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We were visiting General Yue Fei's tomb in Hangzhou. Hundreds of Chinese tourists were there. It was early October 2008. This was our third trip to the city in ten years, and I was watching people spitting on the kneeling, life sized metal statues of men dead for more than eight centuries. Those metal effigies with their hands tied behind their backs had been traitors.

It may be difficult to understand what honor means to the Chinese if one isn't Chinese. One way to possibly understand the importance of this concept is to examine two of China's historical moral heroes.

General Yue Fei died on January 27, 1142. He was a famous Chinese patriot and military general who fought for the Southern Song Dynasty against the Jurchen armies of the Jin Dynasty. Several, jealous Song ministers lied to the emperor saying that Yue Fei was planning to kill him and take over. The emperor believed these lies and had General Yue Fei executed. When the truth came out, Yue Fei became a model for loyalty in Chinese culture. By spitting on those statues of those ministers that lied, the Chinese honor Yue Fei's memory.

There is another moral hero from China's history. During the Three Kingdoms era (220-265 A.D.) after the fall of the Han Dynasty, there was a long period of civil war. Out of this era came the story of Guan Yu, who was another model for loyalty and righteousness. Guan Yu lived almost eighteen hundred years ago, yet it is easy to find carvings and statues of him in China today. I have bought several hand carved from wood.

It doesn't matter if one is a member of the Communist Party, because role models like Yue Fei and Guan Yu still play an important part in how 'most' Chinese behave and what they believe. Anyone in China holding a position of power is measured against men like Yue Fei and Guan Yu.

To help gain a better understanding of what honor means to the Chinese, here's a link to a piece published in the Los Angeles Times.

In 1935, Lin Yutang wrote, "Face cannot be translated or defined. It is like honor and is not honor. It cannot be purchased with money, and gives a man or a woman a material pride. It is hollow and is what men fight for and what many women die for. It is invisible and yet by definition exits by being shown to the public. It exists in the ether and yet can be heard, and sounds eminently respectable and solid. It is amenable, not to reason but to social convention. It protracts lawsuits, breaks up family fortunes, causes murders and suicides, and yet it often makes man out of a renegade who has been insulted by his fellow townsmen, and it is prized above all earthy possession. It is more powerful than fate and favor, and more respected than the constitution. It often decides a military victory or defeat, and can demolish a whole government ministry. It is that hollow thing which men in China live by." (Lin Yutang, My Country and My People, Halcyon House, New York, NY, 1938, page 200)