FILIAL LOVE

Submitted by:
Gizelle Zeu Alvarez

Jochelle Ann Bondoc

Shalin Catacutan

Renelyn David

Nico Deang

Arces Ruth Dimalanta

Sandrea Escoto

Renalyn Espartero

Louise Danielle Fernando

Lauren Juico

Macro Malonda

Jenica Munar

Frances Quiambao

Nicole Anne Valderrama

Section – 5I

Submitted to:
Ms. Myrna D. Balagtas
 Filial love is the kind of love a child has for its parents. This is, perhaps, a kind of 'root love'.
Loving our parents is a kind of inborn instinct. The parents, being lovable or not, does not matter at all
because the child loves the parents. Filial love is often characterized by a consciousness of 'mine'. It is
commonly known that children are possessive of their toys but they are possessive of their parents as
well.

Through parents, children were born. Filial love comes out from the gratitude towards the parents
who brought their children into the world and let them grow in wisdom and in grace. Love and respect
toward parents fills the home with light and warmth.

According to Colossians 3:20, Children should obey their parents in everything, for this pleases
the Lord. For their own good and of the family, the children should obey their parents and respect should
always be there. They have to honor them, pray for them and make them happy as a way of appreciating
their sacrifices. “The fourth commandment reminds grown children of their responsibilities toward their
parents. As much as they can, they must give them material and moral support in old age and in times of
illness, loneliness, or distress."

In Confucian, Chinese Buddhist and Taoist ethics, filial piety is a virtue of respect for one's
parents, elders, and ancestors. Filial love is related to filial piety which means to be good to one's parents;
to take care of one's parents; to engage in good conduct not just towards parents but also outside the home
so as to bring a good name to one's parents and ancestors; to show love, respect and support; display
courtesy; wisely advise one's parents, including dissuading them from moral unrighteousness; display
sorrow for their sickness and death; to bury them and carry out sacrifices after their death. Filial piety is
indeed central to Confucian role ethics.

According to Chinese tradition, filial piety (hsiao) was the primary duty of all Chinese. Being a
filial son meant complete obedience to one's parents during their lifetime and--as they grew older--taking
the best possible care of them.

Filial piety (孝, xiào) is arguably China's most important moral tenet. A concept of Chinese

philosophy for more than 3,000 years, xiào today entails a strong loyalty and deference to one's parents,
to one's ancestors, by extension, to one's country and its leaders.

The idea follows from the fact that parents give life to their children, and support them
throughout their developing years, providing food, education, and material needs. After receiving all these
benefits, children are thus forever in debt to their parents. In order to acknowledge this eternal debt,
children must respect and serve their parents all their lives.
Beyond the Family

The tenet of filial piety also applies to all elders—teachers, professional superiors, or anyone who
is older in age—and even the state. The family is the building block of society, and as such the
hierarchical system of respect also applies to one's rulers and one's country. Xiào means that the same
devotion and selflessness in serving one's family should also be used when serving one's country.

Thus, filial piety is an important value when it comes to treating one's immediate family, elders
and superiors in general, and the state at large.

Chinese Character Xiao (孝)

The Chinese character for filial piety, xiao (孝), illustrates the term's meaning. The ideogram is a

combination of the characters lao (老), which means old, and er zi (儿子), which means son. Lao is the

top half of the character xiao, and er zi, representing the son, forms the bottom half of the character.

The son below the father is a symbol of what filial piety means. The character xiao shows that the
older person or generation is being supported or carried by the son: thus the relationship between the two
halves is one both of burden and support.

Origins

The character xiao is one of the oldest examples of the written Chinese language, painted onto
oracle bones—oxen scapulae used in divination—at the end of the Shang Dynasty and the beginning of
the Western Zhou dynasty, about 1000 BCE. The original meaning appears to have meant "providing
food offerings to one's ancestors," and ancestors meant both living parents and those long dead. That
intrinsic meaning has not changed in the intervening centuries, but how that is interpreted, both who the
respected ancestors include and the responsibilities of the child to those ancestors, has changed many
times.

In general, filial piety requires children to offer love, respect, support, and deference to their
parents and other elders in the family, such as grandparents or older siblings. Acts of filial piety include
obeying one's parent's wishes, taking care of them when they are old, and working hard to provide them
with material comforts, such as food, money, or pampering.