. If this is the case, it would seem that Mencius does describe how one can achieve salvation. "Mencius said, '"Benevolence" means "man". When these are conjoined, the result is "the Way".'" (Mencius 197) "The Way" is the term for the general pattern or order in the universe. One who lives his life according to "the Way" is said to be a gentleman, or the normative ideal for a human being. Humans, according to Mencius, are also born with l!
             atent inclinations on how to behave and act. When these inclinations, or "seeds/sp...